Upgrading my 2015 imac 27"

[Randy B. Singer]

I know that when I say things, like that the Mac OS has memory compression, that lots of folks will be saying "prove it!" So, to forestall that, here are some links!:

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2013/10/os-x-10-9/17/

http://macs.about.com/od/macoperatingsystems/fl/Understanding-Compressed-Memory-in-OS-X.htm

https://www.macstories.net/stories/el-capitan-review/2/

Enjoy!

 

[MacInWin]

Actually, with the advent of the new Apple Silicon computers, the new wisdom is to purchase the largest amount of storage you can afford (and go with the standard amount of RAM). The storage in an M1 or M2 package can't be upgraded, and SSD's begin to slow down as soon as they hit about 50% full. The larger the SSD you purchase, the longer your Mac will continue to run like new.

Good advice. One other thing to think about is that in the past, running short of memory meant things being "paged out" to the drive and then brought back when called on. On a rotating disk, that was a slow process. With the M1/M2 approach to storage, that function might happen, but it happens now at internal buss speeds, which makes it much faster. I have an M1 MBP with 16GB of memory and the swap has never gone above zero. in fact, right now with two instances of Safari running, plus Messages, Mail, Calendar and Activity Monitor, plus Word, along with Enpass and Chronosync and Maps, I am only using about 10GB of that 16, and the "memory pressure" is green. Apple has definitely made some good strides in memory management!