Newbie seeking RAM advice

[LWB]

I am considering upgrading the RAM (stock 1GB currently) on my computer (iMac 2.0 GHz Core 2 Duo) so advice on how much I might need would be greatly appreciated!

I haven't had to yet, but probably will need to do some fairly extensive video editing and creation (using iMovie, nothing professional). I also am getting an SLR camera and will obviously be taking high res pics and might use Aperture, undecided at this point. Word processing, medium-size music library run fine. Also I know Apple says 512 MB for Leopard, but coming from Windows not too too long ago I remember buying software that just crashed when running it even above the recommended amount of RAM with all other specification met as well.

Thanks in advance for any suggestions.

 

[Gee]

Well, the more you have, the better everything will run. However, having said that, anything over 2GB and you're probably not going to notice, even for home video editing. Anything less than 1GB might be sub-optimum, but you have 1GB already.

Conclusion being, if you can afford another GB, get it. If you can't, 512MB will still make a noticable difference. If you can't afford that, then what you have already is fine for most of the stuff you want to do.

 

[LWB]

Thanks Gee

I've been looking at prices on OWC and it's much cheaper than I thought to upgrade. I might just max out the computer with 3 gigs (even if it is overkill) of matched RAM for $160.

 

[Heb1228]

I've been looking at prices on OWC and it's much cheaper than I thought to upgrade. I might just max out the computer with 3 gigs (even if it is overkill) of matched RAM for $160.

Its not overkill and the performance increase will certainly be worth that kind of money. Go for maxxing it out, OS X will take advantage of the memory, even in day to day usage. My 1.5 GB is starting to feel cramped. You may also want to check out http://www.datamem.com to see how prices compare. They sell great memory for Macs.