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General discussion

3GB of RAM vs. two 1GB sticks

Dec 10, 2007 10:03AM PST

Just as a random note here, but my MBP apparently shipped this morning, arrived at the depot, had the casing fixed, and is currently en route to my Apple Store. Speedy for Apple repairs.

Anyway, when it comes back, I am going to see whether or not I should install an additional gig of memory into it, bumping it from 2GB to 3. I know that Apple and most people say RAM pairing is more beneficial, but didn't OWC or somebody test that in some of the recent MacBooks, 3GB was slightly better than 2GB? I just want to know what everyone's thoughts are on this. I plan to go to an authorized Apple tech and have a 320GB HD installed. I want to have my MBP maxed out to the limits, since I will need all the power and storage available to me.

Also, will 3GB work better overall than 2GB? I have had pretty good performance with 2GB, but I'm hoping an increase will improve some performance. Or could the uneven pairing cause a small drop in performance? What happened to the old saying "the more the merrier"? Used to apply to RAM.
Thanks,
-BMF

Discussion is locked

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Just links to fill the void.
Dec 10, 2007 10:15AM PST
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I'm not running a Santa Rosa system.
Dec 10, 2007 10:21AM PST

Mine's a 2.16Ghz model, with the pre-Santa Rosa board and ATI graphics. I just read some more on this link I found a little while ago, and if some of the posters are right, Leopard could utilize 4GB of RAM in the 64-bit environment even though my MBP would only accept 3 as the max.

http://arstechnica.com/journals/apple.ars/2007/05/18/is-3gb-better-than-2gb-of-ram-in-a-macbook-yes-and-no

So theoretically, the system could actually use all 4GB and the added bonus of the pairing because of the 64-bit. It wouldn't have to "cram it all in a 32-bit environment". Interesting. Even without the environment limitations and all, it would use two 2GB sticks and report as 3, leaving the 4th unused. But you could still benefit from the dual bandwidth I'm guessing. But I'm just assuming that this one article is correct. Being without a functional MBP to test on, I can't really say. What do you guys say?
-BMF