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Maxing out memory on iMac (2011)

Hi guys,

I have a late 2009 imac ( I have to verify but the box is put way at the moment)

I have a 27" Quad core with 4GB Ram. I would more. I work with some highend CAD applications and illustrator to make some layouts for presentation and I noticed the sometimes 4GB its just not enough.

I was on newegg looking at ram. From reading here I can get DD3 @ 1333 and it should work, and also from reading on this thread if its true all imac can take up to 32GB I should be able to get two 8GB dims and have 16GB + the already 4GB installed is this correct? .. edit YIKES 8GB is very expensive.

Okay, so ill get a 8GB kit. lol ;)

Either way, the question is, on Newegg there is Crucial and Corsair mac memory. How is this memory different from the other ram. Would you recommend the mac ram over the other kind?

Thank you. :apple:
 
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32GB of RAM can be installed on
An iMac mid-2011. The iMac itself comes with a standard 4GB module (2x2) and the iMac has another 2 slots free, so you can max it to 4 x 8GB RAM modules. But I would suggest getting another 8GB (2x4) RAM module and make it 12GB of RAM. Any higher and it will get too expensive, as justified by someone else earlier.
 
thank you.
yeah that sounds like a good idea.


Can someone recommend a brand? is the corsair mac ram any good?
 
27" iMac RAM configuration question

Buying four 4gb chips is a lot cheaper than buying two 8gb. If I want 16gb total, is there an advantage to using larger chips and only 2 slots in the iMac, or will I get the same results with the cheaper, 4-chip option?
 
wanted to say the corsair ram I have bought it quite nice. The machine is very quick (it always was for some reason). But yes happy with the ram. 3dsmax and other applications are very very happy.
 
Memory

16 gigs? I use it frequently.

I do very large music productions, sometimes into the hundreds of tracks with lots of software synthesizers and sometimes dozens and dozens of guitar tracks.

If I could max this one out to 32 gigs (Late 2009 Corei7 model) I probably would.
 
I just booted up my refurbished stock iMac 27" i5 2.7 that came today and it has 8 gigs of memory using two 4 gig DIMMs. I'm glad I didn't order memory before I got it. That would have been an extra $200 from the Apple Store.

My refurbished Macbook Pro came with more memory and a larger HD than advertised.

Lucked out again!
 
fastlanephil said:
I just booted up my refurbished stock iMac 27" i5 2.7 that came today and it has 8 gigs of memory using two 4 gig DIMMs. I'm glad I didn't order memory before I got it. That would have been an extra $200 from the Apple Store.

My refurbished Macbook Pro came with more memory and a larger HD than advertised.

Lucked out again!
Click to expand...

I can't believe that Apple would mess up on something they make one of their greatest profits on. Not calling anyone liar, simply shocked and surprised.

Do I use my 16GB of RAM when I am browsing on Chrome and using iTunes? No!

Do I use my 16GB of Ram when I have Premiere Pro, After Effects, Photo Shop, Parallels, Chrome and iTunes open? Yes!
 
MR.Raul said:
It's not officially supported.
But don't even go there unless you wanna throw your money into the lake, not even to 16, cause if you ask what benefits, you most likely don't need it.
I'd recommend you to buy an extra 8 to your current 4 and make it a total of 12, if you even need that.
Click to expand...

Agree! That's what I did and now have 12GB - more than I will ever need, but it was cheap, so why not.
 
Glen Quagmire said:
Bit narrow minded, aren't you? Perhaps other people do things that you don't do.
Click to expand...

The bottom line is use your 'Activity Monitor' (it's in your 'utilities' folder) and leave that open while you do all the stuff you normally do with your mac, including some really intensive things.

If, for instance, it never ends up showing more than 5 out of 8 gigs being used, then you most certainly don't need additional ram. Getting more won't make damn bit of difference.

However, if Activity Monitor often shows you nearing, or maxing out on ram, why then you most certainly would be a good candidate for getting more ram.

Simple as that. :)

----------
desantii said:
Just added two 8gb simms so now have 24mb ram.. 8+8 + 4 + 4
Click to expand...

Wow, what do you do on your Mac? Also, when you do what you do, have you ever run Activity Monitor to see how much of that ram you're actually using?

I'm just curious.
 
Man, you people are getting your prices all messed up. Does anyone even do research before typing?

Apple officially only supports up to 16 GB of RAM in the iMac. I have a late model 2009 i7 iMac, and currently have stock 4 GB total (2GBx2) . I am replacing it with 4 GB chips (4GBx4). I JUST purchased them last week on newegg, for $100 total. 16 GB for $100. And they are Crucial. Not sure where people come up with their inflated prices. I laughed out loud at the $2,000 comment. I laughed even harder at the 8GB for $800 comment. RAM has dropped considerably in the last few months.
 
I have 16Gb in my iMac 21.5 and I can say I don't break 4Gb on normal everyday uses. I could have got away with only have 4Gb or 8Gb but the price point for 16Gb (Corsair 4x 4Gb) was cheap enough to bite for me. Now 32Gb or 8Gb sticks were/are still a bit costly.

I don't do photo, music, or movie stuff on my iMac just not my thing. I'm a application / web(Backend) Developer. I try to keep all my stuff small, quick, and easy on resources. The only time I used up 16Gb of ram was when I used the wrong search pattern which at that time it use all 16Gb..lol.

So my advice is put what you can afford into the machine. If your needs right now only requires half of what you buy then you have room for future proofing. I also learn that soon as you do need it the price goes up because the companies move on making the newer stuff. Had that problem with DDR1 ram a while back on another machine. Kicking my self for not getting while it was way cheaper.

FYI
Ram I used: Corsair
I got two sets for for 16Gb paid $85 shipped

If I would have did 32Gb of ram it would have been around $325.
 
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Subish said:
I also learn that soon as you do need it the price goes up because the companies move on making the newer stuff. Had that problem with DDR1 ram a while back on another machine. Kicking my self for not getting while it was way cheaper.
Click to expand...

All the various technologies go through a price cycle where the start expensive, reach a bottom, and then after they are discontinued (only existing stock is sold) the prices shoot up. I had a computer in the mid 90's that when I went to add RAM the type it used was discontinued and it was actually cheaper for me to replace the motherboard, processor and buy new ram than the cost of the upgrade RAM alone!
 
[/COLOR]
Subish said:
So my advice is put what you can afford into the machine. If your needs right now only requires half of what you buy then you have room for future proofing.
Click to expand...

With all due respect, I think the whole argument for buying tons of ram now to 'future proof' your machine is nonsense.

1) In a year or so, if you find out you really do need the ram, you can buy it then - it almost surely will be cheaper then anyway.

2) if we're talking the more extended future (3-5 years), the mac's comparatively slow processor, hard drive, bus and everything else will make your mac way out of date, not matter how much useless ram it has in it.
 
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Im assuming I can have a 4 x 4 2 x 2 totalling 12 Ram? Would there be any problems?
 
Anyone got any tests?

Does anyone have any actual tests to demonstrate the difference some extra ram makes with the latest imacs?

I mean I'm sure it has minimal impact on surfing and general computing needs. But, what about taking a 500 meg photoshop file and having it run through a bunch of edits. how does does that take with 8, 16 ,32 gigs of ram? How long to rip a blue ray to MP4 etc.

I'd really like some hard numbers on what difference that makes. All I can ever find is comparisons of stock units from apple. Here we the baseline mid-range and caddy of imacs and here is how they stack up against the previous gen. But, never details on how much ram actually helps.

Just generalizations like "I can tell its faster" which yea thats nice but not really helpful when determining how much of a ram upgrade is worth getting.
 
MrEddy said:
Does anyone have any actual tests to demonstrate the difference some extra ram makes with the latest imacs?
Click to expand...
The difference will depend on what memory demands are placed on a system at any given point in time. It's not just the editing of a large image or ripping or encoding one movie, but it's a combination of everything running on that system at one point in time, including all apps/processes/widgets. The best you can do is check your own RAM usage to see if you'd benefit from an increase.

Launch Activity Monitor and click the System Memory tab at the bottom to check your page outs. Page outs are cumulative since your last restart, so the best way to check is to restart your computer and track page outs under your normal workload (the apps, browser pages and documents you normally would have open). If your page outs are significant (say 1GB or more) under normal use, you may benefit from more RAM. If your page outs are zero or very low during normal use, you probably won't see any performance improvement from adding RAM.

Mac OS X: Reading system memory usage in Activity Monitor
 
I have been running 12 GB (2x2 + 2x4) since I got my 2.7 i5 27" in Aug. However, I notice that I leave a lot of Safari tabs open, keep iTunes running all the time for ATV2 access, and have AirPrint and ScanSnap running all the time along with DEVONThink Pro, Mail, and DayMap and iCal. I often launch iPhoto too. None of this is Pro use, no video or photo editing or anything high end. But I get up to 10+GB or more used and sometimes start seeing Virtual Memory usage and Page Outs. I do have a lot of other things running like Dropbox, TotalFinder, Default Folder X, iTeleport Connect, etc., but I think the multiple Safari pages with multi tabs each is the main culprit.

I find that Mission Control gets jerky and unresponsive with so much running. I am thinking of getting 2 more 4 GB sticks (currently $57) to go to 16 GB total, but would love to get 2 8 GB sticks for a total 24. However, that's another $123 in cost over the 4 GB sticks. I'm sure the 16 total would give me enough to get away from that near max I hit now, and I should just keep an eye on my activity and reboot more, however, I hate the idea of spending the $57 now only to want to get the bigger sticks 6-12 months down the line.

Maybe I'll just wait and better manage the RAM and go with the larger sticks in a few months when prices come down a bit more.
 
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