Upgrading MacBook (13-inch, Mid 2010) Hard Drive and RAM

I successfully upgraded my macbook of the same specs, a mid 2010, 13 inch to 16GB RAM and a 2TB HDD from the original 4GB RAM and 250gig HDD. Even with the old configuration, I upgraded to OSX Sierra, but the 4gigs RAM was maxed out and it was dropping processes to accommodate other more important ones, so obviously I needed more RAM. I had also filled up my 250gig drive so I needed something larger.

After reading this post I deciced 16gigs RAM and 2TB was the way to go.

I bought mine from ebay as I already had an account there and did not have one with amazon or any other online markets. So ebay it was for me.

These are the items I bought. Just did my homework and made sure the items were for a macbook upgrade of the age that matched mine.

New! 16GB 2x8GB Memory PC3-8500 DDR3-1066MHz for 13″ MacBook 2.4GHz (Mid 2010)

Price:US $121.41

Seagate 2TB SATA, Mobile , 2.5 inch 5400 internal hard drive for laptops, PS4 PC

Price:US $122.01

After cloning the old drive to the new one and testing it out for a week by booting off it externally, I decided to open up my macbook and install the RAM and HDD which all went well. I booted up successfully and the RAM and HDD worked fine off the bat and have been since the install. I definitely recommend this upgrade but there is no need to downgrade to an older version of OSX. For starters it makes sense for the system to use the extra RAM in the file cache to speed things up, as the system needs more RAM for programs it can re-allocate from the cache to the programs. If you think all your memory is "being gobbled up" then you don't understand how memory management works.

This is the correct information:

A 2010 Macbook model identifier 7, 1 will accept up to 16 GB RAM (get it from OWC)

https://eshop.macsales.com/shop/memory/Apple_MacBook_MacBook_Pro/Upgrade/DDR3_Wh ite

You can install the largest SATA HDD/SSD currently available which are 2 TB in capacity.

You can install a 'data doubler' in place of the DVD drive for a second HDD, but since that Macbook can have a 2 TB HDD installed, I see little point in doing so unless you have an extraordinary amount of data.

Ciao.

Marshall Waha wrote:

OK you didn't really answer my other question, What if I just want to put a second Hard Drive its already got a 500 GB Hard Drive in it? Can I do that?

I did address this point:

'You can install a 'data doubler' in place of the DVD drive for a second HDD, but since that Macbook can have a 2 TB HDD installed, I see little point in doing so unless you have an extraordinary amount of data."

https://eshop.macsales.com/item/OWC/DDAMBS0GB/

Ciao.

16GBs in the 2010 all-white 2.4GHz Macbook definitely works:

Upgrade its firmware though, and run at least 10.10.** Yosemite or, better yet, El Capitan which I had on another hard drive that I stupidly (not accidentally) turned into a shiny skipping stone. Capitan is MUCH better than Yosemite as far as freeing up unused RAM memory is concerned and, it appears to me, better also at prioritizing CPU usage.

This is the 16GBs of RAM I bought off of Amazon for my mid-2010 MB 7,1:

NEW! 16GB 2 X 8GB DDR3 PC3-8500 SODIMM PC8500 1066MHz LAPTOP MEMORY RAM

by Samsung

4.4 out of 5 stars 7 customer reviews

Price: $54.39 + $4.48 shipping

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00KFNBP24/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o00_s00?ie=UT F8&psc=1

The first bootup after installation took a little bit longer than usual, but after that all's well. And with my 16GBs I can see that frikkin Yosemite STILL ***** up & keeps sucked up BIG chunks of RAM. So it's back up to Capitan for me soon.

Happy Mac'in

Impatiently waiting for Sierra with Siri... 😉

Kevin K