New White Macbooks Support 800mhz RAM

[sovereign]

People on the Apple site are claiming that the new white Macbooks with the NVIDIA MCP79 chipset will support and run 800mhz RAM at the rated speed. Looking for more successes before I order. Everyone seems out to lunch over there, so I thought I'd see if this site has more action...

http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1877953&tstart=0

 

[bozz2006]

if true, that would be nice. I don't know how much luck you'll have over here, as I don't think there are many people here who own the white macbook with the nvidea graphics.

 

[NewMacbookPlz]

IIRC, the last version supported/came preinstalled with 800mhz RAM too, but the FSB was only running at 667mhz

 

[Sun Baked]

Never has worked before.

The Macs have always checked to make sure the RAM is programmed with the minimum specs, but have never altered the bus speeds to make use of faster RAM.

If EEPROM says RAM too slow, RAM bad. If RAM faster than needed, downclock it to the machine's bus speed.

 

[dwc]

/Users/dcoble/Desktop/Picture 3.pnghttp://att.macrumors.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=157784&stc=1&d=1234567539

Sorry was trying to post picture..............anyway it works fine in my new white macbook.

 

[sporadicMotion]

IIRC, the last version supported/came preinstalled with 800mhz RAM too, but the FSB was only running at 667mhz

That's backwards. The FSB was 800mhz and memory was 667mhz.

 

[NewMacbookPlz]

That's backwards. The FSB was 800mhz and memory was 667mhz.

oops, good catch. thanks.

/Users/dcoble/Desktop/Picture 3.pnghttp://att.macrumors.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=157784&stc=1&d=1234567539

Sorry was trying to post picture..............anyway it works fine in my new white macbook.

Yeah, you'll have to upload that picture somewhere.

 

[sovereign]

/Users/dcoble/Desktop/Picture 3.pnghttp://att.macrumors.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=157784&stc=1&d=1234567539

Sorry was trying to post picture..............anyway it works fine in my new white macbook.

Is this a picture or screenshot showing that the 800mhz is recognized?

 

[ihabime]

Unfortunately, someone on the Apple discussion link is now claiming it doesn't work, so that's one yes, one no and still no definite answer.

 

[JJP9398]

I upgraded with PC-5200

I kind of stupid when it comes to all this memory stuff, but when I bought my new macbook the guy at the store said to use PC-5200 and I would be able to upgrade. When I bring up system profiler it says that my memory is running at 800 MHz. Hope this helps.
Hardware Overview:

Model Name: MacBook
Model Identifier: MacBook5,2
Processor Name: Intel Core 2 Duo
Processor Speed: 2 GHz
Number Of Processors: 1
Total Number Of Cores: 2
L2 Cache: 3 MB
Memory: 4 GB
Bus Speed: 1.07 GHz
Boot ROM Version: MB52.0088.B00
SMC Version: 1.38f4

BANK 0/DIMM0:

Size: 2 GB
Type: DDR2 SDRAM
Speed: 800 MHz
Status: OK
Manufacturer: 0xCE00000000000000
Part Number: 0x4D342037305435363633515A332D43463720
Serial Number: 0x935E7ED7

BANK 1/DIMM0:

Size: 2 GB
Type: DDR2 SDRAM
Speed: 800 MHz
Status: OK
Manufacturer: 0xCE00000000000000
Part Number: 0x4D342037305435363633515A332D43463720
Serial Number: 0x935E7E39

 

[phjo]

I kind of stupid when it comes to all this memory stuff, but when I bought my new macbook the guy at the store said to use PC-5200 and I would be able to upgrade. When I bring up system profiler it says that my memory is running at 800 MHz. Hope this helps.

That is certainly interesting... Could you run something like xbench and post the results here ?

thanks,

phjo

 

[JJP9398]

Xbench Results

Here you go, I don't know what all this stuff means but here it is.
Results 81.68
System Info
Xbench Version 1.3
System Version 10.5.6 (9G2110)
Physical RAM 4096 MB
Model MacBook5,2
Drive Type FUJITSU MHZ2250BH G2
CPU Test 81.28
GCD Loop 133.91 7.06 Mops/sec
Floating Point Basic 76.84 1.83 Gflop/sec
vecLib FFT 52.31 1.73 Gflop/sec
Floating Point Library 104.04 18.12 Mops/sec
Thread Test 147.37
Computation 235.14 4.76 Mops/sec, 4 threads
Lock Contention 107.31 4.62 Mlocks/sec, 4 threads
Memory Test 131.71
System 124.30
Allocate 160.16 588.16 Kalloc/sec
Fill 103.37 5025.97 MB/sec
Copy 121.71 2513.85 MB/sec
Stream 140.06
Copy 135.52 2799.18 MB/sec
Scale 133.33 2754.60 MB/sec
Add 146.55 3121.73 MB/sec
Triad 145.83 3119.75 MB/sec
Quartz Graphics Test 88.97
Line 85.14 5.67 Klines/sec [50% alpha]
Rectangle 101.50 30.30 Krects/sec [50% alpha]
Circle 84.95 6.92 Kcircles/sec [50% alpha]
Bezier 87.65 2.21 Kbeziers/sec [50% alpha]
Text 87.57 5.48 Kchars/sec
OpenGL Graphics Test 78.01
Spinning Squares 78.01 98.96 frames/sec
User Interface Test 86.61
Elements 86.61 397.49 refresh/sec
Disk Test 42.70
Sequential 48.46
Uncached Write 91.87 56.40 MB/sec [4K blocks]
Uncached Write 87.13 49.30 MB/sec [256K blocks]
Uncached Read 21.90 6.41 MB/sec [4K blocks]
Uncached Read 68.84 34.60 MB/sec [256K blocks]
Random 38.16
Uncached Write 15.30 1.62 MB/sec [4K blocks]
Uncached Write 91.88 29.41 MB/sec [256K blocks]
Uncached Read 55.39 0.39 MB/sec [4K blocks]
Uncached Read 94.95 17.62 MB/sec [256K blocks]

 

[DoFoT9]

i think the real issue is, why doesnt apple have 800MHz RAM installed by default?!?!

 

[phjo]

i think the real issue is, why doesnt apple have 800MHz RAM installed by default?!?!

Well, maybe the benchmark that JJP9398 posted here (thanks for that btw) is part of the answer...

Could you make sure, JJP9398, that you run the benchmark with :
- no program running or window open (no safari, no Mail, not anything but Finder)

(The best is to reboot and run the benchmark soon after the reboot)

The results you posted look seriously bad compared with mines (new white macbook with original apple 667Mhz ram, but with the harddrive swapped for a 320Gb WD) :

Results 128.68
System Info
Xbench Version 1.3
System Version 10.5.6 (9G2110)
Physical RAM 2048 MB
Model MacBook5,2
Drive Type WDC WD3200BEVT-00ZCT0
CPU Test 129.94
GCD Loop 227.59 12.00 Mops/sec
Floating Point Basic 109.73 2.61 Gflop/sec
vecLib FFT 90.57 2.99 Gflop/sec
Floating Point Library 160.40 27.93 Mops/sec
Thread Test 241.69
Computation 388.07 7.86 Mops/sec, 4 threads
Lock Contention 175.50 7.55 Mlocks/sec, 4 threads
Memory Test 158.37
System 198.10
Allocate 260.02 954.86 Kalloc/sec
Fill 159.38 7749.28 MB/sec
Copy 199.06 4111.49 MB/sec
Stream 131.92
Copy 125.12 2584.39 MB/sec
Scale 125.75 2598.05 MB/sec
Add 140.22 2986.95 MB/sec
Triad 138.01 2952.39 MB/sec
Quartz Graphics Test 155.79
Line 146.05 9.72 Klines/sec [50% alpha]
Rectangle 184.85 55.19 Krects/sec [50% alpha]
Circle 151.79 12.37 Kcircles/sec [50% alpha]
Bezier 150.50 3.80 Kbeziers/sec [50% alpha]
Text 151.40 9.47 Kchars/sec
OpenGL Graphics Test 127.78
Spinning Squares 127.78 162.09 frames/sec
User Interface Test 223.32
Elements 223.32 1.02 Krefresh/sec
Disk Test 57.05
Sequential 72.21
Uncached Write 92.04 56.51 MB/sec [4K blocks]
Uncached Write 94.80 53.64 MB/sec [256K blocks]
Uncached Read 39.93 11.69 MB/sec [4K blocks]
Uncached Read 111.86 56.22 MB/sec [256K blocks]
Random 47.15
Uncached Write 18.54 1.96 MB/sec [4K blocks]
Uncached Write 124.99 40.01 MB/sec [256K blocks]
Uncached Read 70.19 0.50 MB/sec [4K blocks]
Uncached Read 115.57 21.44 MB/sec [256K blocks]

So could you JJP9398 run the benchmark again ? I strongly suspect, and hope, that some intensive cpu task was already running in the background when you ran the benchmark...

phjo

 

[55orangeave]

The results you posted look seriously bad compared with mines (new white macbook with original apple 667Mhz ram, but with the harddrive swapped for a 320Gb WD) :

phjo

Your hard drive. Is it 7200 rpm? This will make a difference in the benchmark. I went into the Apple Store the other day, and did several test on the the new White and Alum. The Alum won by a long shot. When all tests were checked.With out a doubt the memory in the new White Macbook is the achilles heal.

I am getting a Macbook this Friday. And I have bounced back and forth between the white and alum. If the 800mhz can be confirmed, personally I think it would make a little differecne.

While we are here in this thread with New White owners. I have to throw the question out there. How do you guys rate them. Do they have the same zippy feel as the Alum?

Some have mentioned in other threads that the new one by far beats the old one.

EDIT: Also at first glance it would appear that the new White has a crisper screen and softer edges? Is this true. The keyboard also seemed different?

 

[TheScavenger]

I really don't think the 667MHz RAM is the Achilles heel of the white MacBook. I understand that DDR3 1066MHz is going to provide greater memory bandwidth at the expense of looser timings. In reality, 99.9% of the time that higher memory bandwidth just isn't useful. DDR3 is going to reach its true potential when we get an Intel processor with an IMC.

Check out OWC's MacBook benchmarks. Specifically look at the 2.4GHz white MacBook with 4GB of RAM versus the 2.4GHz Alum MacBook with 4GB of RAM.

http://eshop.macsales.com/shop/Memory_Benchmark/Apple_MacBook/

 

[phjo]

Your hard drive. Is it 7200 rpm? This will make a difference in the benchmark.

Nope, it is the 5400 rpm model (but it is already a significant improvement over the 5400 rpm 120Gb harddrive sold with the macbook)

But this is typically the part that should be ignored in the two previous benchmarks posted... Cpu, OpenGl seems to be about 50% faster on my macbook than on the OP's... The only part where the OP gets better results is (not quite unexpectedly) part of the memory tests...

I went into the Apple Store the other day, and did several test on the the new White and Alum. The Alum won by a long shot. When all tests were checked.With out a doubt the memory in the new White Macbook is the achilles heal.

If you tested with something like xbench, I bet the harddrive made the largest difference in the end, much more than memory (so the difference could be largely compensated with a new harddrive...)

I am getting a Macbook this Friday. And I have bounced back and forth between the white and alum. If the 800mhz can be confirmed, personally I think it would make a little differecne.

I am interested as well, as I do intend to upgrade my macbook to 4Gb, so of course I'll choose 800Mhz modules over 667 it that makes any positive difference. (The difference in price is negligible)

While we are here in this thread with New White owners. I have to throw the question out there. How do you guys rate them. Do they have the same zippy feel as the Alum?

Well, that's funny, as I had the exact opposite reaction to the alum keyboards, which I found a bit soft and unzippy, compared to the first generation macbook I had been using for nearly three years... But after having seen the alum macbooks in several stores, I must say there are significant differences in the feeling of their keyboards. (The only keyboards that always feel the same, which is to say perfect IMHO, are the alum desktop keyboards...)

EDIT: Also at first glance it would appear that the new White has a crisper screen and softer edges? Is this true. The keyboard also seemed different?

Not much difference in my experience for keyboard, screen, or case... but the new one runs quieter and cooler...

phjo

 

[sovereign]

Just received and installed 4gb of 800mhz RAM from Newegg. The 800mhz appears to be recognized, as others have reported. I went with Patriot brand for $43 shipped. I was thinking to go with Crucial, but for some reason it has a latency of 6 in this particular chip. So I went with Patriot which has a latency of 5 and has been confirmed by others to work, which it does.