Upgrading MacBook Pro Memory

Who wants to spend $300 for 1GB of Apple branded ram? Not me! So, I checked the reviews at Newegg.com and gave Fry’s a call to see what they had in stock. Fry’s has a liberal return policy and I decided to buy what they had (Patriot, Mushkin, and Corsair), test, then return the ram that didn’t work. I also purchased 512MB of Apple branded memory ($90) just in case the Fry’s stuff didn’t work.

First up was the Patriot 1GB 200-Pin DDR2 SO-DIMM DDR2 667 (PC2 5300). I turned on my MacBook Pro and it seemed to boot okay… but then it stopped. An error message telling me there was a hardware problem appeared. I shutdown the MPB, reseated the ram and turned the MBP on again. The same error message appeared. Strike one, that was the end of that test.

Next I tried the CORSAIR ValueSelect 1GB 200-Pin DDR2 SO-DIMM DDR2 667 (PC2 5300). No error messages this time – good! So, I booted the MBP into the Apple Hardware Test. I tested the memory 5 times with the Apple Hardware Test and each time the extended memory test failed. I reseated the memory, swapped sticks, nothing worked. I guess the Corsair memory won’t work either. Strike two.

I really wanted one of these three brands to work… the Mushkin was all that I had left. But it didn’t work either and after another 30 minutes of failed testing I gave up. Strike three on the Mushkin ram.

In the end, I returned all the ram I purchased from Fry’s along with the 512MB Apple ram (why spend $90 for 512MB?). I think I’ll call Other World Computing. More to come!