Mac Mini Memory question

[ianmarsh]

I've just got a new-to-me Mac Mini (late 2012) with 4GB of memory. Everything runs fine but is a little slow compared to the pc I used to use which had 8GB of memory and a faster processor.

Two questions:

1. how can I tell on a mac what is limiting the speed of use? Is there something I can look at to see how much RAM memory is being used at each point in time?

2. assuming I need more memory, will 8GB be enough or should I consider 16GB? I use Lightroom with Nik plugging for photo stuff, not photoshop (and a statistical software package called Stata)

 

[ianmarsh]

Despite finding nothing on google first time round, another quick search seems to have answered my questions:

http://www.macworld.com/article/203...ifications-of-additional-memory-on-a-mac.html

but if anyone has further bright ideas or experience please let me know.

 

[DizMatt]

good link that
I was going to say 8MB is good and be aware that it used to be SODIMM laptop memory, but i'm not sure of the specifics
the crucial UK website is good for finding the right memory.

 

[LongLensPhotography]

Get 16GB from Crucial and you won't look back. Mine works a treat.

You could also look into hacking a HDD for an SSD if you are good at these things.

 

[ianmarsh]

thanks chaps. I don't think I will risk more than swapping the RAM given my technical skills. Crucial looks the way to go, I've just got to decide whether I need 8 or 16. 8 worked fine on my pc so I am inclined to go that way at the moment.

 

[neil_g]

Slow doing what? Throwing ram at a slow CPU problem would be a waste of money. You can use activity monitor in utilities to see whether you are running out of available ram.

 

[ianmarsh]

it is slow at processing stuff - running the big stats analysis I need for work, adding Nik filters in photo processing.

Thanks to the above link I found the activity monitor and RAM usage is pretty high at peak times so I think more RAM will help

 

[ancient_mariner]

I found my Macbook with 4Gb ram and 2GHz core 2 duo processor slow with lightroom, and becoming increasingly slow the more processing I did to an image. I've just upgraded to 8Gb, and while it's no faster initially, it also doesn't slow down like it did. When I monitored ram use it was getting down to just a few MB on some tasks.

 

[Porsupah]

EveryMac.com has full tech specs of every Mac produced. The Mac mini line is over here - the late 2012s can take up to 16GB. Myself, I'd go for as much as the system can address, given Aperture and Lightroom can chow down on a few GB by themselves, let alone any other applications you might be running.

As the MacWorld article notes, you can use Activity Monitor (in Applications/Utilities) to check up on memory usage - in particular, if you see a large amount of swap space being used, that's a strong indicator you'll benefit from more memory. (Some use of swap space is fine, but if you start seeing as much swap being used as you have actual memory, that's a big warning sign)

I'd second the recommendation for an SSD, particularly if you don't need an especially large one, where cost starts to get a bit eye-watering. Replacing the optical drive on my previous MBP with an SSD made a surprisingly large difference in performance and responsivity, though that model could only take up to 8GB. If you like, you could always pop the HD into an external case and keep it around for bulk storage.