MacBook Pro Supports 16GB Ram

Hi Tchou,

Here are my results after upgrading my early 2011 macbook pro 17'' with i7 2.2Ghz from 8GB to 16GB corsair DDR 3 1333Mhz RAM modules. I think my memory results are very low for 16 GB RAM? Am i right? what should

i do?

Have you checked to find out how much Parallels is designed to use? Since it's third party software, the best place to check would be with them. There may be a setting in their software that prevents us from using more RAM than a set amount. This may be a good thing since it's possible for your Mac to have a spike in memory requirements, but it's not available because you've given it all to the VM.

What results were you expecting? Perhaps the Corsair RAM doesn't perform as well as other brands. I've never bought their RAM so I have no basis of comparison as to its quality and performance. Also, the amount of memory may not have any influence on it's performance. The test is simply a measurement of how the memory responds to requests from your Mac. This would not be influenced by the installed amount. The speed of the RAM and performance of the memory bus do not changed based upon the amount of installed memory. Honestly, I don't run tests like this on my system, and I don't watch Activity Monitor constantly. You'll drive yourself nuts watching every detail of your system all day.

I agree with that I have a late 2011 BMP 13" 2.4 i5 with 16 gb corsair and a OCZ 512 gb sata III ssd

and the responce and stabillity of this machine is siply graet. And i also upgraded a erly 2011 with the old 4 gb of ram that i had it was running 2 gb 1000 Mhz and it accpted the 1333 Mhz and is also proformin at that speed.

I also did a trial with the 1600 and it worked but the moduls were not mine and had to return them to the machine that they were in.

I just got 16gb installed on my late 2011 macbook pro 15-inch and everytime I close the laptop, it shuts down. I haven't changed anything in the settings and ram a system check on everything else.

Anyone encounter this problem?

I ordered directly from crucial and had a tech guy to the installation and I was going to return it to crucial but I didn't know if it was incompatible so I'd buy the 8gb instead or just that specific item was faulty and ill try buying another 16gb.

I'm not sure that you've a RAM problem - what you describe isn't indicative of memory failure - and I've been running 16GB of RAM in my late 2011 15" since April of 2012 with no problems.

Follow the steps in ds store's excellent user tip - Step by step to fix your Mac. It's a wealth of information.

Good luck,

Clinton

I have been running a MacBook Pro Late 2011 with 16GB of RAM installed for several months, and I have experienced zero issues with it. About a month before, I also installed a 512GB Crucial SSD too. This thing is blazing fast, no matter what I do with it. I won't need to buy a new MacBook Pro for quite a while as a result of these two upgrades. I highly recommend also installing an SSD in your system as well. The prices are falling rapidly. Just make sure you buy a good brand of RAM and SSD. Crucial, Samsung, Techworks, etc. are all really great brands.

For my 2012 mbp the standard ram speed is 1600, I. Don't know about the older models but I wouldn't put anything lower thanthat in mine if i had to replace the ram. I plan on doing a 16gb upgrade as well but will stick with the 1600 speed, I think if I were to go any faster that it may cause issues

Running lower speed RAM would not work properly if at all. Depending on the type of RAM, you can install faster RAM than the design speed of the memory bus, but why should you when you can just buy the correct RAM? Installing faster RAM (if it fits) does not mean faster performance. Your system will always run at the bus speed that it's designed to run, no matter which RAM is installed.

Niel are u sure? 🙂 i read from here that 8 is the maximum http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1270#link2

AlexNubani wrote:

Niel are u sure? 🙂 i read from here that 8 is the maximum http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1270#link2

What you read and what is actual are two different things.

See image below - any questions?

It's interesting that this whole debate keeps going on since several of us have reported that the 2011 MacBook Pros work really well with 16GB of RAM installed. My fear in the beginning was that it might cause issues with heat generation, or loss of battery life. Neither of those things have happened. I think Apple was simply being conservative with their system specs. A Core i7 processor can actually address far more than 16GB of RAM, but there must be some limitations due to power flow, heat, etc. I have had absolutely no degredation in reliability as a result of adding the 16GB RAM upgrade. With any upgrade, you should always make sure to focus on getting a great quality upgrade rather than going for a low price.

KTGHowie wrote:

It's interesting that this whole debate keeps going on since several of us have reported that the 2011 MacBook Pros work really well with 16GB of RAM installed.

This will keep going for another year or two since people will keep on asking the same questions that's been answered a couple of hundred times in different threads.

It's the "me too" phenomenon. I understand some people just need to ask a lot of questions to be sure they're not going to screw something up. I can respect that. My only problem with it is that when I'm trying to do research on how to solve a technical issue, a lot of forums (including this one) are filled with "me too" repsonses, rather than useful advice from people who found the solution to the issue. It's why I try to CONTRIBUTE as much as possible rather than complain constantly. Stack Social does a great job of weeding out those annoying "me too" responses.

Apple Geniuses themselves have told me that 16GB shoudl work although it's not recommended becuase they havent done enough testing on anything more than 8GB.

RAM sellers like crucial.com all say 16GB should be fine.

HOWEVER, knowing all this, I still posted an inquiry into the compatability becuase I have order 4 different sets of 16GB ram (brand-new, high-quality, direct from manufacturer or retailer) and none of them have worked. I have either had (1) power issues, (2) faulty/unrecognized RAM, or (3) about a week after installation apple's "black screen of death" happened so often my computer was unusable. I ran every diagnostic, reboot, reset, etc. and I took it into multiple repair shops; they all said it was due to too much RAM. I have since switched to 8GB and all the issues have been resolved.

It is true, I have read multiple people confirm that the 16GB works fine, but unfortunately in my case it didn't.