Do I need to upgrade my RAM?

Yeah you need to upgrade. 2gb is low for today's standards, even more so for what your doing!

Try OWC or newegg, I got my 8GB for under $200
macsales.com
newegg.com

 

I'm going to buy this soon:

http://www.google.com/products/cata...ed=0CAcQ8wIwADgA#scoring=tp|cond=1|freeship=1

 

I have this ram.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231294

 

In a word yes, I installed this in my late 2009 13" MBP last week, signifigant speed improvement and so far the best buy I could find.

http://eshop.macsales.com/item/Newer Technology/8566DDR3S8GP/

 

you only have 2gb ram? atleast get 4GB, mac runs best when it has atleast 4GB of ram. also make sure to quit apps that you arent useing instead of just closing them

 

What program is that and where do i get it?

 

How about buying one 4GB module. That way you'll be able to add another one when you have more cash and you feel the need for more ram.
Another possibility is to see if anyone is selling 2x2GB modules that became useless after upgrading to 8GB.

 

RAM prices have come down over the past year.
When I bought my current AI Macbook, 8gb of RAM was $800. Needless to say I went for the 4gb at $200.

 

and kill dual channel memory in the process, no...

 

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...rue&Keywords=(keywords)&Page=1#scrollFullInfo

What do you think about these modules for a mac pro 12 core 2.66...I am thinking of getting 4 of those....they are much cheaper than the owc
thanks

 

Me as well. Good solid RAM.

 

In all seriousness, try restarting before you buy more RAM. Things can get stuck in there, you know.

 

that would work, and would give you a cheaper upgrade path later

yes it kills dual channel, but that is usually negligible, especially if it's only internet use, not photo/video editing.

 

Definitely get the single 4gb ram chip, and run a 5gb setup with your single 1gb. You'll be better set up to upgrade down the road, and 5gb running at single channel is WAAYYYY faster than 2 gb running at dual channel, and much faster even than 4gb running at dual. Dual channel is maybe a 10 percent performance improvement over same capacity at single channel - Basically more ram will trump dual channel mode.

Futhermore at this point in the game, buying 2x2gb is a huge waste of money if you ever plan on upgrading.

I made the same upgrade to my 2.26 mbp and it was an unreal difference. Then you can toss in another 4gb chip when the price goes down in the future - you'll be much better off.

 

From that pic, you aren't using more than you have. More ram never hurts though. I could be wrong but the way I understand it is this: The red and yellow is what you are using (OS, open programs, etc). The blue chunk is memory that contains data but isn't being used. That's from programs that were open and are now closed and stuff. There is no point in the OS clearing that out unless you needs the space. Unused ram is just wasted ram. This way if you decide to reopen those programs it will make it launch way faster.

 

You might want to look into an SSD. Made a huge improvement in app launch time for me. (Boot time was also drastically improved, which means I can shut down my machine knowing that it no longer takes minutes to boot back up.)

Also, I used to notice when I was running low on RAM, because Safari would freeze for a good 10+ seconds when the RAM was swapping. But the SSD drive does the swapping so fast that I can't tell anymore.

This is the SSD I bought.

 

Will this work in a early 2010 mb?