What kind of stupid world is it where 8GB of RAM is actually not enough? I’m not doing anything that fundamentally different to what I was doing 10 years ago, and back then 2GB was fine on the low end of things.
Apple keeps flogging 8GB of RAM for its Mac computers but it's still a dead horse
Submitted 7 months ago by Dragxito@lemmy.world to technology@lemmy.world
Comments
GnuLinuxDude@lemmy.ml 7 months ago
Asifall@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Because ram is incredibly cheap and developer hours are incredibly expensive. I think it’s a bit silly too but there’s just no financial incentive for companies to care about memory usage when they know most consumer devices have tones of extra headroom.
MataVatnik@lemmy.world 7 months ago
It’s like adding lanes to a highway, it doesn’t reduce traffic, it increases demand. Developers will create software that needs more ram just cause they can. So unless you want to be running office 2010 then it’s necessary.
mojofrododojo@lemmy.world 7 months ago
640k should be enough for anything right?
fuck progress, eh?
goddamn this is dumb.
NotMyOldRedditName@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Not gonna lie, writing code in various ways can be more efficient processing time wise, but often at the cost of complexity, or readability or time to code it.
As phones have gotten faster, and depending on what I’m working on, I’ll take the easier to code and read route than the absolutely best optimized route.
Although there are definitely times you still need to optimize
KingThrillgore@lemmy.ml 7 months ago
The ramifications of Apple standardizing on-die RAM are going to be felt all over.
AnUnusualRelic@lemmy.world 7 months ago
PC (so, presumably meant for Windows) laptops with 4GB are still all over the place.
They’d probably work reasonably well under [not Windows]. How well they do with Windows is left as an exercise for the reader.
FlorianSimon@sh.itjust.works 7 months ago
Not at the same price point, and definitely not in “Pro” devices though
gamermanh@lemmy.dbzer0.com 7 months ago
Macbooks are meant to be for creative professionals and those of us deluding ourselves into thinking we might one day be one of those
8G RAM for that purpose is NOT enough in 2024. Shit, it barely was when I went through college in 2016 with a macbook (which is why our models had 16)
pathief@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Here in Portugal the lowest is 8gb. The 500 euro models have 16gb already.
Shurimal@kbin.social 7 months ago
At these prices I'd expect at least 32 GB of RAM. 8 GB is for entry level phones and SOHO 2 to 4 bay NAS boxes.
snownyte@kbin.social 7 months ago
This author needs to go back to a time where you had to manage 512MB of memory.
People back then would've killed for 8GB now.
The problem I see though is software developers having a field day with not caring about optimizing and not making their software bloted as possible so that it doesn't require so much memory.
ares35@kbin.social 7 months ago
the 'problem' is: you can't upgrade; you're stuck with that 8gb.
want more in a year or two? you have to buy a new mac. and that's apple's goal--sell more product. buyers will be back (because they're hooked on the platform and ecosystem) to buy a new one sooner than they otherwise would have.
snownyte@kbin.social 7 months ago
Well that's what you get for being a tool and buying Apple products.
All of us PC users have had the convenience of upgrading anything we want. While Apple users just bitch about the choices they've made where a company decides how much they think they need and whether or not they can upgrade.
Wah wah wah.
xep@fedia.io 7 months ago
Yes, no big deal. We can go back to having 640x480 displays too.
Hule@lemmy.world 7 months ago
1.2 GB hard drives, too.
I had to think twice, it didn’t sound right…
echodot@feddit.uk 7 months ago
That’s a daft take. The reason that software now requires more ram is because it can do more than in 1998.
snownyte@kbin.social 7 months ago
That doesn't excuse the ridiculously high requirements.
billiam0202@lemmy.world 7 months ago
You realize that just because things used to be worse, doesn’t invalidate complaints about how things could be better now, right?
snownyte@kbin.social 7 months ago
I think the comparison went over your head and I didn't use a word wrong. Try not to think too much into it. Oh wait, you did.
Veedem@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Everyone’s experience and usage is different, but I have a base M2 MacBook Air with 8gb of RAM and besides web browsing, streaming/air playing some videos, and typing some documents, I don’t do much else. I never feel the need for more RAM.
pancakesyrupyum@kbin.social 7 months ago
I spent about a year arguing with C-levels that our fleet running 8GB was slowing down productivity, with evidence to prove it. It was like pulling teeth to procure some SODIMMs.
I’d still say this article is coming at things from the wrong perspective. That $700 Walmart M1 MBA is more than adequate for most kids doing school work, and/or grandparents farting around on FB. If you have a family and had to grab a few identical laptops, and you aren’t able/willing to be tech support, it really makes a lot of sense financially.
echodot@feddit.uk 7 months ago
If you were just going to use it for browsing the web and you don’t need anything that’s capable as an M1 processor. Just buy a cheap Lenovo. Yeah I know we don’t like Windows but it’s a well-known operating system and when it inevitably breaks you don’t have to go to Apple to fix it. Any random PC repair shop will be able to deal with it.
IamAnonymous@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Just need to make sure the cheap Lenovo has sufficient RAM. I have a $300 HP laptop and it’s slows down if I have more than 10 tabs open on Firefox.
FontMasterFlex@lemmy.world 7 months ago
How is it not true? Damn near everyone I know that has a macbook uses it to cruise the internet and look fancy doing it.
Dirk@lemmy.ml 7 months ago
I can’t remember when I had such little RAM in a machine I own.
lengau@midwest.social 7 months ago
I can! It happened to be the last Mac I owned, which I bought in 2008.
DdCno1@kbin.social 7 months ago
My mid-range 2014 laptop has this little. This was considered the minimum for a productivity-oriented device a decade ago.
Much to my annoyance, it's also one of the first laptops with non-upgradeable RAM, which I didn't know beforehand. It's still usable, but I'm using Firefox instead of Chrome (so 50 tabs are no issue) and it's never been my primary device.
lengau@midwest.social 7 months ago
Oh Timmy… Linux typically uses less RAM than MACROS and I have 64 gigs in my laptop 3
werefreeatlast@lemmy.world 7 months ago
My car radio update would have much more than that! LOL.
GBU_28@lemm.ee 7 months ago
Who cares? Buy em or don’t.