RAM: 8 or 16 or SSD?

[kokhoong0624]

I know this question had been asked many times but I just wanna know if it's worth it on my MacBook Pro.

I have an early 2011 15 inch MBP: 2.0GHz, 500GB HDD, 4GB RAM and AMD 128MB graphics.

Should I upgrade my RAM to 8 or 16 GB? I don't know if it's worth it because my Macbook Pro uses a 1333 ram instead of a 1666 one?.. And will there be any significant difference between 8 and 16?
I surf the web and I play games like Sims 4 and I just do some nifty video editing with AE (I don't mind waiting for longer renders).

(I am currently planning to buy a MBP Retina but I'll probably wait till next year or 2017 :l )

And should I upgrade to an SSD? I think it's pretty expensive and my MBP connects to it via a SATA cable right? Which is a lot slower than PCIe.. I saw this somewhere in this forums.

How much incremental speed I can expect if I change my RAM and my SSD?

I'm new here and thanks for reading this! Hope you guys have a nice day! I'll appreciate your opinions a lot.

 

[Ries]

An SSD will give you the most bang, everything will load a lot faster, which will make the machine feel like you just got a brand new faster macbook pro.

8GB will give you some on memory heavy programs. 16GB will properly not make any difference unless you do in virtual machines.

I have upgraded my late 2011 with 16GB (memory is cheap) and an SSD. I would not have a reason to update if my dGPU wasn't dying on me.

 

[Weaselboy]

How much incremental speed I can expect if I change my RAM and my SSD?

See this test. RAM beyond 8GB is not likely to make a difference given your described usage.

SSD will make a big difference in app launch time or when opening large files (like videos), but otherwise not much difference once the app/file is launched.

 

[CoastalOR]

OP: I did the RAM and SSD upgrade on my 2011 15" MBP. I agree with Ries & Weaselboy that 8 Gb should be fine for you. My old OEM drive was a 500 Gb 5400 RPM that had a Blackmagic speed test of about 68 MB/s Read/Write. The SSD Blackmagic speed test was around 300 MB/s Read/Write. The internal drive connector is SATA3 capable of 6 Gb/s. Be careful of the drive ribbon cable because they can be fragile.

 

[zombiecakes]

if you are using an old HDD the answer is always SSD. You dont have to get an expensive large one, a $60 128gb SSD is fine and then you can replace your useless DVD drive with the old HDD to use it for data using an optibay which is less than $10.

 

[austinpike]

Do the SSD, like, yesterday.

Probably don't need the 16GB.

 

[gngan]

I have an early 2011 13'' MBP. SSD will make your laptop last 2-3 more years. 8gb RAM is also a good upgrade. You don't need 16gb.

 

[Meister]

SSD

 

[kokhoong0624]

Thanks people! I decided to get an 8GB Ram and upgrade my HDD to an SSD haha
Thanks a lot again for your suggestions!
Especially

See this test. RAM beyond 8GB is not likely to make a difference given your described usage.

SSD will make a big difference in app launch time or when opening large files (like videos), but otherwise not much difference once the app/file is launched.

You convinced me completely to go to an 8GB ram! hahaha