iMac RAM/GPU Question (Uk)

[Robert Grant]

Hi guys, I am hoping to purchase the high end 27" iMac (i7) when Apple refresh the iMacs (hopefully soon).

I am thinking about upgrading the RAM to 12GB having recently seen a post by Hellhammer saying that you can combine 2 x 4GB with 2 x 2GB.

If I were to just buy the iMac from Apple without any RAM upgrades then I get the 2 x 2GB modules leaving me to find a suitable vendor for the 2 x 4GB. Crucial RAM sells the 2 x 4GB modules for £386.56.

Or, with Apple I could custom order the iMac with 2 x 4GB modules for £320. I could then buy the extra 2 x 2GB modules off of Crucial for £92 to add up to 12GB in total.

Option A (non Apple) comes to £386.56

Option B (with Apple) comes £412.

So it seems a no brainer to buy outside of Apple but I was wondering if there are any other cheaper sites for iMac RAM than Crucial. I have always though that Apple RAM was horrificly overpriced although in this case it's not that much extra.

To the GPU side of things: I was wondering what people's thoughts are on the possibility of there being 1GB of dedicated RAM in a future iMac graphics card?

Thanks for reading.

 

[Hellhammer]

eBuyer has 4GB modules for 145£ each

I really hope Apple uses 1GB as the res in iMac is so great that the VRAM would help. Up to Apple though, usually they bitch about VRAM

 

[Robert Grant]

Wow awesome thanks for that. I can get the high end i7 model with a 1TB HD (all I need) for £1470 with a student discount + the £290 for the RAM too is £1760.

Not bad for an awesome piece of kit with 12GB RAM.

And yeh I was reading a thread in the laptops forum comparing a Macbook Pro to a Sony laptop of equal cost and even they had 1GB of VRAM - hopefully Apple will sort it.

 

[Hellhammer]

Wow awesome thanks for that. I can get the high end i7 model with a 1TB HD (all I need) for £1470 with a student discount + the £290 for the RAM too is £1760.

Not bad for an awesome piece of kit with 12GB RAM.

And yeh I was reading a thread in the laptops forum comparing a Macbook Pro to a Sony laptop of equal cost and even they had 1GB of VRAM - hopefully Apple will sort it.

Amount of VRAM doesn't matter if the GPU itself sucks. E.g. 330M can't take advantage of 512MB thus there is no difference between the 256MB and 512MB model. In most cases, the amount of VRAM is just to scam people, make them think that the amount is the key for good performance. E.g. ATI 5450 (entry level desktop chip) has 1GB of DDR3 but I doubt it can even use 256MB of it!