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RAM upgrades for 2008 MP for less than a billion dollars?

kirkbross

kirkbross

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Mar 6, 2007
666
22
Los Angeles
I have 8gb in my 2008 MP (3,1) and would love to upgrade to 16gb.

The cheapest used kits I've been able to find are around $200 on eBay. Are there cheaper alternatives?

It's a head scratcher why DDR2 800 is more expensive than newer faster memory... but perhaps it's because they don't make it anymore, or only in limited quantities.
 
kirkbross said:
It's a head scratcher why DDR2 800 is more expensive than newer faster memory... but perhaps it's because they don't make it anymore, or only in limited quantities.
Click to expand...

It had a short lifetime - from January 2008 until March 2009, bang in the middle of a major recession. It was only used with 5 very high-end processors and I would expect the majority of 800MHz FB-DIMMs are in working Mac Pros. When you see how few used Mac Pros are out there then it makes sense there would be little of this memory too. Most cheap memory suitable for Xeons comes from servers being sold off, and there was little reason to get 800MHz FB-DIMMs and 1600MHz FSB Xeons over the 667/1333MHz ones for servers.

As it was more expensive than DDR3 anyway due to memory prices continually coming down, it just holds its value. Best thing is to probably replace it all with 667MHz. Although you may even be able to upgrade to a 2009 Mac Pro for a small amount if you are willing to flip your 2008 on eBay or craigslist.
 
Umbongo said:
It had a short lifetime - from January 2008 until March 2009, bang in the middle of a major recession. It was only used with 5 very high-end processors and I would expect the majority of 800MHz FB-DIMMs are in working Mac Pros. When you see how few used Mac Pros are out there then it makes sense there would be little of this memory too. Most cheap memory suitable for Xeons comes from servers being sold off, and there was little reason to get 800MHz FB-DIMMs and 1600MHz FSB Xeons over the 667/1333MHz ones for servers.

As it was more expensive than DDR3 anyway due to memory prices continually coming down, it just holds its value. Best thing is to probably replace it all with 667MHz. Although you may even be able to upgrade to a 2009 Mac Pro for a small amount if you are willing to flip your 2008 on eBay or craigslist.
Click to expand...
That's kind of what I suspected and it makes sense. DDR2 800 is a vintage item now.

I think I'm just going to wait a year or two for the Mac Pro replacement to come out and get a whole new computer and sell my MP.
 
$200 is actually quite good price as for 16GB FB DIMM 800. On my local market it's usually $300+ (4x4GB).
 
kirkbross said:
I have 8gb in my 2008 MP (3,1) and would love to upgrade to 16gb.

The cheapest used kits I've been able to find are around $200 on eBay. Are there cheaper alternatives?

It's a head scratcher why DDR2 800 is more expensive than newer faster memory... but perhaps it's because they don't make it anymore, or only in limited quantities.
Click to expand...

So you just want 8 more GB? Here ya go... $100 and it even has the totally unnecessary monster heat-sinks on. LOL

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Apple-Mac-P...1575671?pt=US_Memory_RAM_&hash=item51ab9d7b77
 
ColdCase said:
Yeah for high quality apple certified and burned in RAM, $350 seems to be the going rate for 16GB. I think prices have come down a bit. Was over $425 just last August.

http://www.datamemorysystems.com/ap...-2-8ghz-ma970ll/a-early-2008-memory-upgrades/
Click to expand...

Yeah, for some reason 800MHz DIMMs are especially high priced. Nearly three times that of 667MHz modules. And I really have no idea why - nothing proposed makes any sense to me.

For example here's 8x2GB is 667MHz for about $100 which is about average.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/INFINEON-DD...erComponents_MemoryRAM_JN&hash=item2ec76c1368

And here's the same but in 800MHz for over $300... Grrrr...
http://www.ebay.com/itm/16GB-8X2GB-...8256383?pt=US_Memory_RAM_&hash=item20be18e67f


Both kinds will work in MacPro 1,1 or 2,1 or 3,1 with little or no difference in speed.
<shrug>

Also it's a complete myth that memory with the Apple heat-sinks on is higher quality. It just has the heat-sinks on and that's the ONLY difference. In fact most distributors take advantage of this and sell especially low grade RAM hiding the maker label with the heat-sinks and then not specifying who it's made by. Only saying that it's "Apple approved"... riiiight, like I was born yesterday! Heh!

And to top it all off those heat-sinks are totally unnecessary on new modules or any modules larger than 1GB. :)
 
Last edited:
kirkbross said:
That's kind of what I suspected and it makes sense. DDR2 800 is a vintage item now.
Click to expand...

DDR2 FB-DIMMs have always been stupidly expensive.

I believe I paid about $350 in 2009 for 16GB (8x2GB) for my 2008 MP, and the price hasn't changed much in the last 4 years (brand-new, anyway).
 
Umbongo said:
Pshh! Try $800 for 4GB in 2006 ;)
Click to expand...

I'm still trying to come over the fact that they sold their early 2008 Mac Pro with 2 GB of RAM as standard heh.

At least it were twice as much as the first Mac Pro with a paltry 1 GB of RAM as standard.
 
Pressure said:
I'm still trying to come over the fact that they sold their early 2008 Mac Pro with 2 GB of RAM as standard heh.

At least it were twice as much as the first Mac Pro with a paltry 1 GB of RAM as standard.
Click to expand...

That was actually a good thing from the common perspective. G5s and Mac Pros until the 2009 models came with the minimum amount of memory required to run, which was standard practice for workstations. Giving the user choice of what memory config they wanted and allowing the to source it from a 3rd party.
 
Umbongo said:
That was actually a good thing from the common perspective. G5s and Mac Pros until the 2009 models came with the minimum amount of memory required to run, which was standard practice for workstations. Giving the user choice of what memory config they wanted and allowing the to source it from a 3rd party.
Click to expand...

Yeah. It kept the base prices down, too. In 2008, $2,799 was a killer deal for the base 8-core. At the time, it had about $1,600 worth of CPUs in it.
 
I'm in the same boat. I'd love more memory than the 12GB I have, but I'll wait until the new MP ... I hope.
 
BConvery said:
Just ordered this.....
Click to expand...
I suppose I could buy two of those 8GB kits... but the more I think about it, I think I'm better off just toughing it out with my current 8GB (8x1gb) until I get a new Mac... and just get 32gb of 1600MHz DDR3 or whatever the new MP (or replacement) uses.
 
kirkbross said:
I suppose I could buy two of those 8GB kits... but the more I think about it, I think I'm better off just toughing it out with my current 8GB (8x1gb) until I get a new Mac... and just get 32gb of 1600MHz DDR3 or whatever the new MP (or replacement) uses.
Click to expand...

I agree. Over $500 is just too much IMO too. The under $300 for 32GB of the 667MHz parts is already bad enough.
 
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