I recently decided to upgrade the ram on my Intel mac-mini. The original size of the ram was 512mb, 2 X 256Mb, which was really becoming a huge problem. I had never changed memory on a mac-mini before but I had this feeling that Apple's design would allow me to change the ram quickly. That was a big mistake. If you are not familiar with mac-mini's design I would suggest you do some research before getting into it.
I ordered memory from Ramjet. They are great! The prices are really good. I would recommend it to anyone. Once the memory arrived, I got right to it. The first step was to open the case. This took a while as there was no easy way to pop it open. There are no buttons of any sort and the case is tightly integrated into the design of mac-mini. It basically required some unusual tools. I used 3 slim fruit knives to loosen the edges. Once the knives were in there, I used a larger and thicker knife to pop it open. Once it was open, I had no clue where the ram modules were installed. Everything in this computer was so very small. I did some research and found out that depending on your mac, whether it is power pc or Intel, memory modules are installed at separate locations on the motherboard. I found out that the ram module in Intel based mac-minis are located at the bottom of the computer beneath the hard disk and the optical drive. They needed to be taken off before the ram modules can be replaced. The hard disk and the optical drive were integrated into a chassis which was screwed to the bottom of the computer. There were 4 corner screws. Each of them needed to be taken off before the hard disk and the optical drive can be taken off. The first 3 of the 4 corner screws were easy to get. The fourth screw was right below the Airport antenna. The antenna had to be taken off before the screw can be taken off. The antenna looked very fragile but it actually was not.I thought it was going to get broken when I started applying some force. I found out that trick is to push the holding plastic inward and pull it right up. When I did it, it came right off. Once I took the last screw off, I found out that there were some cables holding the chassis. To be exact, there were two cables. Taking one of them was enough for me to take the chassis off. Once it was off, I was able to quickly change the ram.
I upgraded from 512Mb to 2Gigs. This was really worth it even though I had all the above challenges.
I ordered memory from Ramjet. They are great! The prices are really good. I would recommend it to anyone. Once the memory arrived, I got right to it. The first step was to open the case. This took a while as there was no easy way to pop it open. There are no buttons of any sort and the case is tightly integrated into the design of mac-mini. It basically required some unusual tools. I used 3 slim fruit knives to loosen the edges. Once the knives were in there, I used a larger and thicker knife to pop it open. Once it was open, I had no clue where the ram modules were installed. Everything in this computer was so very small. I did some research and found out that depending on your mac, whether it is power pc or Intel, memory modules are installed at separate locations on the motherboard. I found out that the ram module in Intel based mac-minis are located at the bottom of the computer beneath the hard disk and the optical drive. They needed to be taken off before the ram modules can be replaced. The hard disk and the optical drive were integrated into a chassis which was screwed to the bottom of the computer. There were 4 corner screws. Each of them needed to be taken off before the hard disk and the optical drive can be taken off. The first 3 of the 4 corner screws were easy to get. The fourth screw was right below the Airport antenna. The antenna had to be taken off before the screw can be taken off. The antenna looked very fragile but it actually was not.I thought it was going to get broken when I started applying some force. I found out that trick is to push the holding plastic inward and pull it right up. When I did it, it came right off. Once I took the last screw off, I found out that there were some cables holding the chassis. To be exact, there were two cables. Taking one of them was enough for me to take the chassis off. Once it was off, I was able to quickly change the ram.
I upgraded from 512Mb to 2Gigs. This was really worth it even though I had all the above challenges.
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