How to know if ram will work on my Macbook

[bsolomonny]

Hi All,
I just arrived in Taiwan where i will be getting my MBA. I want to upgrade my CD Blackbook to 2 gb of ram. However, ever shop here claims that any ram stick will work with my macbook because it has an intel chip. So far they have tried to sell me Patriot, Kingston, and Adata Ram. I have been looking for brands that say Mac Certified but so far nothing. The Apple authorized reseller only sells only patriot ram but according to their website Macs are not supported.

Any tips on what to get. Or is there any code on the ram that would indicate mac compatible. For those of you who have never been to Taiwan, it is not easy to return things. So i would like to be sure i get the right Ram the 1st time.
Thanks,
I love my and I love this website.

 

[Scarlet Fever]

make sure its 667MHz PC2-5300 DDR2 SDRAM, and it should be fine. Maybe get them to test it instore as well.

 

[Bill Gates]

make sure its 667MHz PC2-5300 DDR2 SDRAM, and it should be fine. Maybe get them to test it instore as well.

Agreed. If the vendor is confident that their product will work, then surely they ought to be willing to either test it themselves, or wait while you test it on-site.

 

[siurpeeman]

make sure its 667MHz PC2-5300 DDR2 SDRAM, and it should be fine. Maybe get them to test it instore as well.

also make sure it's 200 pin so-dimm. you don't want to be stuck with 240 pin ram that's too big.

 

[bsolomonny]

Thank you for your responses. I knew about the basic criteria, such as 200 pin and PC2 5300 667 mhz. I was just concerned that some companies say their ram is not supported on a MAC. I know Patriot for sure says it is not supported. Kingston seems to have mac certified ram. Any idea if this is just marketing. Any opinions on the above mentioned brands?

I have not seen any of the favorites like Crucial, OWC, or G.Skill here.

Do all the ram sticks have the same latency? Does Latency make a difference? I feel stupid for asking but what is latency?

 

[swiftaw]

I always go with otherworldcomputing.com for my RAM

 

[bsolomonny]

I went the most official looking "authorized Reseller"

I went to the most official authorized in my city and they tried to sell a brand i never heard of but there price was much more in line with what apple charges about $110 a stick. I asked for the brands that apple pre-inatalls like nanya and hynix and they never heard of them. I guess it would be just as good to use patriot or kingston which are $4o cheaper per stick and i have heard of them.

Just a side note i went to some shady looking places that claimed they were authorized resellers. I think i might take some pictures of the scariest one and post it so all of you who live in cities with real apple store can see how lucky you are.