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7/28/2019 Lab Tested the Ramifications of Additional Memory on a Mac | Macworld
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Sign In Join
(http://www..com/Macworld) (https://.com/macworld)
COMPUTER ACCESSORIES (/CATEGORY/COMPUTERS-ACCESSORIES)
upgrades (/tag/upgrades/), imac (/tag/imac/), macbook (/tag/macbook/),
mac mini (/tag/macmini/)
Lab Tested: The ramifications
of additional memory on a
Mac
It happens to every Mac (and every other kind of PC): The system slows down
when its doing lot of things at once. If this happens to your Mac more than youd
like, though, your system might need more RAM.
Adding more RAM to your Macif you can add more RAMis one of the eaiest
ways to improve your Macs performance. The crucial question is, How much
more RAM do you actually need? Macworld Lab ran benchmarks on a couple ofMacs at different RAM configurations and analyzed the results. Our conclusion:
The impact of more RAM depends on the types of tasks your Mac performs. In
some situations your Mac may benefit from having as much RAM as you can
afford; in others, youll be fine with the stock configuration.
But before we dive into the results, lets take a brief look at what RAM is and why
its important to your Mac. (This article focuses exclusively on the impact of RAM
on system performance, but of course RAM isnt the only component that affects
performance. Macworld Lab is currently working on tests that will allow us to take
a similar look at how other componentsstorage, graphics, and CPUaffect
Albert Filice@monstasaurous May 10, 2013 3:00 AM
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ALBERT FILICE
performance.)
What is RAM?
Random Access Memoryis a temporary storage medium that your Macs CPU
uses for fast access to data its processing. The CPU can access data contained
in RAM much faster than it can data held on long-term storage devices like
traditional hard drives and even solid-state drives.
(http://images.techhive.com/images/article/2013/04
/ram_assortment_types_museam_thingy-100034102-orig.png)
RAM designs vary for different computers and different needs.
Suppose that you want to work on a text file. Your computer will copy the text
fileand the necessary information for the text editor youre usinginto RAM.
Next, lets imagine that you open Photoshop, while leaving the text editor open.
Photoshop also loads data into RAM; so at this point, your Mac will have two apps
loaded into RAM. The more apps you open without closing down other ones, the
less available RAM will remain available to accommodate other apps and perform
other functions.
When your RAM is full and another app needs to use some of the space,
somethings got to give. In this case,paging will occur: Your Macs CPU will move
data that isnt in active use from RAM to a swap file on your storage device (hard
drive or SSD), and the new data will go into RAM. Paging can make a computer
that seemed fast a second ago slow to a crawl. The more RAM your system has
available, the less your CPU will rely on paging
(http://images.techhive.com/images/article/2013/04/ram_sys_information_photo-
100034812-orig.png)
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A Retina MacBook Pro with 8GB of RAMa system that doesn't have user-upgradable RAM.
Can I upgrade my RAM?
Apple adopts a locked-down approach toward many of its Macs, including theMacBook Air and the Retina MacBook Pro. On these Macs, RAM is factory-
installed directly on the motherboard as onboard memory. As a result, you cant
upgrade the systems RAM later; on the other hand, this approach allows Apple to
make laptops slimmer and more portable. In Apples current computer lineup, the
Mac Pro, the 27-inch iMac, the Mac mini, and the non-Retina MacBook Pro have
user-upgradable RAM.
Crucial (http://www.crucial.com/store/drammemory.aspx), Kingston
(http://www.kingston.com/us/memory/search/options/), and Tiger Direct
(http://www.tigerdirect.com/sectors/campaigns/memory-finder.asp) offer onlinetools designed to tell you whether your RAM is user-upgradable, and to help you
find the correct RAM for an upgrade. NewEgg has a memory finder
(http://www.newegg.com/MemoryFinder/). OWC offers an online RAM upgrade
guide (http://eshop.macsales.com/shop/apple/memory/).
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ALBERT FILICE(http://images.techhive.com/images/article/2013/04/ram_onboard_macbook_air-
100034082-orig.png)
The RAM modules on this 2010 MacBook Air are soldered to the motherboard and thus are not
user-upgradable.
Benchmarks: The effects of RAM
The more RAM a Mac has, the better it performsbut how much improvement will
you see? To find out, we ran tests, including our Speedmark 8
(http://www.macworld.com/article/2013458/measure-mac-performance-
with-speedmark-8.html) benchmarking suite, on two computers equipped with
three levels of RAM: 4GB, 8GB, and 16GB. The first system we tested was a
mid-2011 iMac with a 3.1GHz Core i5 processor and a 1TB hard drive. The
second was a late-2011 MacBook Pro with a 2.4GHz Core i7 processor and a
750GB hard drive. Both systems carried standard congifurations and originally
came with 4GB of RAM.
Photoshop CS6 actions test
100MB file
250MB file
500MB file
Results are in seconds. Smaller results/shorter bars are better.
Our Photoshop test consists of performing a series of actions on a file. As the test
results show, the effect of additional RAM on performance depends on the file
sizes you typically work with. Its possible to see a diminishing return or a huge
benefit from extra RAM.
Photoshop is a perfect example of an app that can take advantage of having a
large amount of RAM available. It even lets you specify a maximum allowable
amount of RAM for the app to use. Otherwise, Photoshop might eat your entire
RAM pie, leaving just the crumbs for your other applications.
(http://images.techhive.com/images/article/2013/04/screen-shot-2013-04-22-
at-9.43.59-am-100034081-orig.png)
4GB 141.3 seconds
8GB 98.7 seconds
16GB 98.0 seconds
265.0 seconds4GB
8GB 130.3 seconds
16GB 122.7 seconds
795.6 seconds4GB
330.3 seconds8GB
16GB 178.0 seconds
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Adjust your settings to prevent Photoshop from hogging all of your system's RAM.
VMware-PCMark on Windows 7
Results are scores. Larger results/longer bars are better.
We ran Windows 7 using VMware with a relatively light set of tests. Virtual
machines can require a lot of RAM, but not always. We didnt see any substantial
improvement when allocating more than 4GB to the virtual machine; however, your
experience may be different if you have a lot going on. The same factors that go
into deciding how much RAM you need also apply to virtual machinesso if youdo heavy lifting in your virtual OS, youll need the RAM to back it up.
Mathematica
Mathematica results are in points. Longer results (and bars) are better.
Mathematica was the only other test that saw a speed boost of greater than than 5
percentbut the overall increase on this test was only about 6 percent. After
doubling the RAM from 4GB to 8GB, we saw a 2.5 percent increase in
performance. After quadrupling it from 4GB to 16GB, we saw a 6 percent
increase.
Elsewhere, not much changed
After running our Speedmark test suite with three different RAM configurations, we
concluded that maxing out RAM wont accelerate many computing pursuits. Of
our 15 test results, 12 failed to show at least a 5 percent increase in speed when
we upgraded our test systems from 4GB to 8GB or 16GB.
Below, we list the results for the 12 tests where our systems showed minor or no
12604GB
34568GB
365716GB
1.624GB
1.668GB
1.7316GB
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improvement after we added RAM. Some test results even seemed to get slightly
worse after the RAM upgrades, although this effect is probably due to
randomness.
iTunes
HandBrake
Results are in seconds. Shorter results and bars are better.
Cinebench CPU
Cinebench CPU test results are in seconds. Shorter results and bars are better.
Cinebench OpenGL
Cinebench OpenGL test results are in frames per second. Larger results/longer bars are better.
Copy 6GB folder
Zip 6GB folder
Unzip 6GB folder
Results are in seconds. Shorter results and bars are better.
iPhoto import
Aperture import
Results are in seconds. Shorter results and bars are better.
iMovie import
101.334GB
101.338GB
105.3316GB
119.004GB
117.678GB
113.6716GB
80.004GB
80.338GB
80.0016GB
40.264GB
40.238GB
40.1116GB
199.864GB
201.768GB
207.2716GB
337.364GB
349.368GB
316.1416GB
226.824GB
232.488GB
234.2016GB
119.334GB
113.338GB
114.0016GB
89.004GB
87.338GB
91.0016GB
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iMovie export
Results are in seconds. Shorter results and bars are better.
Portal 2
Portal 2 results are in frames per second. Larger results/longer bars are better.
Whats the ideal amount of RAM?
Most new Macs come with either 4GB or 8GB of RAM standard. Thats enough for
most Macs destined for general use. In the real world, every Mac setup is different,
so if youre considering adding more RAM, be sure to keep track of yourcomputers RAM usage during your normal workflow. If you tend to leave apps
open instead of closing them, or if you keep several browser windows open with
dozens of tabs in each, adding RAM will probably help your computer run more
smoothly. If you use an app that handles large files, it helps to have a lot of RAM.
(http://images.techhive.com/images/article/2013/04/screen-shot-2013-04-22-
at-9.11.49-am-100034075-orig.png)
OS X's Activity Monitor shows that this system is currently using a little more than half of its available
RAM.
Its not too hard to figure out the RAM sweet spot for your system and your
workflow. If your Mac is running slowly, open Activity Monitor (Applications >
Utilities >Activity Monitor) and check out the System Memory tab at the bottom of
the window. If youre low or completely out of Free or Inactive RAM and youre not
doing anything unusual (editing a humongous Photoshop file, for example), adding
76.264GB
73.488GB
73.9816GB
55.594GB
54.278GB
54.3616GB
108.734GB
109.178GB
109.5616GB
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more RAM will probably speed up your performance.
Try not to get carried away, though, as adding fistfuls of RAM that your Mac will
never or rarely use is throwing money away. Even if you can think of a few
scenarios where you might use all of the RAM that your system can handle,
consider how often they are likely to happen and whether buying RAM to handle
them is worth your money. Take a bit of time to diagnose your system and get a
rough idea of how much memory youre using now; and think about what you plan
to do in the future and how long it will be before you upgrade to a new Mac.
Editor's note: Updated 5/13/13 to include the non-Retina MacBook Pro in the list
of Macs that have user-upgradeable RAM. Also added Tiger Direct and OWC to
the list of online resources for buying RAM.
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