danahfromla
Level 1 (0 points)

Q: Adding RAM 2009 imac 27inch

I have a 27inch late 2009 iMac with 2x4GB and wondering can I add 2X4 gb chips into the other empty  slots,(totaling 12RAM)  or do I need to balance and have each slot have the same memory? thanks

MacBook Air, iOS 6.1.4

Posted on Oct 29, 2013 7:11 AM

by danahfromla,Solvedanswer
danahfromla danahfromla
Level 1 (0 points)
A:

Brillant! that helped me a whole lot, thank you so much!

Have a great night,

Danah

Posted on Oct 29, 2013 7:17 PM

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danahfromla

Q: Adding RAM 2009 imac 27inch

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  • by R C-R,

    R C-R R C-R Oct 29, 2013 7:21 AM in response to danahfromla
    Level 6 (17,700 points)
    Oct 29, 2013 7:21 AM in response to danahfromla

    Yes you can add two 4 GB modules to your iMac. See http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1423#4 for more about this.

     

    BTW, four 4 GB modules should give you a total of 16 GB ... right?

  • by danahfromla,

    danahfromla danahfromla Oct 29, 2013 5:33 PM in response to R C-R
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Oct 29, 2013 5:33 PM in response to R C-R

    Had a busy day at work, and  so sorry about the delayed response. Also, I am new to this forum,), and was a bit confused by the process. ( Though I am impressed by both your level 6 status, and mister potato head icon: )

     

    Anyhow, really appreciate the response and the link, and after reading your question I realized I gave bad info in my question.

     

    So here is the question stated more clearly.

     

    Right now I have 2x2 GB (that is a 2gb card in each slot) and so a total of 4gb of RAM (pathetic :-)

     

    and my question is, can I have 2 slots with the 2gb memory models, and the other to slots with 4GB modules....Thus ending up with 2x2gb, and 2x4 gb adding up to 12 GB of RAM ...or is this "lopsidedness" a problem?

     

    does that make any sense?

     

    Much thanks in anticipation of a response,

     

    Danah

  • by Allan Jones,Helpful

    Allan Jones Allan Jones Oct 29, 2013 7:12 PM in response to danahfromla
    Level 8 (35,316 points)
    iPad
    Oct 29, 2013 7:12 PM in response to danahfromla

    Thus ending up with 2x2gb, and 2x4 gb adding up to 12 GB of RAM ...or is this "lopsidedness" a problem?

     

    No, that is exactly the config I have and my iMac is rock solid. If you leave the original RAM alone and use the empty slots for the new RAM, you are fine, because side-by-side slots will have the same RAM quantity:

     

    [.....2GB....] [.....2GB....]

    [.....4GB....] [.....4GB....]

     

    What might be a problem is removing all the RAM and getting it mixed up so  it goes in like this:

     

    [.....2GB....] [.....4GB....]

    [.....4GB....] [.....2GB....]

  • by danahfromla,Solvedanswer

    danahfromla danahfromla Oct 29, 2013 7:17 PM in response to Allan Jones
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Oct 29, 2013 7:17 PM in response to Allan Jones

    Brillant! that helped me a whole lot, thank you so much!

    Have a great night,

    Danah

  • by danahfromla,

    danahfromla danahfromla Oct 29, 2013 7:22 PM in response to danahfromla
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Oct 29, 2013 7:22 PM in response to danahfromla

    Hate to ask, but is there any way I can look to see what is using my ram? as It just seems to have lost a whole bunch of its punch in the last week or so. I have a memory indicator running, and now, even with no app open (spare dropbox, and fantastical in the background) it only has about 900mb in indle.

     

    Could dust bunnies inside be the problem?

  • by Allan Jones,

    Allan Jones Allan Jones Oct 29, 2013 7:35 PM in response to danahfromla
    Level 8 (35,316 points)
    iPad
    Oct 29, 2013 7:35 PM in response to danahfromla

    Are you running any anti-virus, internet security, or those dreadful "I'll Clean your Mac" programs?

  • by danahfromla,

    danahfromla danahfromla Oct 29, 2013 7:43 PM in response to Allan Jones
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Oct 29, 2013 7:43 PM in response to Allan Jones

    No, those kinds of things are dreadful! I totally agree I've been living in a Mac universe way too long to even think about those kinds of things.

     

    When I go into my activity monitor, a message comes up saying that I have 411 mb being used for Kernel_task, and also 2 that say "Safari content" that are over 121mb each. I do not know what those are? Can it be something that snuck in when surfing the net "acquiring" an episode of Game of thrones last year?

     

    Could it be those, and can I delete these (the kernel task and the safari contnet items as they seem sketchy


  • by Frank Caggiano,

    Frank Caggiano Frank Caggiano Oct 29, 2013 7:47 PM in response to danahfromla
    Level 7 (25,796 points)
    Oct 29, 2013 7:47 PM in response to danahfromla

    Run Activity Monitor (in the /Applications/Utilities folder). It will list the programs and their memory usage.

     

    see your runnning it already. What is your OS Version?

  • by danahfromla,

    danahfromla danahfromla Oct 29, 2013 7:51 PM in response to Frank Caggiano
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Oct 29, 2013 7:51 PM in response to Frank Caggiano

    Thanks for checking in Frank

     

    I did,

     

    When I go into my activity monitor, a message comes up saying that I have 411 mb being used for Kernel_task, and also 2 that say "Safari content" that are over 121mb each. I do not know what those are?

     

    It is also sucking up all the CPU's power

     

     

    Could it be the fan, or dust inside the imac?

  • by danahfromla,

    danahfromla danahfromla Oct 29, 2013 8:00 PM in response to Frank Caggiano
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Oct 29, 2013 8:00 PM in response to Frank Caggiano

    10.9 mavericks just upgraded, though I am not sure if there is a correlation...whadda you think, could that be part of the problem, or is it the KErnels? \\\

     

     

    Also, I was wrong about the use of the CPUs by the Kernels. they are only using about 4%

     

    Message was edited by: danahfromla

  • by danahfromla,

    danahfromla danahfromla Oct 29, 2013 7:54 PM in response to Frank Caggiano
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Oct 29, 2013 7:54 PM in response to Frank Caggiano

    BTW, like the Gomez image