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Upgrading to 4gb of ram in 2007 MBP

E

Evervescant

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jun 24, 2012
6
2
Hey everyone,
I have a 17" non-unibody macbook pro from 2007 and I'd like to upgrade it to 4gb of ram before I upgrade to Lion (or Mountain Lion when it comes out). I'm a little confused about what type of ram to get, but someone told me that this would work: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231135

Would that be suitable for my machine?

Thanks you very much. Any feedback is greatly appreciated!
 
Evervescant said:
Hey everyone,
I have a 17" non-unibody macbook pro from 2007 and I'd like to upgrade it to 4gb of ram before I upgrade to Lion (or Mountain Lion when it comes out). I'm a little confused about what type of ram to get, but someone told me that this would work: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231135

Would that be suitable for my machine?
Click to expand...
Yes. Your Mac can use up to 6GB of 667 MHz PC2-5300 DDR2 SDRAM.

You can find specs on all Apple products, including maximum RAM:
 
4GB is the recommended maximum because the machine operates best with matched pairs. While the machine will support 6GB (1x4, 1x2) it will actually not perform as well as match 4GB (2x2GB).
 
Wow thank you so much for the quick responses! Those links are very helpful GGJstudios; it's good to know that I can have up to 6gb!
 
GGJstudios said:
That's not true. There is a slight advantage to using matched pairs, but not enough to outweigh the advantage of having 50% more RAM.

MR Guide to Matched RAM on Intel Macs
Click to expand...

I have to disagree. There are both stability and unusual performance issues commonly reported with mis-matched pairs. I've seen plenty of people present with machines with mis-matched pairs claiming after the "upgrade" the machine is unstable, or has performance issues, all generally resolved by replacing with matched pairs (occasionally it's bad RAM). But to each their own. I always stick with matched pairs.
 
G-Mo said:
I have to disagree. There are both stability and unusual performance issues commonly reported with mis-matched pairs.
Click to expand...
That's far more likely a problem with the quality of the RAM, rather than the fact that they're not matched. Matched RAM is absolutely not required to have stable and reliable performance. It provides a very slight benefit, but that benefit is easily outweighed by a larger quantity of RAM in the vast majority of cases. If you can use matched RAM, it's certainly preferable, but in the OP's case, sacrificing 2GB of RAM for the sake of having matched pairs is not a good decision.
 
GGJstudios said:
That's far more likely a problem with the quality of the RAM, rather than the fact that they're not matched. Matched RAM is absolutely not required to have stable and reliable performance. It provides a very slight benefit, but that benefit is easily outweighed by a larger quantity of RAM in the vast majority of cases.
Click to expand...

Again, I disagree. OOD.
 
G-Mo said:
Again, I disagree. OOD.
Click to expand...
You can disagree all you like. Statistical facts prove otherwise. Run some tests with 4GB of matched RAM vs 6GB of unmatched. Provided the test fully utilizes the RAM, the 6GB will win every time.
 
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