512 mb ram to 2 gig worth upgrade? - Page 2

my info is ALL over the web. 533 doesnt outperform 667 in any way. but the 667 really doesnt perform all that much better than the 533.

my point was simply get what the OPer can get. i went ahead with the 667 cause i got it for a steal. 533 will not hurt the laptop in any way, and no one will ever notice the difference. the bottleneck in these machines these days is not the ram anyways, its the HD's.

a gig should cover it.

I suppose it's a matter of perspective... I've built enough systems and with the jobs I do, I see the difference even without running benchmark software. OTOH, the performance gain is small. It's like comparing the 2GHz Core Duo CPU to the 2.16 version -- most people will never notice a difference unless they actually compare benchmarks. In general use situations, nobody is going to know - you're right. But when the system is given a task like rendering out animation frames or transcoding video from HDCAM to DVCPROHD formats, or other such stuff I do all day long, every little bit of performance helps.


Yep, it won't hurt the laptop in any way... Most people won't know the difference, but there's always freaks like me.


Unless of course your system is grinding away on a task that doesn't hit the drives much or at all. But for most people under general use, 99% of all their waiting on their system is when they load applications or files, provided they have enough RAM where the computer isn't swapping out to disk all the time.

I'm probably about the only one on these forums that even thinks about stuff this way. I have an extreme overclocker attitude and approach to most of my workhorse systems as every little bit counts for something. Animation sequences that take days to render across multiple systems can see huge savings in time / money (less downtime while we wait for results, faster turn-arounds, etc..) by simply adding a few MHz. I'll shut up now...

no no, i agree with you applied visual, i buy the high speed stuff for the same reasons you do, to do it once and only once.

but most of my suggestions on here are for " the avg user" so i simply said get what he can get, in this situation.

a lot of the time on my macbook, the hard drive is almost taking off its so busy

Yeah the G.Skill, Buffalo Select and Patriot memory are all right about $100 per 1GB module. They all seem to be getting good reviews. I noticed that newegg has 1GB G.Skill modules listed as open-box for $69.99 and that may be a good deal if they have more than just one of them and will still offer a return if they're defective.

got my patriot 1gb 667 for 75$ shipped on special from NE. LOOKED it up the other day, and damn, 112$!!!

He forgot to specify one thing - at standard TIMINGS there won't be a difference. Currently, the 4/4/4/12 533 ram is just as fast as the 5/5/5/16 667 ram; thanks to the timings. Now, if you could find a stick that matched the 533 ram, you would plaster it silly. But until then, they really are the same bandwidth wise.

I can't really say much about 1 gig or 1.5 gig compared to 2 gig, but it certainly is an improvement over a half gig!
Yes, as others have said, if you're planning on using Parallels, get 2 gig. I get no hit on performance in OS X while Parallels is running.
Get it from newegg and install yourself. Make sure you have a set of precision screwdrivers (phillips size #00) to unscrew the itsy bitsy teeny little screws.

i foudn the several phillips size #00 didnt work. i had to go back to sears 2x befoe i bought the one i needed. some just didnt fit the head of the screws.

but hey, i got a blue screwdriver now

why not just buy a kit of small screw drivers a la radioshack?