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ihatephish

macrumors regular
Original poster
Jun 20, 2011
210
7
Between my wife and I we're probably considered mostly casual users. I do enjoy some games here and there. In terms of OS longevity though, is it better to upgrade to the 3.1 i7 or the 16gb ram?
 

GGJstudios

macrumors Westmere
May 16, 2008
44,545
943
Between my wife and I we're probably considered mostly casual users. I do enjoy some games here and there. In terms of OS longevity though, is it better to upgrade to the 3.1 i7 or the 16gb ram?
Most average or casual users won't likely notice much performance difference between processors. As far as RAM, it depends on the typical workload you run.

To determine if you can benefit from more RAM, 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.

Using Activity Monitor to read System Memory and determine how much RAM is being used
 

ihatephish

macrumors regular
Original poster
Jun 20, 2011
210
7
Most average or casual users won't likely notice much performance difference between processors. As far as RAM, it depends on the typical workload you run.

To determine if you can benefit from more RAM, 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.

Using Activity Monitor to read System Memory and determine how much RAM is being used

Thanks for the response. We got the 15" MBPr a few weeks ago but really have no use for a laptop as we both have iPads. And, we have a 3 month old that can only increase the odds of the laptop being dumped from the couch or coffee table.

Saw the new iMac at the apple store and I have no problem w the lack of retina surprisingly.
 
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