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Stock MBA 4gb RAM

R

riley41090

macrumors member
Original poster
Jun 13, 2012
32
0
Purchased my Macbook Air 11" today, was hoping to get with 8gb of RAM but i didn't want any bigger than a 128gb SDD for cost reasons, predictably they didn't stock any custom setups in my Apple store and after assessing my needs with the MBA i decided that 4gb RAM should be enough.

My question is - is the activity monitor 'page outs' reading all i should view to check that it is enough for my usage? Right now i am over the moon with the performance but i'm slightly worried by only having 4gb RAM with the upgrade to 8gb being relatively inexpensive - would you recommend me returning it and buying online and getting the 8gb or not?

I guess waiting to see what the performance is like after a few days of use is best.

I guess what i really want to say is i really love my new macbook air, a wonderful contrast to my 27" iMac :)
 
this whole page out thing is more ocd in my opinion. never had to worry about it before. i had 4gb of ram in my 2011 mbp with no problems and i have 4 gb of ram in my new 13 mba.
 
It depends on what your needs are. The SSD is pretty fast, but flash is still not as fast as RAM. Page outs are normal, no matter how much RAM you have, but obviously having more RAM would make them less common.

I had the 4GB model and it was adequate for everything I did, even with the page outs. That said, I use Parallels Desktop, and having 8GB is nice.

If you do something memory intensive, such as run a virtual machine, or photo editing, the extra RAM may help.
 
4GB is plenty. You saved yourself $100. The only time I went over 4GB on my prior MacBook is when Adobe Flash and/or Safari decided it wanted to spontaneously eat GB of RAM.
 
From my understanding 4GB RAM is enough, but sense the cost of the upgrade is cheap enough at $100 to ensure what ever comes down the road it will handle. That is have several Apps open at one time.

Now you see the unit and you have a good unit for the week it takes to make order one. Go for it.

Everyday for the week I have waited for mine I have tried to talk myself into the $1700 model they have in stock at the Apple Store so I could have it now. I don't have a good computer here. A perfectly fine running 8yr old Pent.4.....

It's been a long week and tomorrow is the day.
 
I've been debating the same issue. 4 vs 8 gb ram.

My concern is future releases of osx such as ML may use more ram?

I've decided to go with 8gb as its not upgrade able and may help future resale value.
 
No page outs with the 4GB RAM but I'm upgrading to 8GB. In the past getting more RAM extended the life of the laptop for years longer. For example, even back in 2001, 1 GB RAM was overkill but 3 years later it was still in use, while the iBook limited max RAM faded away, and even now some 12 years later the PowerBook is still works fine with a wireless N card.
 
I didn't want 4GB, mostly because I like to have quite a bit running and really need to, and I usually keep quite a few Safari tabs open which eats up RAM with web content, so I ordered and got a base 13" with 8GB. They only stock the ultimates with the crazy drive and cpu upgrades in store and base models.
 
thanks for all the advice.

I've had activity monitor up since i got it yesterday evening, had just over 100kb page outs (until i decided to open all the apps at once which isn't really a fair test and it shot up to 116mb but thats not really relevant).

Decided to close the activity monitor as i agree it is a bit like OCD but then again a £800 laptop as a student is a very expensive purchase so i really want to make sure its the right choice. Going to see how it 'feels' more than what the numbers say.

So far it 'feels' fantastic - not heard a peep from the fans, its the most silent thing in my house it seems. Love the form, was so torn between the 11" and 13" but the footprint of the 11" felt so much smaller despite only having a 1.7" smaller screen, its perfect as the portable side to my 27" iMac and the shorter battery life doesn't seem to be an issue, seems to think it'll last 6hours at the moment :)

Happy Apple customer yet again :apple:
 
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