question about ram and bus speeds

I'm sure similar questions have been asked, but I've searched and can't really find an answer to my exact question.

So system bus speed on an early 2008 20" iMac is 1,066MHz. The ram in it is clocked at 800MHz. I also have a late 2009 MacBook Pro 15" with a system bus of 1,066MHz and 8GB of 1,066MHz ram... I was always under the impression that the two speeds should match. Why is it that the iMac has a lower clock speed ram? does that not create a bottleneck? Would upgrading from 2GB @ 800MHz to 6GB @ 1,066MHz make it a ton faster? Or would just getting 6GB @ 800MHz be okay?

Also, what makes "Mac" ram for macs? Can I use ram that has the same specs but is identified as being made, say for example "Dell"?

Any info would be much appreciated.

Thanks,
Mike.

Welcome to our forums.

The specs for your 2008 early 20" iMac are correct: System Bus speed of 1066 MHz and memory speed of 800 MHz. I can't answer why Apple designed it that way but your iMac uses:

Maximum Memory 6.0 GB (Actual) 4.0 GB (Apple)
Memory Slots 2 - 200-pin PC2-6400 (800MHz) DDR2 SO-DIMM

Using faster memory won't make any difference and will only run at 800 MHz. Your other question about memory type depends on the structure of the modules. PCs (Dell, IBM, Acer, etc.) may use a different type of module. As long as the module is the same spec, it will work.

Thank you for your quick reply, chscag! I only paid $20 for this iMac last week because it had a bad hard drive in it. I had a 1TB external Western Digital hard drive laying around that I wasn't using, so I decided to take it out of the box and use it for an internal in this Mac. Other than upgrading to 6GB of ram, would swapping the 2.4GHz processor to a 3.06 make much of a difference?

The best bang for your buck would be a Solid State Drive.

Suggest looking at a SATA II drive if that is the way you go. One tip do not install a SATA III drive as Macs prior to 2010 seem to lack compatibility with some 6Gbps drives, notably Sam sung.

Other than upgrading to 6GB of ram, would swapping the 2.4GHz processor to a 3.06 make much of a difference?

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Do some research on that. The CPU is socketed in that model so it can be changed out. However, I have no idea what it entails. There are some threads on that subject and it seems some successes. Like I said, do some googling and research. And I honestly don't know if moving up to a faster CPU will matter since the system bus speeds will remain the same.

Wilsonatoin91 said:

...would swapping the 2.4GHz processor to a 3.06 make much of a difference?

Click to expand...

In addition to what chscag mentioned. Remember this is a 2008 iMac. It's still 9 years old & being a 9 year old computer it will still be slow for other reasons than the CPU speed.

- Nick

It's still 9 years old & being a 9 year old computer it will still be slow for other reasons than the CPU speed.

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As Nick says. My bolding!!

If you're still determined, try looking up some info for the procedure and implications here:
http://www.xlr8yourmac.com



- Patrick
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