Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Hardware, Apple, Macbook Pro, MacBook
New MacBooks and MBPs can handle up to 6GB of RAM
Is it just me or is it pretty mindblowing what Moore's Law is doing to our computers these days? I remember when 64mb of RAM was great, and even a few years ago, I wondered why anyone would ever use 1GB of RAM (I've got 2GB in my gaming PC, and I still almost think it's too much). But apparently TidBITS has been doing some testing, and they've discovered that not only can the new MacBooks hold 4GB of RAM as Apple recommends for a limit, but stuffing a whopping 6GB in there is possible and doable. There are two DDR3 slots in the new MacBooks and MacBook Pros, and they come with either 1GB or 2GB in each DIMM slot.TidBITS says you can switch out one of those 2GB DIMMs for a 4GB, and voilà, as long as they're the same speed and type, apparently almost everything is hunky-dory. TidBITS says there are two drawbacks: one, that dual-channel architecture requires identical DIMMs, so that's out if you're running a 4GB and 2GB configuration. Plus, it'll cost you an arm and a leg, especially if your leg is priced at around $600, which is what a 4GB stick runs. Even the DDR2 is pricey at that level (then again, if you don't like memory prices, just wait about five minutes, because that's basically how often they change).
And for some reason, there's an issue with running two 4GB sticks in there (for a total of 8GB), but TidBITS surmises that may be fixed by the time Snow Leopard rolls around. Personally, I'd love to see a program that needs 6GB of RAM -- maybe a high end 3D modeler or a financial simulator of some kind. But it's good to know that if you really need that much memory (and have the cash to spend on it), there you go.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
jpf said 3:15PM on 11-03-2008
I have a late-07 MBP with 4GB RAM, and I use all of it almost every day. Working in Eclipse, with Photoshop, VMWare Fusion running XP, Safari, Firefox, plus iTunes, Mail, Adium, etc. -- I hit the ceiling all the time. Who knew web development would be so demanding?
With 6GB I could probably keep from swapping. This is food for upgrade thought. Although that is pretty expensive.
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Brian Sexton said 3:30PM on 11-03-2008
Nice. Unfortunately, even 4GB of PC3-8500 for the new MacBooks is rather expensive.
Joseph said 7:59PM on 11-03-2008
Even Santa Rosa MBP support 6GB. Can't put a price on productivity. Actually if you did put a price on it, it would pay for itself in a couple days max.
Greggsymington said 3:19PM on 11-03-2008
WOW. Have you guys been sleeping for a week???? Old news.
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Jinto said 5:00PM on 11-03-2008
And what are the Apple sites you frequent? Many don't go to all of them, or even part of them. This is the only Apple site I happen to like, besides the apple news that ends up on Lifehacker and Engadget. So it's, "News to me."
erik@netlog.se said 4:55PM on 11-03-2008
I can use up 4gb of memory al the time no problem so 6 or 8 would be great
Erik Ahrsjo
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Brian Sexton said 3:27PM on 11-03-2008
It is not likely to be a question of need, but there are plenty of applications that could make good use of 6GB of RAM, whether individually or within the greater context of a system with 6GB total RAM. In addition to 3D, video and virtualization seem likely to be among them. As a Web and Flash developer, I would love to be able to offer 1GB to 2GB to each virtual machine (e.g., Windows XP and Ubuntu 8.10, which may be running simultaneously) while reserving 2GB for the host system.
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sonicwind said 3:53PM on 11-03-2008
"Personally, I'd love to see a program that needs 6GB of RAM" There's always someone who says something like that. Just because you don't need it or want it doesn't mean you're the golden standard for the world. Virtual machines need just as much memory as a dedicated machine to run well. There are all kinds of other applications that require a lot of memory. I'd like to run multiple virtual machines at the same time for N-tiered app development. What I really need is a terabyte of memory. Nobody will ever need more than that. (rolls eyes).
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Tomahawk said 4:13PM on 11-03-2008
I have to agree, my machine goes to a crawl when I run three VM's at the same time within Fusion, but then again I only have 2GB's of RAM.
Luigi193 said 3:54PM on 11-03-2008
Yeah, 4GB is perfect for me! That was one of the main reasons I upgraded my Intel Core Duo First Generation bottom of the line early 2006 White macbook, due to its 2gb limit! That and the battery not working, the charger sparking, and pink discoloration!
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Brent Schmidt said 3:57PM on 11-03-2008
lmao, great tag with the moore's-law
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Ian said 4:37PM on 11-03-2008
The 6GB limit, while odd sounding, is not surprising or unprecedented. Recall that that the early Core 2 Duo MacBooks had a 3GB limit:
http://blogs.zdnet.com/Apple/?p=321
Despite the story about memory management, some believe that this is simply a functionality cap to protect future products against competing against upgrading old hardware.
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Joseph said 8:04PM on 11-03-2008
or that the system cannot support more than 8GB of ram and with a discrete graphics card taking up 128, 256 or 512, the next highest configuration was 4 + 2 aka 6gb.
Joergen Geerds said 12:43PM on 11-04-2008
It seems that the old specs of 3GB for 2007 models is also not completely accurate. I just stuffed 2x2GB in my 24" iMac that was supposed to only support 3GB, and it works without a glitch. Now I wonder what's going to happen if I try more: a 4GB PC2-5300 SO-Dimm is only $56 (according to dealram.com)
Jeff said 5:31PM on 11-03-2008
this will be a funny article to look back on even just 2 years from now.
"I've got 2GB in my gaming PC, and I still almost think it's too much"
hahah classic.
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grifmx said 5:54PM on 11-03-2008
Virtual instruments and orchestral sample libraries eat GBs of RAM for breakfast!
I've easily hit the wall with 8GB of RAM on my old Mac Pro. I hope that every computer Apple updates can fit more RAM in it. (8 GB Mac MINI - please!)
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Ed said 6:33PM on 11-03-2008
"640k ought to be enough for anybody"
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ianlive said 9:07PM on 11-03-2008
Nice!
Jesse said 6:50PM on 11-03-2008
It's a classic trade-off familiar to computer science folk: the time-memory trade off. Usually, the memory footprint is reduced at the cost of performance and conversely, performance is improved at the cost of memory use. Luckily, RAM is plentiful and cheap nowadays. No use in having 4GB of RAM if you aren't going to do anything with it. I sure wish I had an extra 2GB to play with in my Perl bioinformatics script.
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studio said 7:10PM on 11-03-2008
well i have 4gb in mine and am waiting for something to render in after effects as we speak i need a laptop as i travel around and need lots of ram for my video work
if when snow leopard hits we get support for 8gb of ram i will upgrade
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