More Ram?!?!

[e²Studios]

So well ive decided to go ahead and upgrade the Mini from 512mb to 1GB of ram.. The local Apple store is holding a stick for me and tomorrow at lunch i am going to take them my mini and then pick it up after i get off work. Now on to my question..

I got tired of seeing in Activity monitor that i constantly had 4-6mb free at any given time, what was open? well Adium, mail, ical, safari, itunes, dashboard and its assorted neat widgets, and some hp thing for my printer that really only takes like 2mb. I noticed after use safari was up to 67-71mb Adium around 47 and mail 20ish. i noticed the ram was really eaten up when i kept the computer on and logged in (or stayed on for a long time, like last weekend), if i logged out running all the same would keep 100ish mb free till the memory sizes climbed again. Now i get a little delay say i open finder and click in to utilities or whatever the first folder i click may be and it will lag a tad before the contents show.. In the course of use is it normal for my mini to eventually eat up all 500mb, and if i go up to 1gb will it eventually do the same to it? I guess my MAIN question would be will i notice a significant difference in performance between 512mb and 1GB?

Thanks and sorry for that being long winded..
Ed

 

[joecool85]

As far as your main question is concerned, yes, 1gb should be substantially faster than 512mb.

 

[e²Studios]

As far as your main question is concerned, yes, 1gb should be substantially faster than 512mb.

But for someone that mainly uses safari, ical, mail, Adium, dashboard with assorted widgets and itunes notice much from 512mb?

The main reason i would buy this is so i can do CS, Dreamweaver, and all of the above at the same time, though i dont know if that would be possible?

I would also like to be rendering in iDVD and doing other things, but i think thats more of a processor thing too

I know i can get third party and do it cheaper myself, but i want to keep my warranty, and apple care will tell any other mini owner like they told me "If you or any non apple authorized party opens the cover to your mini the warranty will be voided" In fact when i called the apple store they transferred me to apple care since the memory upgrade for a mini is considered a "service part" to be installed by a apple store or apple authorized repair shop.

Bottom line, this will cost me around $350 to get done, so i just want to be sure that i will see a noticeable performance difference with how i use it normally and be able to do more with my mac mini as explained above without that "lag" effect and the added performance.

Thanks to all the MR members, you guy are great
Ed

Edit: One last question, after continued use is it normal for safari, ical, mail, Adium, dashboard with assorted widgets, and itunes to absorb all but 6mb of my 512mb ram, is this how OS X memory management works? I can still load and use CS, then i close it and i have 55mb free, give it time and im back to 6mb. seem normal?

 

[Platform]

That gig will help a lot.........by the way Dashboard is a menory hog

 

[Applespider]

Edit: One last question, after continued use is it normal for safari, ical, mail, Adium, dashboard with assorted widgets, and itunes to absorb all but 6mb of my 512mb ram, is this how OS X memory management works? I can still load and use CS, then i close it and i have 55mb free, give it time and im back to 6mb. seem normal?

All perfectly normal. OS X will take advantage of as much physical RAM as you can throw at it but is pretty good at swapping it in and out to the apps that need it. It's the 'pageouts' that you want to look at - if you're getting lots of pageouts with your basic apps open, then you want to get more memory (with the caveat that if your system's been up for a while with lots of activity, you're going to end up with some pageouts regardless!)

I have 1.25GB which gave me a massive performance improvement over the standard 512 my PB came with; I rarely see beachballs.
But if I look in Activity Monitor with several apps open, OS X will be using all but 100MBs or so.

 

[joecool85]

It WILL NOT void your warranty if you upgrade the ram yourself, AS LONG AS you DON'T break the case. Also, the new ram won't be covered under warranty, but everything else still will be....personally I'm thinking of getting a mini and doing the upgrade myself. However, I'm waiting for a rev b or c to come out because I want at least a 64mb vid card.

 

[James Philp]

It WILL NOT void your warranty if you upgrade the ram yourself, AS LONG AS you DON'T break the case. Also, the new ram won't be covered under warranty, but everything else still will be....personally I'm thinking of getting a mini and doing the upgrade myself. However, I'm waiting for a rev b or c to come out because I want at least a 64mb vid card.

you mean rev A (as the original is not a revision right?!?)

 

[e²Studios]

It WILL NOT void your warranty if you upgrade the ram yourself, AS LONG AS you DON'T break the case. Also, the new ram won't be covered under warranty, but everything else still will be....personally I'm thinking of getting a mini and doing the upgrade myself. However, I'm waiting for a rev b or c to come out because I want at least a 64mb vid card.

That was straight from a apple care rep on the phone, i am more apt to believe a apple employee. This is why when you go to the apple store and click on memory the mini doesn't show. The minute you open the case you voided your warranty. Call apple care yourself if you like, it came as somewhat as a shock to me too

Anyhow, thank you all for the messages, ill be getting said upgrade done

Ed

 

[Trout74]

That was straight from a apple care rep on the phone, i am more apt to believe a apple employee. This is why when you go to the apple store and click on memory the mini doesn't show. The minute you open the case you voided your warranty. Call apple care yourself if you like, it came as somewhat as a shock to me too

Anyhow, thank you all for the messages, ill be getting said upgrade done

Ed

Ed,

you will like the 1gig, but the previous poster IS correct. You will NOT void your warranty, and you can get 1gig for around 125$ easily and save yourself lots of money. I swear on my first born, YOUR WARRANTY WILL NOT BE VOIDED. this had been covered easily 50 times on here.

But to each his own. If you got enough money to burn a wet mule then go for it.

trout

 

[e²Studios]

Ed,

you will like the 1gig, but the previous poster IS correct. You will NOT void your warranty, and you can get 1gig for around 125$ easily and save yourself lots of money. I swear on my first born, YOUR WARRANTY WILL NOT BE VOIDED. this had been covered easily 50 times on here.

But to each his own. If you got enough money to burn a wet mule then go for it.

trout

I called apple care again about 10 minutes ago and was again confirmed that if anyone other than a apple authorized service center opens your mini your warranty is voided. You're right if you dont break it chances are they wont know, but legally it would still be voiding my warranty which i really dont want to do. The risk of losin a machine i paid $705 for because i wanted to save $125 isnt enough for me not to just shell out for apple branded ram and a professional install. Just because apple doesnt see you do it doesnt mean it is legal (a warranty is a legal binder between you and apple) or that you wont get caught, it feels wrong to not let apple do the install and i would rather not void my warranty for how little the savings versus how much i could lose if it broke afterwards To me spending the extra money is well worth it, hell thats why i have a job i think

Weeee.. just used procare and booked the appointment.. *stares at clock*

Thanks for all the tips, im sure ill enjoy being able to open more apps at once, and hopefully get a nice performance gain tonight hehe
Ed

 

[shadowmoses]

1GB will make that MINI FLYYYYY

 

[joecool85]

you mean rev A (as the original is not a revision right?!?)

no, I meant rev b or c...look at the new iMacs, they are rev b right now...but they are only the 2nd ones out right?