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RAM comes in the form of a chip, and to increase memory, you simply plug additional chips in to slots on your computer's main board.

Has your old computer lost its get up and go? Or perhaps you've just invested in a brand new Mac and you're thinking life is good until your kids try to play games or you want to open four programs at once. You find that the animation just isn't quick enough, and neither is your switching back from one application to another. "But I have a new computer," you say. "It should be lightning fast!"
Just because you have the latest and the greatest, doesn't mean it's the greatest in terms of performance. To keep computer costs down, Apple ships their computers with just enough memory to run the operating system, unless you ordered more when you purchased it. Upgrading your computer's memory (RAM) is one of the quickest, most efficient and most cost-effective ways to boost performance. Adding more RAM can add a remarkable zip to your system. It is easy and relatively inexpensive. It is a small chip as pictured above (PowerBook chips are smaller) and Miss Mac can pop it into your machine in no time. You'll be happy you did.

How much Ram does my computer have ?

When you are at your main desktop, not in any particular application, go under the Apple to About this Computer. In the window that opens, it will show the built-in memory. Virtual memory or total memory doesn't count. It is the built-in that you want. If it only has one number, that is the built-in.

Lets's take a look at what a memory upgrade can do for you.

Smoother multitasking
Like to have your cake and e-mail, too? Do you open several programs at the same time and switch between them frequently and does your Mac moan and groan when you do? Then a memory upgrade is essential for smooth, effortless multitasking. It gives your computer an extra boost.

Faster Web surfing
Are you a surf-aholic? If you like to spend time on the Internet, but don't like it when your system slows to a crawl, you'll want to add RAM. No matter how fast your Internet connection is, a memory upgrade can help your browser display pages faster. Web sites use rotating banners, Flash and Shockwave animation, streaming audio and other plug-ins as dazzling effects to entice visitors. A computer memory upgrade can give your computer the zing it needs for today's browsing.

Enhanced printing
Are you tired of your pokey printer? A printing bottleneck can be fixed easily with a simple memory upgrade. And the boost in performance can have a big impact on productivity, especially in a networked environment where several Macs may be sharing one printer. And you'll be able to print faster because a printer buffers (or holds data temporarily) part of a print job before actually printing. The more memory you have the more that can be buffered, and the faster you will print.

More efficient video editing
If the video-editing bug has bitten, you'll want to add RAM. Editing is fun or can be if it's not too slow. Because video files are very large, you'll not only need a big hard drive to store the file, but a quick processor and lots of RAM help speed things up. Video editing software like iMovie and Adobe Premiere typically recommend 64MB of RAM, but once again, more is better. 512M to 1G (1000M) or more should have you editing without waiting for your computer's hard drive to catch up.

Spectacular gaming

Enhanced multimedia presentations

Efficient networking

This is technical stuff.

I like to talk plain talk but if you want to know how memory really works, this is for you. Before information can be processed by a computer, it must first be transferred to a special data storage area called RAM (Random Access Memory). RAM is connected directly to the processor by high speed data pathways. As long as your data is in RAM, the computer's processor has almost instantaneous access to it. When the processor needs information that is not currently in RAM, it must be loaded from the hard drive and placed in RAM, a much slower process. So the more RAM you have, the higher your system's overall performance.

Ready to rev up your system's performance? Call Miss Mac for assistance.

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