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Adding RAM

S

SHydroxide

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jul 22, 2005
8
0
Hi there,

I'd like to add some RAM to my 17" MBP SR; I was going to throw in 3GB of Corsair Mac RAM, but I've heard that the benefit of the extra GB is going to be negated by losing the Dual Channel addressing.

Now, I figure I'll just put in 4GB, then, so I should get dual channel addressing and more RAM and everything should be happy.

My question is what type of RAM do I need to add, exactly? Near as I can figure, I need PC2-5300 SODIMMs, would a pair of these be fine? How close do the sticks have to match to take advantage of dual channelness (I remember buying kits in the past for my desktop setups that had uber-matched sticks or whatever; that may have been a marketing gimmick to better separate me from my monies)?

Thanks!
 
SHydroxide said:
Hi there,

I'd like to add some RAM to my 17" MBP SR; I was going to throw in 3GB of Corsair Mac RAM, but I've heard that the benefit of the extra GB is going to be negated by losing the Dual Channel addressing.

Now, I figure I'll just put in 4GB, then, so I should get dual channel addressing and more RAM and everything should be happy.

My question is what type of RAM do I need to add, exactly? Near as I can figure, I need PC2-5300 SODIMMs, would a pair of these be fine? How close do the sticks have to match to take advantage of dual channelness (I remember buying kits in the past for my desktop setups that had uber-matched sticks or whatever; that may have been a marketing gimmick to better separate me from my monies)?

Thanks!
Click to expand...

Unless CanadaRam comes on and corrects me, the additional GB will vastly outweigh the dual channel benefit. I read a benchmark report on 'dual channel' gains. I was populating my MP for optimum rendering/compression. I was upgrading from 4GB to >= 8GB. The consensus opinion was that the optimum dual channel benefits were < 5%, perhaps it was lower. I did not commit the actual amount to memory. It seemed too insignificant.

There is a definite benefit for every incremental memory increase between 512MB and 4GB. But, it is not linear. The gain from 512MB - 1GB is huge. 1GB-2GB is also a very noticeable increase. The next two jumps, from 2GB-3GB and 3GB-4GB, is most noticeable at the application level. It will make a big difference for some, and very little for others. This is likely to change soon. Anyone that is, or expects to, run sophisticated applications, will require significant RAM.
 
It's ok. That deal at Fry's for the OCZ 2GB sticks was too delicious to pass up, so I ordered 2 and will get the best of both worlds. Thanks for your help, though, guys!
 
flopticalcube said:
XBench and 3dmark06 would be good. And GeekBench.
Click to expand...

Will do, from stock to 4GB. The Mac won't mind if I add this RAM later, will it? This is my first one after using Windoze for the last bazillion years, and I'd usually format after adding RAM.
 
Goddammit.

Fry's cancelled my order, stating that they cannot export that RAM (no reason why).

Anywhere else I can find some RAM? Google is being surprisingly unhelpful.
 
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