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Best Non-Apple Brand RAM for New Mac Mini

W

wrxcrystal06

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Oct 23, 2010
1
0
Hello,

I recently purchased the new mac mini from Best Buy: http://www.bestbuy.com/site/Apple&#...200370733&skuId=9952305&st=mac mini&cp=1&lp=1 Unfortunately they had no option to upgrade the units RAM, so for now I am stuck with the standard 2gb.

My question to you would be my best option out there for cheap RAM. My preference would be either a single 4gb stick or to 4gb sticks to get me to 8gb. In full I am looking to spend no more than $300 dollars, but want to have the best performance possible. Unfortunately the Apple branded RAM is a little too steep for me at this time: http://store.apple.com/us/memorymodel/ME_2_4_MACMINI (8gb in particular), and I would hate to get two 2gb sticks and have to re-purchase everything again when I decide to go to 8gb in the future.

I am a little newer to RAM and do not know what to look for. Any advice or guidance is greatly appreciate!
 
Samsung is good, Kingston is good. My advice would be to go with newegg.com. I always just check the reviews for previous buyers that have similar mac models.
Also, I would stick to matched pairs. It will run on unmatched pairs but performance is comprimised a bit whne you have more stuff open. As the upper section of ram will be half speed becuase it is only on one of the chips. This is true of all dual channel memory rigs since forever.
 
RAM, one stick at a time

Buy RAM that is known to be compatible. Kingston is good.
So are several others. Make sure whoever you buy it from
has a good return policy. Also, you can upgrade you RAM
one stick at a time.
 
Hellhammer said:
However, the 3rd party RAM is not covered by Apple
Click to expand...

Which is why I took the advise of somone on this forum and kept the original Apple RAM and if I ever have to take it in for warranty I can pop the original RAM back in.
 
b-rad g said:
Which is why I took the advise of somone on this forum and kept the original Apple RAM and if I ever have to take it in for warranty I can pop the original RAM back in.
Click to expand...

The other advantage of keeping your original RAM is that it's great for troubleshooting problems. If the computer starts acting up, it's often a good idea to remove the 3rd party RAM and reinstall the Apple RAM. If the problem goes away, the 3rd party RAM is at fault. If the problem remains, it's not RAM related.
 
Great advice

mchalebk said:
The other advantage of keeping your original RAM is that it's great for troubleshooting problems. If the computer starts acting up, it's often a good idea to remove the 3rd party RAM and reinstall the Apple RAM. If the problem goes away, the 3rd party RAM is at fault. If the problem remains, it's not RAM related.
Click to expand...

Great advice on keeping the original RAM and you will not get anything for it by selling 1GB modules anyway. If you ship it back it will likely come up even on what you get vs. the shipping costs.
 
wrxcrystal06 said:
My question to you would be my best option out there for cheap RAM. My preference would be either a single 4gb stick or to 4gb sticks to get me to 8gb. In full I am looking to spend no more than $300 dollars, but want to have the best performance possible.
Click to expand...

the best reviewed by far.....

http://www.crucial.com/store/listparts.aspx?model=Mac mini (Intel Core 2 Duo 2.4GHz) DDR3 - Mid 2010&pl=Apple&cat=RAM

http://www.crucial.com/store/mpartspecs.aspx?mtbpoid=AF55B68FA5CA7304
 
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