16GB RAM Upgrade for Early 2011 - 13 inch MacBook Pro

[996]

Hi All!

New to Mac-Forums (and Apple laptops in general). I have been a PC guy my whole life, and still am. My sister has an early 2011 model MacBook Pro 13 inch with the 2.3 i5.

I recently purchased and installed the 16GB RAM upgrade for this model from Crucial, BUT I have not noticed much of a difference in performance.

I read that the 16GB upgrade was compatible with this model. When I open up system information, it does show 16GB of memory. Maybe the 8GB option was the way to go?

Will a reformat make much of a difference? My next option is an SSD. I wanted to see if anyone has upgraded JUST RAM and noticed a difference on these models.

Any suggestions/opinions would be greatly appreciated.
Thank you all in advance.
Best,
996

 

[harryb2448]

G'day and welcome to the forums.

The 16GB is the go. Need to know what operting system is running, how much free space is on the hard drive and any cleaning and antivirus programs installed. The Early 2011 model came out with Snow Leopard OS X.6, which is now four operating systems old and security etc is no longer supported by Apple.

Think your best shot would be to download Yosemite via your Apple ID, use LionDiskMaker X to burn to a USB thumb drive, boot from the thumb drive, erase and format the hard drive and do a clean install. If there are programs/files you need to save backup to an external hard drive first.

Do you have an Apple ID to access the App Store?

 

[996]

G'day and welcome to the forums.

The 16GB is the go. Need to know what operting system is running, how much free space is on the hard drive and any cleaning and antivirus programs installed. The Early 2011 model came out with Snow Leopard OS X.6, which is now four operating systems old and security etc is no longer supported by Apple.

Think your best shot would be to download Yosemite via your Apple ID, use LionDiskMaker X to burn to a USB thumb drive, boot from the thumb drive, erase and format the hard drive and do a clean install. If there are programs/files you need to save backup to an external hard drive first.

Do you have an Apple ID to access the App Store?

I upgraded her to Yosemite recently. There is about 200GB free space on her HDD. No Anti-Virus/cleaning programs installed. Do you recommend any? And booting from the drive allows me to choose how much disk space to allocate to another partition? (kind of like how windows does it). Also, how big would Yosemite be as far as GBs go? I have a 64GB USB flash drive.

SSD potentially? Or would it be snappy with a reformat? If I choose not to reformat, any anti-virus/cleaning software you recommend?

Thanks!

 

[pigoo3]

I recently purchased and installed the 16GB RAM upgrade for this model from Crucial, BUT I have not noticed much of a difference in performance.

Adding more ram to a computer does not automatically mean it will perform better.

I'm going to guess that this MacBook Pro previously had 4gig of ram. My guess is that this computer was running just fine with 4gig of ram. And if it was…then adding more ram was not necessary.

- Nick

 

[996]

Adding more ram to a computer does not automatically mean it will perform better.

I'm going to guess that this MacBook Pro previously had 4gig of ram. My guess is that this computer was running just fine with 4gig of ram. And if it was…then adding more ram was not necessary.

- Nick

It did previously have 4GB of ram. But, it WAS running pretty slugish after Yosemite. So, I thought it would be best to first upgrade RAM.

 

[harryb2448]

Yosemite can take a while to index. Give the computer a reboot, and see if there is any improvement. Next option is rest SMC, power down, turn off, remove mains power, leave it for ten minutes, reconnect to mains and boot up.

 

[lclev]

If the original hard drive was a 5400 rpm SATA hard drive then putting in an SSD will give a very nice boost.

Lisa

 

[996]

Yosemite can take a while to index. Give the computer a reboot, and see if there is any improvement. Next option is rest SMC, power down, turn off, remove mains power, leave it for ten minutes, reconnect to mains and boot up.

Would I have to physically remove the battery to reset the SMC? I believe the battery is removable for this model. Correct me if I am wrong.
Thanks!

 

[996]

If the original hard drive was a 5400 rpm SATA hard drive then putting in an SSD will give a very nice boost.

Lisa

I am taking an SSD into major consideration. Would you recommend Crucial?

Thanks!

 

[harryb2448]

Should the battery be removable, yes. Have a read of this link from Apple:-


https://support.apple.com/en-au/HT201295

 

[lclev]

I am taking an SSD into major consideration. Would you recommend Crucial?

Thanks!

Crucial or OWC. I have used both. They tend to be mac friendly.

Solid State Drives For Apple Macs. Upgrade to the Right SSD Today!

Lisa

 

[chscag]

Keep in mind that the SSDs sold by OWC do not require TRIM which is reason enough to consider purchasing from them.

 

[chas_m]

And no, no anti-viruses are needed or recommended. The biggest threat on Macs is adware, and Adware Medic is a free utility that can take care of that if you happen to get it (very, very rare if you stay off dodgy sites, ignore hyperbolic ads, and don't download pirated stuff).

 

[996]

Keep in mind that the SSDs sold by OWC do not require TRIM which is reason enough to consider purchasing from them.

Hmm, so what point are you trying to reach? I know TRIM is a good thing. Does the MAC OS support TRIM?

Would you recommend an OWC SSD over a Crucial SSD?

Thanks!

 

[chscag]

The SSDs and Flash storage installed and provided by Apple support TRIM and TRIM is on by default. Other SSDs and Flash storage including Crucial are not supported. There are work arounds such as "TRIM Enabler" but it can create problems (please read thru some of our threads regarding "TRIM Enabler"). OWC SSDs and Flash storage have TRIM built in which means it does not have to be turned on. A good reason to purchase from them. But of course, it's your choice.

 

[harryb2448]

996 I have used Kingston, G. Skill Falcon, Toshiba, OZC and OWC and would recommend OWC who are Mac specialists.

 

[996]

996 I have used Kingston, G. Skill Falcon, Toshiba, OZC and OWC and would recommend OWC who are Mac specialists.

Thank you. I am reading about OWC at this moment.

The question now is: Electra or Extreme. Which have you had experience with?

Thanks!

 

[lclev]

I have a 480 GB OWC Mercury Extreme Pro 6G as my boot drive. I guess the biggest draw was the five year guarantee. It runs great, boots fast, so far very pleased.

Lisa

 

[pm-r]

I have a 480 GB OWC Mercury Extreme Pro 6G as my boot drive. I guess the biggest draw was the five year guarantee. It runs great, boots fast, so far very pleased.

Lisa

Nice, and another draw is the $150.00 discount they have available today… and similar other discounts on some of their other drives…
https://eshop.macsales.com/search/Mercury+Extreme

 

[996]

I have a 480 GB OWC Mercury Extreme Pro 6G as my boot drive. I guess the biggest draw was the five year guarantee. It runs great, boots fast, so far very pleased.

Lisa

That is good to hear. Thank you for the insight