4GB Upgrade - Worth it?

I have been hunting the net for benchmarks comparing the Santa Rosa MB's with 2GB vs. 4GB. Can't find anything worth a crap. Does anyone know where I can find such data??? Is the 4GB upgrade worth it? I am a moderate user doing a little bit of heavy audio and video editing for fun - nothing crazy though, strictly with iLife08 software. I was just thinking with ram being so low right now it may be the best time to jump on it, especially after the Leopard jump.

I don't think you'll find benchmarks for that. If you use less than 2gb ram then the benchmarks will be identical. I you use more than 2gb then 4gb will be faster because ram is faster than a hard drive for imputting and outputting data. It's completely dependent on how much ram you use.
the only way to tell if you need ram is to use activity monitor (applications/utilities) - or istat menus (you can download it from islayer.com I think) and then look at ram usage. In particular look at the number of pages ins/pages out. If the pages out are more than about 10% of the pages in, then you are running out of ram and the computer is using the hard drive as extra ram. If less than 10% then you're not using up all the ram.
More ram doesn't speed up a computer, it just allows it to do more work simultaneously.
Ram is really cheap though. Crucial.com had a 2gb chip for $99 which is very good.
Good luck

Similar Messages

  • I have a mid 2010 macbook pro with 4GB memory and need to purchase an additional 4 GB.  Do I need to purchase 8GB of memory to upgrade or can a 4GB upgrade be placed next to the existing memory?

    I have a mid 2010 macbook pro with 4GB memory and need to purchase an additional 4 GB to.  Do I need to purchase 8GB of memory to upgrade or can a 4GB upgrade be placed next to the existing memory?

    You need to purchase 8 GBs as two 4 GB modules. Must meet these requirments:
    Maximum Memory
    8.0 GB
    Memory Slots
    2 - 204-pin PC3-8500 (1066 MHz) DDR3 SO-DIMM

  • NB550D - Is RAM and OS upgrade worth it?

    Hi -
    I have got a NB550D and generally pleased but would like to improve performance. Am considering either just an upgrade to 2GB of RAM & leaving with Windows 7 starter or going to 4GB RAM & upgrading to Windows 7 Home Edition but later would cost atleast 70 more & wondering if it is worth it.
    I am not bothered about limitations like desktop & have overcome the DVD playback issues of Windows 7starter but do want the basic system to run quicker. Has anyone done either upgrade & was there a noticeable improvement?
    Separately if I upgrade the OS do i need to reinstall the programs etc?
    Thanks

    Hey,
    Are you not satisfied with the performance of new NB550D or why you want to upgrade it? I mean such netbooks are designed for mobile usage and therefore its great device. Very portable, small and light.
    Usually 2GB RAM is enough for Windows 7 if you dont run 3D games or any high CPU usage programs like video editing or something else.
    Furthermore Im not 100% sure but probably the chipset limitation is 2GB RAM. Did you check the user manual about RAM upgrade?
    Anyway, in opinion its important such RAM upgrade.

  • Macbook from Feb08 w/ 4gb upgrade. Can I download Mavericks?

    I just added 4gb of ram to my Macbook from Feb08. I was contemplating upgrading my OS from Snow Leopard (10.6.8). Any recommendations? I almost bought Lion, but Mavericks is free. However, the first step doesn't include my computer. Are there limitations besides 4gb?

    Is the Mac you're upgrading the late-2007 MacBook? If so, it cannot run Mountain Lion. At most, you can go to Lion.
    I'm running Lion on a machine similar to yours and I like it well enough. I've been contemplating downgrading to Snow Leopard but I've found I don't use it as often anymore and don't need it to be as zippy as it was with SL.
    If this is your primary computer, stick with Snow Leopard. It would be worth buying Lion so you can upgrade in the future, though. At some point, SL will no longer be supported by Apple and third-parties so you'll find that software updates, etc, won't be available.
    You can purchase Lion through this link.
    ~Lyssa

  • Buying a new Macbook Pro for sound design - is the 2.7GHz upgrade worth it?

    Hi everyone,
    I'm in my final year of sound design and I will be using Logic, Max MSP, Traktor, Ableton, Maschine, softsynths, some hardware and large sfx libraries. I will be using this computer as a source of income for the next three years and I'm finding it very difficult making decisions for the upgrade with purchase. I've decided not to go with the retina display as I'm going to be buying a separate monitor/s anyway. I will be getting the 15-inch Macbook Pro.
    Is the upgrade from 2.6 - 2.7GHz worth it? I've decided against SSD at this point as I think I need the capacity more than anything. I could upgrade to SSD in the future if necessary. But I can't decide between the 750GB Serial ATA Drive @ 7200 rpm or the 1TB Serial ATA Drive @ 5400 rpm - should I forgo the 250gig for the 7200 rpm speed? Any advice welcome thanks!

    It depends on whether your productivity is limited by CPU bandwidth. If it is, then you should easily recoup the cost of the upgrade over the life of the machine. If not, you won't.

  • Is OS upgrade worth it?

    Hi all... I'm running OS 10.4.11 on my non-Intel dual 2.3 G5 silver tower w 2 gigs of RAM. Honestly, is it worth it for me to upgrade to 10.5? If "yes" then how far in updating should I go, since I seem to notice people having issues with 10.5.2? Thanks for any-all input.

    Robert Wendel1 wrote:
    Excellent answers, folks. I guess I should have asked: "Did you notice any speed and/or stability increases with 10.5?" The extra features like iLife '08 I'm sure are wonderful, along with "Time Machine" but my speed, stability, and functionality are most important for my Finale/Sibelius/ Digital Performer/ MOTU Symphonic instruments and midi-audio based business.
    Thanks again for the responses! Anyone else have feedback to give?
    My G5 runs faster with Leopard, and also boots and shuts down more quickly. I still have Tiger on my second HD so the comparisons are accurate.
    Ditto with my two MBPs, both of which still boot their original Tigers from the external HD. Again, there is a noticeable speed/performance increase. I don't have the new iLife - the original still works fine. My Epson printers and scanner work just as well as with Tiger and all the 3rd party apps I have that required updating also work fine.
    For me, there is no reason to go back to Tiger except to check it out from time to time and see if there are any updates, etc.
    I also have XP running on both my G5 and my older MBP and am running Vista Ultimate 64-bit on this MBP. Again, all without any problems whatsoever.

  • Processor Upgrade: Worth It?

    I've a QS 933 at home and a 733 at work. I use mostly Adobe apps (Photoshop, Indesign, Illustrator) as well as QuarkXpress. These were o.k. in OS 9 but in X (.4x) It's too slow for comfort.
    I don't want to purchase a new desktop at this point, I'll probably wait to see how the Mactel towers are before any major hardware purchase.
    Will upgrading the processor(s) in my current units give a noticeable increase in the above mentioned apps -- e.g., from 933 to, say, a 1.6 ghz card -- or would the difference be negligible?
    What are the major pitfalls to going to a third party card?
    TIA.
    Quicksilver 933, PB 15" 1.67 Superdrive   Mac OS X (10.4.6)  

    Hi
    I think it's worth considering upgrading the processor in the QS 733 at least, and perhaps swapping the computers over if you need the more powerful one at home.
    Whilst they're not major pitfalls at all, some third party processor cards (primarily 7447 based ones) do require a firmware update, which depending on the upgrade manufacturer may have to be performed via OS 9. Also most come with their own heatsink and fan(s), either in addition to or in place of the existing processor fan, which may increase the noise level slightly. Finally there's also a small amount of risk involved in swapping the cards over, for example, if the screw driver slips when removing the heat sink clips or the card isn't lifted straight up, you could potentially end up damaging the logic board.
    I recently upgraded the processor in my QS and rather than going for a third party card managed to get a dual 1GHz card pulled from another QS. Like your's mine was the base model (733/800MHz without level 3 cache) and the extra processor speed, level 3 cache and second processor have all contributed to a very noticeable speed increase.
    Even if you do eventually get an Intel based Mac, it may be that you need to initially continue using your PowerPC ones for certain applications, either because they're not available as a universal binary or because of the expense of buying newer versions.
    I hope this helps.

  • Are upgrades worth it?

    I am preparing to install 1 gig of RAM and hoping to get iLife 07 (when it comes out) in my Flat Panel iMac 800 running OS 10.4.7, and I noticed on these discussions some information on the graphics card. My graphics card does not support Core Image and the graphics card cannot be replaced. Is it worth the upgrade to do video editing (I also use Final Cut Express 2) or should I save the $200 for memory toward a newer iMac?

    Tim, it is good that you are asking these questions now. As Ian mentions it is always a balancing act where you must weigh the cost of upgrades and their long term value.
    You are looking at $200 in RAM, plus $79 for iLife and $129 for Leopard - over $400 in upgrades to an older machine. If you plan to replace that unit any time soon, then it would seem to not be worth it. If you are going to hold onto that baby until it gives up the ghost or if someone else in the house can make use of it when you do replace it, then it might be worth it.
    Like Ian, if it were my money I would probably save the money towards a new Mac. You can get a mini for not much more than the upgrades you have in mind - just as a monitor.
    it is entirely up to you but you are reaching that point that it is no longer worth it to make any upgrades. If you do choose to add RAM and such, this might be the last upgrade you will make. I would then max out the RAM and leave it at that.

  • Pismo Upgrades Worth It?

    I posted a while back about the same Pismo. It now sits on the table lifeless. When pressing the power button, nothing happens, no ding, ping or grunts. It acted strange for a few days prior to its current state. It would suddenly have the screen go blank like a hot key was used to make it do so. Then it was random whether it would recover from that blank screen. Finally it simply stopped working in the midst of use. The battery is fully charged and was showing AC power as the source when it died. Any ideas on where to start and if it's worth it? I has 10-4-11 installed and a 120 Gig hard drive. had to revert back to the 400 board as the 500 died a while back. 1 GB of RAM. Have had this for almost a decade and truly would like to keep it going. Rumor has it a new aluminum is on the way for Christmas, but still would like the Pismo as backup. Thanks for any input.

    Richard,
    Intrigued by your question I went to eBay and just put in Pismo in the search bar. I had to change the display order to "Price + Shipping Highest first" in order to get past the batteries and panoply of pismo related items and get to what I really wanted to know. How much are people asking for upgraded pismos? Well, it looks like around $650 for a g4 550 pismo with a large hard drive and airport and dvd burner. That is more than I expected frankly. Considering that I recently bought a 2 year old Macbook Pro for $911 it seems like a stretch to ask so much for a computer that, even though it is pretty cool, is still 8 years old!
    That being said, I love my pismo and would probably ask more than I should if I were to sell it.
    So, I guess the question comes back to you, how badly to you want your pismo back? You can probably get it to run again with a $30 logic board. If you look on that same list I found you can find the whole bottom case for $64 and a whole new display for $34! That's a $100 pismo (excluding shipping of course). You might consider putting in a bid on a working machine and swapping out parts until you get the one you like.
    Two years ago I had a dead pismo, it would light up the caps lock and number lock but that was it. It was the logic board and I was lucky to find one for as low as $65. Now they're half that amount, "TESTED!".
    I knew I was going to the third world and wanted a tough machine that didn't have a lot of street value so I opted to fix it and upgrade it via Daystar. They did the logic board swap and the g4 upgrade and also gave me a nice flannel keyboard cover that I'm still using 2 years later! It was, all said and done, around $500 at the time.
    Now you can go to Wegenermedia.com and order a g4 550 daughter card for $200 (after you get a core refund for sending in your old one, I wonder if you could get more for sending in the 500mhz and the 400mhz!?). Of course you could send yours in and get it done for $239 (plus shipping both ways).
    So, assuming you have a decent display and hard drive, optical drive etc you could have a hot rod pismo for about
    Logic board ($40) + Upgrade ($200). That is assuming we are right about the logic board. I did read our friend's post from Australia who votes for replacing your power control board. I saw those on ebay ranging from $10 - $30 plus shipping.
    Again, this is assuming you do all the work yourself. If you pay someone else to do it then you're in for more but you get a guaranteed working machine (well, at least a warranteed machine!)
    Hope this helps you put things into perspective.
    John

  • So many apps upgrades worth nothing for us in saudi arabia

    hi guys
    here in saudi arabia we tried to upgrade our apps to newest but it worths nothing because our Providers of the service, and the Authority... most of Official RIM apps dose not work without WIFI ... we try to contact our provider to solve this problems but there is no solution ... they support IPHONE and its stuff no any support for blackberry and blackberry's Official apps
    what should we do ???? we try to find solution but we cant
    what should RIM do >>??? you should do a lot of things to force our provider .... RIM dose not sell just only phones they sell also there service that not working here BOLD 9900 cost about 600$ and its not have service equal to its Price
    should we move to IPHONE????

    berryarab wrote:
    should we move to IPHONE????
    I would take Ronbob's advice before I would move to iPhone. 
    - If my response has helped you, please click "Options" beside my post and mark it as solved. Clicking the "thumbs up" icon near the bottom of my response would also be appreciated.

  • 4GB Upgrade from Crucial only recognising 2GB

    HI - I've just upgraded my 17" 2.4GHz MBP from 2GB to 4GB using the 2x2GB upgrade pack from Crucial. Problem is that my MBP is only recognising 2GB of it. When I open up 'About This Mac' and click 'More Info' the memory section is telling me that I have 2x1GB sticks installed. I've pulled the sticks and swapped them around ad I've checked that they do actually have 2GB printed on each stick.
    Is this a MBP problem or have I bought dodgy RAM ? I'm running Leopard 10.5.1.
    Thanks.

    Yours is the 3rd post I've seen in the last 2 days where a Crucial 2gb sodimm is showing as a single 1gb.
    It looks like Crucial have accidentally labelled some 1gb sodimms as 2gb.
    Crucial ram is usually excellent quality. I'd get in touch with them and get the ram swapped out, but also point them to this forum so they can look up the other two cases. Seems like a major error on their part.
    Best of luck.
    Message was edited by: Rajesh Sharma

  • Lost text messages, slow and apps that crash. Is upgrade worth it on a 3G?

    Upgrade was slow and interupted. Finally everything seemed ok but then I found I'd lost all my text messages.
    Can anyone help me get them back please?
    Once over this shock I realised the only big change seemed to be to the folders - utilities etc - and the new look mail app. Both ok mail more so but nothing incredible.
    Then the worst thing of all. The phone seems so slow. Big delay in accepting input actions like 'done' etc. Then my safari app crashed - on an apple page! Then iPod app crashed. Am only using about 6gb of my 16!
    Is it worth it? Can I revert to os3? If so how?
    Oh and finally when I'm typing this- in landscape mode- I can't even see the words I'm typing as the screen constantly jumps to 4 lines above the new text? Typing blind is not good at all.
    Thanks for any answers to above.
    Paul

    Salmon81 wrote:
    Hi Butch,
    Thank you very much for your help. Strong case you put forward!
    Just wondering, if your iMac is about the same age, have you noticed any slowing down at all since updating everything? Do you find LR3 with Snow Leopard runs quicker on your iMac than LR1 did with 10.4?
    Thanks again.
    Best wishes.
    I find it runs quicker and more responsive for most tasks ... but LR3 adds some new features that that use more computing power, while it isn't what I would consider slow, it didn't increase speed dramatically though it is very stable and consistent ... I've had no crashes or problems and LR3 runs as well as LR2.6 did for me.
    I should also note that my catalog is on the startup drive, my image files are on external FW800 drives. I think this helps keep things flowi smoothly. I also try to keep the use of too many other apps to a minimum when I am working a high volume shoot in LR, like a large event or wedding ... this keeps as many resources available to LR as possible.
    On the other hand, PSCS5 64 bit on 10.6 flies compared to PSCS3 on 10.4.

  • Is the better NVIDIA GeForce GTX 780M 4GB GDDR5 worth it?

    Just a year ago, having 2GB of video ram was considered pretty massive.  Now we can upgrade the standard iMac to this 4GB card (when ordering new).  Wondering if anyone has any views about whether or not I will notice any benefit in real world rather than benckmark tests, compared to the 775m card.  I will be using Final Cut Pro X, Photoshop, Aperture and some other graphics stuff, but no gaming to speak of and no 3D rendering.

    I take your point about future needs, but at the same time, if the 2GB card was the top end just a year ago, then I wonder if the faster card makes a real difference at all. 
    Mende1, I'm saying that I will be using all those apps snf I'm using them all for my work, so seroius work, but can't ever imagine editing 4k video and no 3d rendering.  I will edit in 1920 HD though.

  • KT7 Pro MS6330 V1.4(?) 750-1200 Mhz Athlon cpu upgrade worth it?

    Hi
    I’m not experienced at any modifications except adding RAM!
    I have looked at the discussions in the “Retired Intel/AMD” forum and am beginning to have second thoughts about all this but just wanted a definitive answer from the experts please!
    I have a K7T Pro MS6330 board with BIOS version 1.4, (is that reeeally old?) according to the bootup screen and a AMD Athlon 750Mhz processor. I haven’t yet looked at which board  version I have…. The manual says an upgrade “to 900Mhz or above”.
    Having checked the AMD & MSI’s sites I believe can upgrade the CPU to a Athlon 1.2Ghz providing the board has a v1.6 or later BIOS.   So far so good.   I’m not sure which bios update I should use. Can I use the latest version available i.e version 3.6 or only version 1.6 ?. Apart from a new fan/cooler will I need a different power supply?  What else might I need to install?
    If I shouldn’t tackle all this what would be the highest rated Athlon I could use with the current BIOS? If it’s say a 950 Mhz & fan (but no PSU change ) would it really be worth it for an extra 150Mhz?   The system’s used for word processing, surfing, some gaming but not much else.   I really wanted to upgrade before the motherboard’s too old.
    I’m also concerned about the warning: “It is risky to update BIOS manually. We don't recommend the beginner-users to do so”
    Any advice gratefully received!
    Thanks for your time
    H

    http://www.msi.com.tw/program/support/cpu_support/cpu/spt_cpu_detail.php?UID=97%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20&NAME=MS-6330
    are cpu you can use
    3.5 was last actually relevant to your board bits in 3.6 will never effect you
    follow directions and you will be fine
    if using ntfs on drives get none fat 32 method
    http://www.msi.com.tw/program/support/bios/bos/spt_bos_detail.php?UID=97%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20&NAME=MS-6330
    http://www.msi.com.tw/program/support/bios/bos/spt_bos_detail.php?UID=97%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20&NAME=MS-6330

  • Satellite M200 doesn't boot after RAM 4GB upgrade

    Hi,
    I recently upgraded my RAM just to speed things up a little as RAM is soo cheap these days.
    I have a M200 T2130 Vista came with 1GB (2*512) sticks.
    The new sticks are 2 *2GB Dane-elec DDR2 pc2-5300, when I put the two in and rebooted the hard drive light came on briefly and then it just stayed idol, no POST, Bios options.
    I tried using a single 512 stick with both new sticks and they both work in a 2.5GB setup just not together also this only works when the 512 stick is in the more internal slot and not the other way around.
    So if anyone has had a similar prob or can give me some advice that would be great, I'm not to sure if the motherboard can support 4GB?
    Thanks, Dave.

    Hi
    There are two possibilities why your M200 doesnt boot after the RAM upgrade.
    Firstly the installed RAM could be not compatible or could be faulty or the notebook doesnt support the 4GB RAM.
    I dont know what M200 do you have exactly but you could check the installed chipset and could check on the Intel page if this chipset would support the 4GB RAM.
    Greets

Maybe you are looking for