Upgrading to Mountain Lion

Question

Upgrading to Mountain Lion

Hi,

I'm currently running Snow Leopard on a 2011 Macbook (white Unibody), and considering upgrading to Mountain Lion, primarily so I can take advantage of the iCloud features that my iphone 4S benefit from. I'm aware from reading a few negative reviews that some of Mountain Lion's features do not necessarily work on older Macs, but my only real concern is that my Macbook might suffer from a slowdown in performance as a result of the upgrade, particularly as Snow Leopard has always run without any problems at all. According to Apple my Macbook does meet the minimum specification requirements, but would I be wise to at least upgrade the memory (currently 2GB) before attempting to install Mountain Lion?

itunes-OTHER, Mac OS X (10.6.8)

Posted on Oct 16, 2012 2:45 AM

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Answer 1

Sep 5, 2018 1:10 PM in response to Carolyn Samit

Thanks for the information Carolyn, I will visit my local Apple store to upgrade the memory. I did read somewhere that you can also use the store's own broadband to download the software (my own is woefully slow). Is that a practical option given the large file download?

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Answer 2

Oct 16, 2012 2:55 AM in response to Community User

Yes. 4GB of RAM at the minimum. If you are near an Apple store or Apple certified repair provider, you can have them install RAM for you.

If not, if you feel confident about doing this yourself, you can purchase RAM online.

Crucial is highly recommeneded. You can use their scanner tool > SDRAM, DDR2 and DDR RAM memory upgrades from Crucial.com

MacBook: How to remove or install memory

And before upgrading to Mountain Lion > App Compatibility Table - RoaringApps - App compatibility and feature support for OS X & iOS

Be aware, PowerPC apps that require Rosetta cannot run on Mountain Lion.

For downloading Mountain Lion from the App Store, a high speed (broadband) internet connection is strongly recommended by Apple as noted here > iTUNES STORE - MAC APP STORE - TERMS AND CONDITIONS

If you need to reinstall OS X or repair the the startup disk using Mountain Lion Recovery, that requires broadband (high speed) access to the internet via Wi-Fi or an Ethernet connection. OS X is downloaded over the internet form Apple when OS X Recovery is used for reinstallation.

As far as your Mac running slower after upgrading, make sure there's enough available space on the startup disk.

Right or control click your MacintoshHD icon on your Desktop then click Get Info. You'll see Capacity & Available.

Make sure there's at least 15% available disk space. Anything less may slow your Mac down.

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