Macbook air upgrades?

Col_M · 17 Jul 2012 at 11:04

Hey all, after playing with my brother's 11" Macbook air (it's a couple years old now), I liked its size, feel and functionality, I've also always wanted to give OS X a try so I'm thinking of getting one.

I'd mainly use it for internet browsing and the usual casual computer use with rare occasions of work (Excel, LexiLoader) so I thought I'd probably be fine with the 64GB, i5, 4GB version. However are there any recommended upgrades that I'd be crazy not to stump up the extra cash for?

Mr_White · 17 Jul 2012 at 11:30

Col_M said:
However are there any recommended upgrades that I'd be crazy not to stump up the extra cash for?

8GB of ram.

uniQ · 17 Jul 2012 at 11:35

Definitely bump the RAM to 8GB.

pingwing · 17 Jul 2012 at 11:57

Ram soldered to the logicboard on all air's so that's a no go. All 11" have SSD's too which makes that a bit of a pain.

Try just freeing up some space on the drive and maybe a fresh os install (or upgrade to lion)

Mr_White · 17 Jul 2012 at 12:00

pingwing said:
Ram soldered to the logicboard on all air's so that's a no go. All 11" have SSD's too which makes that a bit of a pain.

Try just freeing up some space on the drive and maybe a fresh os install (or upgrade to lion)

Someone didn't read the op

Col_M · 17 Jul 2012 at 12:25

OK, that sounds sensible, my work PC is actually 4GB and it struggles a bit.

Another question, approximately how much space would OS X and Office take up? From what I've found OS X would be about 14GB and Office Home and Student version is about 1.5GB, so about 15-16GB in total, does that sound about right?

pingwing · 17 Jul 2012 at 20:05

Mr_White said:
Someone didn't read the op

feel quite the fool miss reading that one

uniQ · 17 Jul 2012 at 20:58

Col_M said:
OK, that sounds sensible, my work PC is actually 4GB and it struggles a bit.

Another question, approximately how much space would OS X and Office take up? From what I've found OS X would be about 14GB and Office Home and Student version is about 1.5GB, so about 15-16GB in total, does that sound about right?

You're looking at around 20GB for a pretty light install with Office and not much else.

Col_M · 17 Jul 2012 at 22:30

uniQ said:
You're looking at around 20GB for a pretty light install with Office and not much else.

Ah, that's a fair chunk of data, I should be ok, I don't think I'll be storing much on there apart from the odd file.

Thanks guys

lamboman · 17 Jul 2012 at 22:58

Personally, I wouldn't say that upgrading to 8GB of memory is an absolute must. 4GB will be enough if you are just going be work with Office and browse the web. Even with future versions of OS X, you'll be pushing it close but it should still be fine. My workload is similar most of the time, and 4GB is enough. That said, the upgrade isn't exactly a bad choice.

If you need more memory and storage, SSDs can be upgraded (though it will void your warranty). The price from Apple and from another shop is roughly the same, though of course with the non-Apple option you do end up with two drives, one of which can be used externally.