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I have MacBook Pro 15-inch, early-2011. I want to upgrade my RAM from 4 GB (2+2) to 6 GB (2+4). Can I use Kingston RAM (Kingston 4GB DDR3 1333 Bus SOD)? Or is there specific RAM made for Macs?

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I wouldn't mix ram sizes or brands or even ram that is not from the same batch out of the factory. I would highly suggest that you get a 8 GB (4+4) pack and you should not have a problem. – Chad Marmon Jul 11 '12 at 14:17
Could you really not even TRY googling this -.-' – XAleXOwnZX Jul 17 '12 at 0:29

4 Answers

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I upgraded the memory in my Early 2011 MacBook Pro from 4 GB (2x2) to 8 Gb (2x4) using the Crucial site, and haven't had any problems at all.

For the record, I also did the same with a brand new iMac, swapping out both memory modules with 2x4 GB from Crucial.

It worked out to be about 1/3 of the price that Apple charges for the same memory.

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If you aren't sure just use crucial.com's system analyzer. Any RAM brand is fine for the most part, but stick to the more well known companies.

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Any brand of RAM will work, so long as it matches the specs the computer is expecting. (That would be the "DDR3 1333 MHz" part.)

For the most part, Apple uses standard PC hardware, so there's no more restrictions on what types of parts will work than there would be on a non-Mac.

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Be careful with 1333 Mhz RAM - I learned the hard way that my MBP expects 1066mhz and won't recognize two sticks of 1333 (one stick of 1333 and one of 1066 works b/c it downgrades the speed to the slowest stick). Still trying to figure out how to use both sticks of 1333.

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but on this link support.apple.com/kb/HT1270?viewlocale=en_US#link3 it says MBP 2011 Early supports 1333Mhz – kaibuki May 5 '12 at 4:22
Kingston brand is fine, there's nothing about RAM particular to Macs other than the required specs. I'm just saying to doublecheck those carefully. My MBP has Model Identifier: MacBookPro7,1 (check using System Profiler) which is an earlier model than yours, and doesn't support 1333 mhz ram. – Jim Thomas May 5 '12 at 4:48
My 4 year old MBP is using 1333 Mhz ram, but only runs it at 1033 Mhz, it should work fine – XAleXOwnZX Jul 17 '12 at 0:29
It may be an 8gb issue or you may have one stick of 1333 and one of 1033, not sure. There are many tutorials such as tylermilner.com/?p=342 that require a lot of manual effort to get the MBP to start with 8gb of 1333mhz RAM. I haven't flashed the ram to a lower speed yet, but am going to try soon because it definitely doesn't work fine. – Jim Thomas Aug 27 '12 at 1:00

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