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16gb of ram for macbook pro?

macuser1232

macuser1232

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Jan 20, 2012
673
7
Ok, so not too long ago, right after i bought my wonderful 2011 macbook pro i5 processor, I upgraded my ram to 8gb. Usually on my browser, google chrome, i run anywhere from 10 to 20 tabs. Typically 4 of them are videos and the rest are just ordinary websites. Along with google chrome I run skype and mail. Every now and then my fans my start running because of my tabs. Does this mean I should go even further and upgrade my mac's ram to 16 gigabytes! Also, I do wish i could also run a heavy application like Photoshop or a video editor, while having all these tabs open.
 
Fans usually kick up even at 10% in use...which kinda sucks. I hate that about the MBPs.

Flash does this all the time.

I use my MBP as a desktop replacement and the fans kicking up pisses me off to no end. Maybe I should put this under my desk so I won't hear it.
 
I do some pretty heavy duty stuff with my MBP with only 8GB, very rarely hear the fans kick up...specs. in the image.
 

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Ram is not going to help with a bunch of tabs open with flash videos.

Also I have no idea why you would have so many tabs and videos open and also have photoshop and a video editor running. Sounds like you just want other people to justify a decision you've already made.
 
Current macbook pro's only support a max of 8GB of RAM. In fact all sandy bridge laptops max out at 8GB's.

macuser1232 said:
Ok, so not too long ago, right after i bought my wonderful 2011 macbook pro i5 processor, I upgraded my ram to 8gb. Usually on my browser, google chrome, i run anywhere from 10 to 20 tabs. Typically 4 of them are videos and the rest are just ordinary websites. Along with google chrome I run skype and mail. Every now and then my fans my start running because of my tabs. Does this mean I should go even further and upgrade my mac's ram to 16 gigabytes! Also, I do wish i could also run a heavy application like Photoshop or a video editor, while having all these tabs open.
Click to expand...
 
pragmatous said:
Current macbook pro's only support a max of 8GB of RAM. In fact all sandy bridge laptops max out at 8GB's.
Click to expand...

Actually, not true! Apple doesn't declare it, but the current (2011) Sandy Bridge MacBook Pros handle 16GB just fine. :)
 
Add 16GB RAM to your MacBook Pro

Ahh touche'. That's a pretty cool bonus.

jpross123 said:
You can upgrade to 16gb and it will support it
Click to expand...


----------

I've been using PC's for 20 years and never had a mac. Hated macs for a long time and just recently opened up to them. So excuse my ignorance :)

The macbook pro I want to purchase would be my first mac. I work in IT so I figure I might as well learn the damn thing. :p

whdigital said:
Actually, not true! Apple doesn't declare it, but the current (2011) Sandy Bridge MacBook Pros handle 16GB just fine. :)
Click to expand...
 
macuser1232 said:
Every now and then my fans my start running because of my tabs. Does this mean I should go even further and upgrade my mac's ram to 16 gigabytes!
Click to expand...
No, the fans don't kick on when you're running out of memory. Flawed assumption.
 
Well, then what's causing this? Is it just Apple's problem with macbook pro fans running more than they should?
 
macuser1232 said:
Well, then what's causing this? Is it just Apple's problem with macbook pro fans running more than they should?
Click to expand...

It's poor implementation of Flash on the MBP. So technically it's adobe's fault. Chrome is notorious for this as it runs an instance of flash for each tab, eating away at your CPU.

Use HTML5 on youtube, things'll get slightly better. Otherwise, just live with it, your computer is cooling itself as it needs it.
 
Also it only does it occasionally. like right now I have 17 windows upen and some other small programs and it's running fine without excessive heat and the fans are at their lowest rpm.
 
macuser1232 said:
Also it only does it occasionally. like right now I have 17 windows upen and some other small programs and it's running fine without excessive heat and the fans are at their lowest rpm.
Click to expand...

Get a 1080p youtube video going, that'll change soon enough.
 
macuser1232 said:
Ok, so not too long ago, right after i bought my wonderful 2011 macbook pro i5 processor, I upgraded my ram to 8gb. Usually on my browser, google chrome, i run anywhere from 10 to 20 tabs. Typically 4 of them are videos and the rest are just ordinary websites. Along with google chrome I run skype and mail. Every now and then my fans my start running because of my tabs. Does this mean I should go even further and upgrade my mac's ram to 16 gigabytes! Also, I do wish i could also run a heavy application like Photoshop or a video editor, while having all these tabs open.
Click to expand...

Us Activity Monitor to see if your MBP is running low on memory in these instances. Typically what happens if you run low on memory is that your computer starts swapping to the hard drive and (unless you're on SSD) making HDD spin-up noises, not fan noise. Swapping will significantly slow performance.

Generally the CPU/GPU is a laptop's greatest source of heat (heat being what prompts the computer to turn up the fans), followed by the battery.
 
snaky69 said:
It's poor implementation of Flash on the MBP. So technically it's adobe's fault. Chrome is notorious for this as it runs an instance of flash for each tab, eating away at your CPU.

Use HTML5 on youtube, things'll get slightly better. Otherwise, just live with it, your computer is cooling itself as it needs it.
Click to expand...

Yeah i have heard many people tell me that Google Chrome uses high quality graphics which uses up my ram. If i run into this problem I will try switching to my backup browser, firefox.
 
Right now i have 20 tabs open on google chrome, skype, and mail open and i have over 4 and a half gigs of active ram and only 1 gig of free ram memory! Why is my mac hogging my memory?
 
macuser1232 said:
Right now i have 20 tabs open on google chrome, skype, and mail open and i have over 4 and a half gigs of active ram and only 1 gig of free ram memory! Why is my mac hogging my memory?
Click to expand...

Because of what you typed right before your question. More stuff open = more memory used, it isn't rocket science, your mac is acting as it should.
 
snaky69 said:
Because of what you typed right before your question. More stuff open = more memory used, it isn't rocket science, your mac is acting as it should.
Click to expand...

Yeah but I didn't think that that was a lot of stuff open..
 
macuser1232 said:
Right now i have 20 tabs open on google chrome, skype, and mail open and i have over 4 and a half gigs of active ram and only 1 gig of free ram memory! Why is my mac hogging my memory?
Click to expand...

OS X does such an excellent job of memory management that you really don't need to worry about memory usage. (Wow, I just had the term EMM386 pop into my head, if you know what that is, then your an old fart like me). Actually, literally 15 min. ago, I put 16GB into my MacBook Pro. Cost a whopping $80.00
 
SDAVE said:
Fans usually kick up even at 10% in use...which kinda sucks. I hate that about the MBPs.

Flash does this all the time.

I use my MBP as a desktop replacement and the fans kicking up pisses me off to no end. Maybe I should put this under my desk so I won't hear it.
Click to expand...

Sounds odd, my fans very rarely go higher than the 2000rpm default, I hardly ever hear them.
 
SDAVE said:
What do you do with your computer?
Click to expand...

programming mainly, photos web email online videos etc. fairly lightweight stuff so my fans only really kick in if i'm playing a game or converting video

edit: just tested watching a 1080p youtube flash video, fan steady at 2000rpm throughout
 
Fans have nothing to do with ram. Even if you were short (it doesn't sound like it here) I doubt the increased disk access would have that much of an effect on ram. I wonder how the temperatures vary with higher density dimms.
 
phpmaven said:
OS X does such an excellent job of memory management that you really don't need to worry about memory usage. (Wow, I just had the term EMM386 pop into my head, if you know what that is, then your an old fart like me). Actually, literally 15 min. ago, I put 16GB into my MacBook Pro. Cost a whopping $80.00
Click to expand...

Really? Nice Tell me how it is!
 
samac92 said:
programming mainly, photos web email online videos etc. fairly lightweight stuff so my fans only really kick in if i'm playing a game or converting video

edit: just tested watching a 1080p youtube flash video, fan steady at 2000rpm throughout
Click to expand...

Try using it as a desktop replacement and do some heavier work.

If it runs under the discreet card, it will definitely kick up the fans.

If you really want to push it, run this. Run both the graphics card test and the CPU test and watch the fans kick up.
 
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