I’ve been becoming increasingly frustrated with the speed of my iMac. It’s my fault. It’s not unusual for me to have at least 20 tabs open in my internet browser. In addition to my browser, I’m usually running Pandora Desktop, Photoshop and at least one other program. Combine that with all the programs that run in memory, it’s no wonder my computer was struggling. After an incredibly frustrating morning, I decided to price new memory. I started at Crucial. They have a very easy to use scanner. You just download, install and run it and it will tell you what memory your computer has and what they recommend. My iMac had 2GB of memory consisting of two 1GB sticks. The crucial website was selling two 2GB sticks for $65. When I checked at Amazon, they had the same Crucial memory for $59 plus I had a promotion of $8.71 and a $5 gift card from Swagbucks. With the promotion and gift card, I only spent $41.28 out of pocket.
When the memory arrived I was excited to get to work. After a quick web search I found a video on YouTube showing how to upgrade the memory. YouTube is a great resource for learning how to do things like this. Written instructions are nice, but if you can see someone do what you’re getting ready to do, it really helps boost your confidence. A few minutes later, I had doubled the memory in my iMac. On the YouTube page it mentioned that iMacs use laptop memory. I wondered if what I took out of my iMac would work in my laptop. So I ran the memory scanner on the laptop and discovered it took the same memory. So a few minutes later I had also doubled the memory in my laptop and have 1GB leftover!
I cannot believe how much this has helped speed up my iMac. This is something I should have done sooner. The time I will save is worth more than the price I paid. Upgrading memory is often touted as the easiest way to improve your computer. Keep in mind that it’s best not to mix and match different size memory sticks and there is a limit to what your computer can handle. The Crucial scanner will tell you which sticks to use to get the most out of your computer.
