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Just upgraded to Mountain Lion and there is a serious memory leak in the new Safari causing it to use tons of memory. Just putting it out there in case it might sway some people toward the 16GB upgrade.

If anything, Mountain Lion should actually keep people from wasting money on a 16gb memory machine they don't need. All of the lag is gone for me - the machine is blazingly fast with 8gb. And that includes Safari, btw., which was painfully slow before.
 
From my experience, the only reason you'll need more than 8GB of RAM is if you're a heavy parallels user. For example, I'm using virtual box on my machine to use windows 7 in parallel with OS X. I am a drafter who uses a lot of autodesk software, as well as CATIA. If am using AutoCAD on my mac, and either Inventor Professional or CATIA on the windows virtually, all 8GB of my RAM is pretty much gone, and I am using some swap already. But if you don't use virtual operating systems, 8GB should get you through a couple of years without any hangups.
 
I'm a first time Mac user & I need help upgrading my RAM to 16GB. I own a MBP 15" mid 2012 & I can't decide which RAM to buy from those?

Found this thread https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1394912/ & it recommends 1.35v RAMs for my Mac & the CORSAIR Vengeance 16GB is 1.5 so I found those 3

http://eshop.macsales.com/item/Other.../1600DDR3S16P/ (CL = 9)

http://www.crucial.com/store/partspe...IT102464BF160B (CL =11)

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...scrollFullInfo (CL =11)

which one is better?
 
8GB is plenty for me.

I was debating the 8gb vs. 16gb issue for my base RMBP. I decided to go with 8GB mainly because I didn't want to wait and didn't think I would need the extra 8GB for the stuff I do. I think I made the right decision.

Right now I have 10 applications open, including Photoshop, Word, Safari (10 tabs) and a VMWare Fusion virtual machine running Excel. I also have a few moderately sized PSD files open in Photoshop. This is pretty much the upper bounds of my day to day computing needs. I'm out of Free memory and Page Outs are kinda high at times, I have noticed zero lag or performance issues so far. I feel like the memory activity monitor can freak you out because it shows no free memory left, but this does not lead to a resource choke. The only weird thing I'm noticing is that sometimes when I'm typing on a web form (such as now), the text hides and reappears every once in a while. Not sure if that's a safari bug or if that has anything to do with low memory.

Attached is a screen shot of my system memory. If anyone sees anything freaky please let me know because I don't think I fully understand the diagnostics.
 

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I went to an Apple Store today to experiment with RAM usage. The display rMBP without apps running had 2GB used memory.

I opened 20 tabs in Safari, iMovie, iPhoto, Adobe Photoshop, Abobe Illustrator, iTunes, iCal, MS Word, MS PowerPoint and Pages. At that point a little over 6GB was being used so still well under 8GB for an extreme usage "test."
 
I went to an Apple Store today to experiment with RAM usage. The display rMBP without apps running had 2GB used memory.

I opened 20 tabs in Safari, iMovie, iPhoto, Adobe Photoshop, Abobe Illustrator, iTunes, iCal, MS Word, MS PowerPoint and Pages. At that point a little over 6GB was being used so still well under 8GB for an extreme usage "test."

Try opening and editing a 30 megapixel file in Photoshop while running other applications and then get back to me...
 
Try opening and editing a 30 megapixel file in Photoshop while running other applications and then get back to me...

Perhaps my use of extreme was itself extreme. I implied only that even at high-level of usage for an average, non-professional user there was plenty of RAM. Personally, I dont believe this will be the case in 3 or 4 years, so I am getting 16.
 
i have a cMBP that i threw 16gb in just because i could (that's why we still buy the cMBP i guess) and i'll probably never notice it until the software I use (Logic Pro, Ableton Live) gets upgraded to 64 bit (Ableton Live 8.4 will be 64 bit, and the beta's out now, i dunno if apple gives a crap about logic anymore)

but uh

i like being able to say i have it
 
Same boat...

With great intrepidation I purchased my base rMBP (256 SSD, 8 GB RAM) because it was on sale at Best Buy a couple of weeks ago with 18 months zero interest financing...and they just happened to have one in stock. I had already decided that I would have greater peace of mind with 16 GB RAM, but after being reassured that I could return my purchase if it didn't perform as expected (as a side note, boy has Best Buy changed their return policy!), I couldn't resist.

Bottom line, at least for me, is that the base machine performs well...until I open Aperture and work in it for a bit...then let the paging out begin. As a side note, I always close out all other programs except sometimes I have iTunes open and I listen to music while working. I also notice a lag in performance when this starts. So, I am giving serious consideration to returning it and going with 16 GB. Bottom line is that if you are a regular Aperture user, you might want to consider the upgrade...love the program, but it is a total RAM hog.
 
How about for my needs? On a regular day, I have Word, Chrome (about 6-8 tabs), Twitter, and sometimes Photoshop but only to design logos and such. On the Bootcamp side, I will only have Battlefield 3 going. Is 8GB good for me?
 
From my experience, the only reason you'll need more than 8GB of RAM is if you're a heavy parallels user.

This is exactly why I upgraded my 2012 MBP 13" with 16gb RAM right out of the box. I wanted at least 8gb available for Windows 7 while in coherence mode.

Besides that, on the OS X side, 12-14gb of the ram goes unused when I'm not running Parallels.
 
Try opening and editing a 30 megapixel file in Photoshop while running other applications and then get back to me...

...can you let us know what will happen, please ? Because I open last night just for the fun CAD, iPHOTO, Safari, Chrome,iTune,Mac Theripper,Word,Excel,Page,iMovie,iDVD,...then I play DOOM 3...dude I did not manage to pass 6Gb or RAM.:D
This 8Gb vs 16Gb is just a matter of A size not a necessity, but don't get me wrong you may need 16Gig but wait maybe next refresh you may be able to get 32Gig of ram :D
 
Dude...

...can you let us know what will happen, please ? Because I open last night just for the fun CAD, iPHOTO, Safari, Chrome,iTune,Mac Theripper,Word,Excel,Page,iMovie,iDVD,...then I play DOOM 3...dude I did not manage to pass 6Gb or RAM.:D
This 8Gb vs 16Gb is just a matter of A size not a necessity, but don't get me wrong you may need 16Gig but wait maybe next refresh you may be able to get 32Gig of ram :D

Opening an app is presumably different than actually doing something using open apps when it comes to RAM usage.

Editing a 30MB in Photoshop is going to eat up RAM pretty darn fast if you are using multiple layers, filters, etc.
 
One of these 8 vs 16 threads has instructions on taxing the system and causing pageouts. It convinced me to go 16 gig.
 
i have a cMBP that i threw 16gb in just because i could (that's why we still buy the cMBP i guess) and i'll probably never notice it until the software I use (Logic Pro, Ableton Live) gets upgraded to 64 bit (Ableton Live 8.4 will be 64 bit, and the beta's out now, i dunno if apple gives a crap about logic anymore)

but uh

i like being able to say i have it

logic is 64-bit.... you have to "get info" on the app, and de-select the "run in 32 bit mode" button.
now, the 32-bit bridge for the older plugins, while annoying, at least works.
 
oh wow

i had no idea

thanks, i'll try this out. have you noticed that it enhances performance w/ a bunch of VSTs and rewires going?

with that, i can't comment - however, if you use large sample libraries, it is absolutely essential to have the ability to address the extra memory space.

if you're using kontakt, (imho) it is best to utilize NI's own memory manager outside of logic.

best luck! it's worth noting that *sometimes* when you install new au plugins, you have to re-enable 32-bit mode for logic to find and authenticate them, and after you've done that, you can switch back into 64-bit mode.

now, if only OWC would hurry up and get me my 16gb order.... i've been running with 4gb since i got the machine and i'm itching to really give it a workout.
 
with that, i can't comment - however, if you use large sample libraries, it is absolutely essential to have the ability to address the extra memory space.

if you're using kontakt, (imho) it is best to utilize NI's own memory manager outside of logic.

best luck! it's worth noting that *sometimes* when you install new au plugins, you have to re-enable 32-bit mode for logic to find and authenticate them, and after you've done that, you can switch back into 64-bit mode.

now, if only OWC would hurry up and get me my 16gb order.... i've been running with 4gb since i got the machine and i'm itching to really give it a workout.


I'm away from home visiting my parents and I didn't bring my external w/ all the libraries, but when I get back (tomorrow) I will do some trial/error

thanks for the tips though, i really didn't know.
 
Uh, 16gb is only 99$

Crucial has two 8gb sticks for 99$. In fact, it's the only option they show for the 15" 2.3 quad i7. I'd say go for it. I mean it's a hundie and what are you going to get that's cheaper? I don't notice ram usage during normal browsing, word processing whathaveyou but Safari is a resource hog. So, if you're doing some editing in FCPX and need to check Lynda.com or youtube for hotkey locations you'd very likely go over 4gb. You will definitely go over 4gb if you dare import or render anything at all. Certainly you can't open any additional programs whilst rendering with only 4gb. And I'm not guessing here. I've seen a mini quad 8gb, macbook pro 8gb, and macbook pro 4gb, max out ram while rendering. Importing photos and videos also tends to peg my ram. I mean these things peg the ram and the cpu. I just ordered the 16gb chip from Crucial. Although with the numbers I've seen in FCPX and Logic 9 I doubt that the cpu can handle anything close to that 16. Logic, with 8gb bottlenecks at cpu power. But Crucial didn't have a 50$ 8gb option so...

Any photo or video work? Any large file transfers? Its 99$! Drop the cash and max it out.
 
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