The Early/Mid 2010 MBP (you know, that one released in April 2010 or more specifically the MacBook Pro 6,1) OFFICIALLY per Apple ONLY supports 8GB of RAM.
SO! Per Apple, the MacBook Pro 6,1 has a documented maximum capacity of 8GB of RAM. OFFICIALLY, this conversation should be over. Everyone here insisting that the MacBook Pro 6,1 only officially supports 8GB of RAM is 100% completely and totally correct.
The issue hackintosh1800 and myself are discussing is not what Apple officially tells us the machine supports. We know that the MacBook Pro 6,1 only OFFICIALLY supports 8GB RAM. It was right there in our owners manuals when we bought the machines. It's in the support documentation. Several people here have generously reminded us of this right here in the forums.
The issue we are talking about is whether this is a physical hardware incompatibility, e.g. the logicboard and chipset simply does not mathematically support the 2x 8GB RAM sticks I put in there, versus a soft block, e.g. the EFI was programmed by Apple to only allow a max of 8GB RAM. Similar to CPUs, kind of. Is the CPU limited to 2.0Ghz because it physically gets to hot and melts itself OR has it been limited to this speed by the BIOS and thus can be overclocked.
More simply, let's say I have a car that cannot go any faster than 65mph. Is my car's speed limited because the engine simply is not powerful enough to go any faster OR has someone installed a speed limiter/governor. (the metaphors are endless here)
Hackintosh1800 and myself have both successfully gotten the machine to turn on with one or both of the 2x 8GB DIMMS installed.
I bought this: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B006DI9PG8/ref=oh_details_o00_s00_i00
I couldn't get it to boot into Windows 7 or OSX with latest EFI, but I could boot into Fedora 17 and it showed 15.6GB RAM installed and had no problems. We're trying to determine if the machine is really just unable to accept 16GB RAM or has Apple purposely limited the machine to 8GB RAM. If the incompatibility is as simple as the hardware cannot accept 16GB RAM, then this conversation is futile. If it's a soft block, e.g. Apple simply does not want us to have 16GB RAM for whatever reason, then maybe the EFI can be unofficially modded to allow the machine to use it (someone out there is likely horrified at such a suggestion).
The issue for me surround the installation of 16GB RAM seems to be Apple's hardware checking. On start up, Fedora 17 noted specifically that the installed RAM failed the EFI hardware check, but let me boot anyways and work without issue. It's 10:45PM CST and I don't feel like taking my MBP apart again to reinstall the 16GB RAM. I plan on returning the RAM to Amazon, but I could install it again and video what happens for show and tell I guess :-/
For what it's worth, it is important to note that the RAM I purchased has a latency of 9-9-9-24 and limited to 1333mhz, the same latency of my 8GB RAM (2x 4GB DIMMS). I've read that even trying to install 8GB RAM at some latencies on our models have caused instabilities.
My suspicions of a soft block from Apple actually begin with the current Corsair 8GB RAM I installed after I purchased it. The RAM was 8GB (2x 4GB DIMMS) clocked at 1333mhz. Interestingly, the documentation says that my machine supported a max clock speed of 1066mhz and, of course, OSX shows 8GB RAM installed, clocked at 1066mhz, BUT when I boot into Windows 7 Enterprise, it shows 8GB RAM installed clocked at 1333mhz. If the hardware supposedly only supports 1066mhz, then why does Windows clock my RAM at 1333mhz? Windose is a ***** OS. If my RAM is trying to run faster than the hardware supports, it would throw a BSOD and die.
We're just expressing our concern that there might not be any physical hardware issue and the Apple Police may be just trying to play nanny with our machines.
