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New RAM = Same Performance

ohla313

ohla313

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Apr 24, 2010
778
0
I recently upgraded the RAM in my 2010 MBP from 4GB to 8GB and didn't notice any significant performance boosts. Could this mean I have bad RAM? The system works just like it did with 4GB as in the apps still load as slow as before.

My system still recognizes the RAM and activity monitor shows it as 7.75GB. The problem is, I don't notice any performance changes. Any way to be sure this is normal or I need to exchange this?

BTW this is Crucial RAM I am using

Thanks!
 
It probably just means you didn't need the RAM, and your bottleneck is elsewhere -the hard drive or the CPU.

What sort of programs are you running? Because unless you're doing heavy development, design, or the like, going from 4gb-8gb isn't going to make much of a difference. especially when it comes to opening programs.
 
The only time I noticed the difference is while running windows 7 on parralels.
 
thejadedmonkey said:
It probably just means you didn't need the RAM, and your bottleneck is elsewhere -the hard drive or the CPU.

What sort of programs are you running? Because unless you're doing heavy development, design, or the like, going from 4gb-8gb isn't going to make much of a difference. especially when it comes to opening programs.
Click to expand...

I use Mail. Safari, OmniFocus, Twitter, Reeder, Word, iTunes, and occasionally use Coda or TextMate.

miles01110 said:
You probably didn't notice any performance gain because the tasks you perform on your computer are not demanding at all.
Click to expand...

Thank you both for the insight. I guess I am not running as intensive apps yet. At least the RAM is most likely not bad! I will be going to graduate school soon so will need to run some VM apps and that may put this new RAM to the test!
 
The RAM definitely has benefitted your computer, but it's probably hard to notice if you're doing simple tasks like what you listed above.

One of the best ways to speed up your computer without spending money is to run a cleaner like CCleaner for Mac (http://www.piriform.com/mac/ccleaner) or Onyx.

Other than that SSDs dramatically increase performance.
 
motoracer1486 said:
With the apps you're using, you won't notice any difference with the ram upgrade.
Click to expand...
Exactly.

RAM benefits are when doing heavy multitasking or running Virtual Machines or when doing rather big number crunching in engineering apps or rendering in photoshop/final cut. The RAM increase would be noticed especially during those tasks.

More RAM doesn't make apps open up faster, they still have to be read off the slow hard drive before they are put into RAM. It does allow you to have a lot more of them open before you notice a slowdown.
 
your hard drive is probably the issue. Get a SSD and all the issues will dissapear
 
You can check the "page outs" with the activity monitor. If you have always 0 page outs, then more ram won't give you any benefit.
 
Go to Activity Monitor and go to the Memory tab. If the total usage is less than 4GB, then you didn't need the upgrade.
 
Most people (average users) don't benefit from more than 4GB RAM.

Upgrading the stock hard drive to a fast 7200rpm, hybrid drive or SSD usually delivers more performance gains. Especially booting, installing, launching applications and file copies are a lot faster.
 
The kernel for your MBP boots into 32bit by default. Unless programs are 64bit, they can't use more than 4gb of ram. So... unless you run a ton of programs, there will be no difference
 
I see...well when SSD prices drop and stability occurs, I'll stick with HDD. I am planning to upgrade to a 320GB drive for Lion so perhaps that will improve speed?
 
ohla313 said:
I recently upgraded the RAM in my 2010 MBP from 4GB to 8GB and didn't notice any significant performance boosts. Could this mean I have bad RAM? The system works just like it did with 4GB as in the apps still load as slow as before.

My system still recognizes the RAM and activity monitor shows it as 7.75GB. The problem is, I don't notice any performance changes. Any way to be sure this is normal or I need to exchange this?

BTW this is Crucial RAM I am using

Thanks!
Click to expand...

I realize that it could just be my imagination, but I just bought a 2011 MBP, mine is the entry-level 13" and when I upgraded the RAM to 8 GB I really noticed that it seemed snappier. I don't run any demanding apps, but I did notice that applications were much snappier when being launched. The amount of video RAM changed from something like 384 MB to 512 MB.
 
Last edited:
Like others have said, HAD you looked in activity monitor and had zero 'page outs' then more ram us useless.

If you look in AM now, you obviously won't have any page-outs.

The only difference replacing ram makes if you have zero page outs is your battery life goes down. It takes more energy to power 2x 2gb than it takes to power 2x 4g.
 
ohla313 said:
I use Mail. Safari, OmniFocus, Twitter, Reeder, Word, iTunes, and occasionally use Coda or TextMate.
Click to expand...

I use AutoCAD, SolidWorks, Google Sketchup (these three almost always run at the same time as I need to go back and front between them). Other than this, I always have mail and Safari running. I have iChat video chat running constantly as well. In the background I run skype which I hardly use but it runs for calls and what not. At the same time, I have xcode and textwrangler running. I also have iTunes always running where I watch some HD xcode videos. Aside from this, little tools like Logmein, splashtop remote, and todo sync application. I have 4GB of ram and usually have about 10mb free with 500mb or so inactive so that is a total of 700mb at the minimum available to me. What's my point? For your needs, you really do not need more than 4GB of ram. I should mention, however, that when I start running AutoDesk Alias 2012, I have to shut one of my usual applications as my page swaps really jump up. Oh, on average I have about 4-5GB in page ins and about 250mb in page outs. Hope this gives you a good idea of how much 4GB of ram really is.
 
jasonbro said:
The only difference replacing ram makes if you have zero page outs is your battery life goes down. It takes more energy to power 2x 2gb than it takes to power 2x 4g.
Click to expand...

are you sure that's not the other way around?
 
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