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Pulled the trigger and bought a Mac – now where to buy RAM?

Thanks for everyone’s input today about what Mac laptop to get. Here’s what I ended up getting:

MacBook Pro 15.4″
2.16 GHz, 1 GB RAM, 120 GB Hard Disk, 128 MB graphics card


After people pointed out some good reasons to go for the Pro, the decision was then about the higher-end version or not. The benefits of the more expensive version would have been a faster processor (2.33 vs 2.16) and a 256 MB graphics card. The faster processor didn’t seem worth the extra price. The extra graphics RAM was more tempting, I don’t know, maybe I should have gone with that instead. As someone pointed out, the upcoming CS3 release from Adobe is going to have more intense graphics requirements, which was one reason to go for the Pro vs. non-Pro. Maybe once I get CS3 I’ll have wished I went with the 256 MB graphics RAM. But I figure I’m gonna drop 3 GB of RAM in there, so I should be able to run whatever the hell I want without problems.

So one more question for people out there: where should I buy a single 2 GB stick of RAM for a MacBook Pro Core 2 Duo?



Someone pointed out macsales.com, and I was checking out the different options. There are three different options I could go with. I’m not a RAM expert, so I have no idea what the benefits and drawbacks for any of these choices are. Here are the choices:

  1. $260 – Other World Computing Brand
  2. $340 – Micron
  3. $450 – Samsung

Crucial’s got a 2 GB stick for $355.

They all look exactly the same to me. The only difference I can spot is that the Micron option says it’s “128 x 8” versus the other two are “256 x 64”. I have no clue what this means. Is there any reason to not go with the cheapest option?

I’m going to be using the 1 GB stick of RAM that comes from Apple and just adding the new 2 GB stick I buy. Is there any brand that would play better with the 1 GB stick from Apple?

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7 thoughts on “Pulled the trigger and bought a Mac – now where to buy RAM?”

  1. I’m not sure about the technical specs, but I’ve had really good purchasing experiences with Crucial, so they get my vote just for the customer service aspect of it (just recently I needed to return a stick of RAM after a year, and they handled it no problem).

  2. Congrats. I just went out and bought the exact same machine 2 days ago. I’ve had an older Mac Mini for a while now, but this purchase represents my official “switch”.

  4. I broke out the putty knives and upgraded the RAM in my Mac Mini with a matched pair from Crucial. Very happy with the experience – very timely shipping, and a great website for figuring out what you need. BTW, they say a matched pair will perform better than a lopsided configuration like you’re considering… I don’t know if that’s just so they can sell more RAM, or if there’s a palpable performance increase, but you might want to consider going the whole way to 4GB.

  5. So everyone recommends Crucial, and I have no doubt that that’s probably the best option, but is it an extra $100 better than the cheap option? MacBook should arrive tomorrow, I guess I gotta get RAM pretty soon then…

    @Tom – don’t think I can go over 3 GB, that seems to be the max. And Apple sells the MacBooks maxed out with a 1 GB stick paired with a 2 GB stick…

  6. Kevin says:

    Crucial is a good company, but I bought my RAM for my MacBook at NewEgg.com. It was much cheaper (at the time) . I am very happy with it. (Bought it in August)

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