in the past month I’ve been restoring an old 09 mbp. Put a new ssd in and bought new ram. It doesn’t register in either of my 09s, the common 3 chime no boot scenario. But it registers in my 11 iMac. And both of them are very finicky with accepting ram. Any suggestions?
MacBook Pro 15″, 10.15
That would be the incorrect spec for that Mac.
You would need: 2 - 204-pin PC3-8500 (1066 MHz) DDR3 SO-DIMM
That would be the incorrect spec for that Mac.
You would need: 2 - 204-pin PC3-8500 (1066 MHz) DDR3 SO-DIMM
Negative, it isn’t booting at all with the new ram. Just like stedman said it’s the incorrect spec ram. It’s just giving the 3x beep. I’m going to return the 2 sticks I got and hopefully buy the right stuff this time
Uniblobber Said:
"2009 MacBook Pro 15” not accepting new ram: in the past month I’ve been restoring an old 09 mbp. Put a new ssd in and bought new ram. It doesn’t register in either of my 09s, the common 3 chime no boot scenario. But it registers in my 11 iMac. And both of them are very finicky with accepting ram. Any suggestions?"
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Verify that you have RAM:
sysctl hw.memsize
What are the brand and the specs of the RAM you bought? "Any old RAM" does not play well in Intel-powered Macs.
Uniblobber Said:
"2009 MacBook Pro 15” not accepting new ram: in the past month I’ve been restoring an old 09 mbp. Put a new ssd in and bought new ram. It doesn’t register in either of my 09s, the common 3 chime no boot scenario. But it registers in my 11 iMac. And both of them are very finicky with accepting ram. Any suggestions?"
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Well, is any RAM seen?
In the PowerPC days (pre-2006) faster RAM than Apple called for usually clocked back if it encountered a slower bus in a Mac. Example: most PowerMacs that shipped with PC-100 RAM would work just as well with PC-133 RAM.
That flexibility in Macs seemed to go away once Apple changed to Intel processors in 2006.
Allan Jones wrote:
In the PowerPC days (pre-2006) faster RAM than Apple called for usually clocked back if it encountered a slower bus in a Mac. Example: most PowerMacs that shipped with PC-100 RAM would work just as well with PC-133 RAM.
That flexibility in Macs seemed to go away once Apple changed to Intel processors in 2006.
I played around with different memory with my first Intel Mac - a late 2007 (Santa Rosa) polycarbonate MacBook. That thing was easy to play with, where the slots were inside the battery hatch and only needed a coin and a #00 Phillips screwdriver to remove, and maybe something to get the release lever to come out.
I remember trying all sorts of things, where I had a combination of OCZ "PC2-5400" (they had some weird claim about being able to overclock but it showed up as PC2-5300), Crucial PC2-5300, and Patriot (was factory installed in a 2006 Toshiba laptop) PC2-4200 SODIMMs. I found that any combination (even singles) worked, but any pair would both then default to both operating at the slowest speed.
I never tried anything faster, but I might have tried PC2-6400 if I had another computer that could use it.
Uniblobber Said:
"2009 MacBook Pro 15” not accepting new ram: Negative, it isn’t booting at all with the new ram. Just like stedman said it’s the incorrect spec ram. It’s just giving the 3x beep. I’m going to return the 2 sticks I got and hopefully buy the right stuff this time”
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Thanks for the update! Getting the right stuff definitely sounds like a plan!
They are crucial ddr3 pc3 4gb 12800.
Alright. In the past I’ve always used whatever ddr3 I had laying around and never came across any problems, so this is new to me. Thanks
You are welcome.
Yup! I’ll give an update when it starts working again too
Uniblobber Said:
"2009 MacBook Pro 15” not accepting new ram: Yup! I’ll give an update when it starts working again too”
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OK —Keep us up to date.
2009 MacBook Pro 15” not accepting new ram
