1GB or 2GB on Powerbook 15"

[james_p]

In a couple of weeks I will be buying a new Powerbook 15". Do I get 1GB or RAM or 2GB??

I'll spend the extra $$$$ if it's going to help.

Thanks,
James

[Bryson]

What are you planning to do with it? I use 1GB to do video editing and haven't had any problems. 2GB might be more money than it's worth.

[stonyc]

And if your income is that disposable, feel free to dispose some of it my way. :)

Seriously, if you have the money to max it out, why not? You could probably get two 1GB sticks of RAM from NewEgg for like $450... sell the 512 that comes with it, and overall it probably wouldn't put too big of a hurt on some people's wallets/purses. I have 1.5GB in mine, do some moderate-heavy image editing, browsing, e-mail, word-processing, etc. and have never experienced a slow down.

[Fooboy]

Yes ... what are you going to be doing with it?

I have a 12" 1.33ghz powerbook with 768 ... and I was scared about not having enough ram. I check the activity monitor periodicly and usually I have like 200 megs of ram free during heavy multitasking.

Granted - Im not doing video editing or what not ... but ill have itunes, sarafi with 4-5 tabs, iChat w/ several IM's, Word, Finder, sometimes iphoto too ...

If you close all that stuff and free up your ram again you can still use (right?) other apps that are more taxing like Garage Band or iMovie fine im sure. I did that stuff on my PC (Cool Edit Pro, NTrack Studio, Windows Movie Maker) but I havent done it on my powerbook yet.

[eleazar]

I know this is probably asked all the time but where is a good place to buy from and what brand (for 15" powerbook) I know that there are many crucial supporters but I ask again only because deals and opinions on ram are constantly changing.

[abraham]

NewEgg.com is nice

[james_p]

Thanks for the feedback, I will be doing allot of Video editing and High Resolution Photo editing. Nothing professional, just enjoy organizing home/family movies and pictures.

Storage space is not an issue because everything is stored off on a Network Drive.

I'm moving to the laptop first and if all goes well then I'll probably look at replacing my desktop with whatever Apple comes out with next year.

I have seen allot of great comments about 1Gig of Ram but not much with regards to 2Gig. I know it gets pricey, but if there is some performance benefit, I mean why not.

From what I've read/searched thus far, I am not sure I would see a benefit out of 2Gig. Maybe I'll go with a 1Gig memory stick so I can have one slot free down the road.

Thanks for the great input.

I'm really looking forward to Tiger and hope it will pave the way for me to make that switch off Windows XP. I like XP, but it's really seems old compared to Panther and escpecially with Tiger now coming out.

[Wyatt]

If you have the cash, go for it. You come across as somebody who doesn't mind spending the money (and is perfectly able)... I say max it out!

[El Guardo]

I know you mentioned that everything will be stored on a network drive, with space therefore not being of primary concern, but it may help to keep in mind your hard drive speed.

I purchased a 1.33Ghz 17" PB that came with 512MB of RAM and a 4,200rpm drive. Needing more performance I upgraded the memory to 1GB and noticed some improvement - mainly in terms of less lags and beachballs when running multiple applications. I then upgraded to a 7,200rpm HDD and the improvement was considerably more noticable than the memory upgrade - especially when working on and storing digital images and databases.

Others may like to comment on this...

[jamie]

A 1 gig stick is pretty cheap, mine was like $150, e.g. nothing.

My 15" PB has 2gig. The nicest thing about having 2gig is leaving applications open. With multiple projects open in Xcode, Safari, Mail, iTunes, Previewer, jEdit, Terminal, etc... I don't notice the memory drain. Also OSX seems to do a good job caching HD reads.

El Guardo is right about the 7200 RPM drives. They are wicked fast when compared to the standard laptop drive, but I use an external 200gig FW drive for storage.

Here's my machine spec for reference:

15" PB w/ 2gig
80 gig 5400 RPM HD
ATI 9700 mobility w/ 128meg
200gig External FW HD

[johnny5w@hotmail.com]

Where did you get this cheap usable ram for your 15" PB, jamie?

[james_p]

While money is always a concern, right now i'm more worried about putting the 128MB video and 2Gig of ram on the powerbook and it's effect on battery life.

One would think that More Ram, faster HD's, and so on just might suck the life out of a battery. Or maybe the difference will be very small.

I had a 17" HP Laptop awhile ago, bought it in Nov 04 but sold it two months later on Ebay...thing was like lugging around block of concrete. I doubt I'll ever get another 17" laptop. Lousy thing always ran hot, but thats what happens you they decided to stick a 3.4 Gig P4 processor in there.

Thanks,
James