Is 4GB RAM enough to run all applications? (comming from a pc world here where ram is never enough)
Cuz I can imagine when you run parrallells desktop and an app, the imac will become very slow, not?
(Just bough a second hand 20" iMac dual core to test it, before I buy a new machine)
And is there a "trick" to use more ramm?
Mac Pro, Mac OS X (10.6.7)
You can never have too much RAM or too many backups.
Parallels can use less than 1 GB of RAM depending upon the version of Windows. Windows 7 requires at least 1 GB plus overhead. Then you need to know how much RAM you will need for OS X applications.
In general 4 GBs is more than adequate for typical home use.
If you are going to be running Parallels Desktop I would double your RAM to 8GBs.
Ok, but I've read that my mac can only use 4 GB? is it a hardware limit? Or can I just inserd 8 GB and will it work?
The most RAM you can install is limited by the hardware. Mac Pros can support at the minimum 16 GBs and a maximum around 48 GBs.
I don't agree with Eric that 8 GBs is needed to run Parallels. I've run Parallels on a 4 GB Mac Pro since the first release of Parallels. I've also used VM Fusion. I've use Parallels on several laptops none of which have more than 4 GBs. Even with Windows installed and providing sufficient RAM to Windows, Parallels rarely hits 2 GBs in use.
Your RAM needs are determined by the RAM needs of the software you use concurrently. I have ten concurrent applications now running on my 4 GB iMac and there's still 1.6 GBs of free RAM available.
I have 4 GB of memory in my MacBook Pro and multi-task quite frequently, and I've yet to see the computer slow down even under a heavy workload. Mac OS X manages memory very efficiently.
So does this means that I can insert 8GB ram?
It shouldn't be a problem. What is the model of the iMac that you purchased second hand? You can find this information by clicking on the Apple menu, click on About this Mac, then click on the "More Info..." button. In the System Profiler window, you will see the Model Identifier which will be displayed as "iMac10,1" for example (the numbers will vary depending on the model).
As I said above you can install at a minimum upto 16 GBs depending on the specific model and version of OS X installed. With Snow Leopard even the first generation MP supports up to 32 GBs.
Hello,
It is an iMac 4,1
Your current iMac has an Intel Core Duo processor and can utilize up to 2 GB of DDR2 667 MHz memory. The currently shipping iMac models featuring the new Intel Core i5 and i7 processors can support up to 16 GB of DDR3 1333 MHz memory.
Hope that helps, have a great day.
Is 4GB RAM enough to run all applications? (comming from a pc world here where ram is never enough)
