Apple Says New Macbook Pro Has Only 16Gb Of Ram To Save Bat

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http://ark.intel.com/I don't track CPU to *type* of memory like the previous user made their statement - but I always eyeball the Intel KB into models of CPU's and their associated specs before I make a build. Previous user was probably an over-generalization by stating 'Intel' without a release of CPU.

Which model? Are you sure it's LPDDR3, and not DDR3? I can't see a model with LPDDR3 with 32GB, but their site is awfully hard to search...I see Dell sell some [low profile DDR3 SO-DIMMs](http://accessories.us.dell.com/sna/productdetail.aspx?c=us&l=en&s=gen&sku=a7209025), confusingly listed as "LP DDR3" with a space. Does the laptop you're using use those? Those use DDR3 memory, despite the very confusing name.

You are correct skylake supports 16g ddr3 dims without ecc/r/u. I have 2x16g in my aw13.

Anandtech have [a comparison](http://www.anandtech.com/show/6326/additional-details-on-microns-ddr3lrs-ddr4rs-and-other-memory) suggesting that LPDDR3 is lower power than the low power variants of DDR4.LPDDR4 would be even better, but Intel CPUs don't support it yet.

The [Intel datasheet](http://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/processors/core/6th-gen-core-family-mobile-u-y-processor-lines-datasheet-vol-1.html) lists 16GB as the max system configuration for LPDDR3. Other memory technologies have higher system limits.

[Bill Gates never said it](http://www.computerworld.com/article/2534312/operating-systems/the--640k--quote-won-t-go-away----but-did-gates-really-say-it-.html).[Actually, actively worked](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expanded_memory#Expanded_Memory_Specification_.28EMS.29) to allow DOS more RAM.

I remember playing WoW on 128Mb of RAM (we thought we had 256Mb -- memtest/Linux showed us this was not the case). The minimum requirements at the time were 512Mb. :)

I remember when my dad bought some kind of aftermarket memory for our [Atari 800](http://www.oldcomputers.net/atari800.html) to bump the RAM from 48 to 64 kb.

Totally depends on the site you're running in said tab.

we as consumers are expecting more and getting more.

Screens are getting bigger, meaning there's more content you can put on them. Ads are everywhere on web pages.Security is also becoming more of a concern, which uses up processing power (Chrome uses a separate process for every tab, which eats away time and RAM).I wouldn't say programmers are lazy/inefficient. More likely companies want more for the money, so they're hiring fewer programmers to write ever-more complicated programs. Libraries/APIs/Engines that do things for programmers have a non-zero cost.There's also things like caching done by the OS that takes up RAM, but saves you processing time when you need to look things up. As HDD space grows and gets filled up, so will RAM usage.

Optimisation is a double edged sword in software development - it makes programs run faster, but it also makes them much harder to understand, fix and extend. When a program works 'well enough', there is no point in making it less easy to support by making it work faster.

The real reason software is getting larger is that they keep adding layers of abstraction. Java runs in a vm. C# is as well, I believe. They both use just in time compliers, which actually compile parts of the program to machine code *as they're running*. There's more libraries being used, everything is sandboxed, and the net result is that to run a simple program, there's about 8 different layers of software before it gets to machine code. in the olden day, you would write directly in assembly (god help those poor programmers) and as a result your whole software suite would be like 1 mb. You can describe everything a lot of software "does" in one mb, but there's no fucking way you can describe how modern software does.

It's nothing to do with laziness. It's everything to do with applications getting bigger, doing more, looking slicker, etc. It's everything to do with more applications open at the same time.Years ago 480 video was wondrous. Today some apps demand 1080 or even 4k.

Frequently, you can code either an error-prone and RAM-conserving implementation or one that wastes RAM but is much easier to understand.In former times, coders had to go the difficult route, which resulted in many more bugs. today, you take the easy route and only if users complain optimize it.Also: software today is frequently sold for very little or has to earn money via ads exclusively. You don't have the time to optimize anymore.

Yes, that is a big part of it to be honest. You aren't really taught to care about preserving it that much since you mostly have tons of it. Unless you are working on embedded systems it never really comes up.

Using Linux is also still really fucking annoying for non-tech people. It works great about 90% of the time, but the other 10% you still need pretty good troubleshooting skills.

It is, but that doesn't change the fact that every year thousands of design professionals make that choice and pick up mbp's and if they do that they should at least have the option to pay for more ram.

A lot of design professionals work on the road out of necessity. If you have to fly several times a month to China or Europe from the US, it sure would be great to take advantage of those long flights if you're on deadline.Sure if the tech wasn't there it would be another story. But laptops have had the ability to go beyond 16GB for years now, and design professionals are arguably the Mac's primary market. It's just a poor decision.

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That's not a good argument for not even giving users the *option* to put more in.

Some people have to be mobile a lot and use their laptop as a mobile workstation.

Full time designer and photo editor here, I don't always work in one place, my company has multiple locations, I have an imac at my "main" office and keep my entire work library synced between it and a mbp with google drive. I commonly notice my mbp failing when i have illustrator, photoshop, lightroom, and indesign all running, on a big monthly flyer campaign with 20+ pages and many versions, only saving grace is having SSDs these days, at least i can start up and shut down one or two at a time quickly as needed. Went big thinkpad workstation for awhile, but 10 years on mac and everything else at work mac made life annoying, very sad. Would adore more ram over anything.

Some of us who work remotely at customers, varying design centers, etc have no choice. Plus some companies like their designers to have to option to be mobile for travel, even if they have a home office.

That's not the point.Users want the ability to take their work with them. As an IT Admin, why should I have to get a user an imac for work and another mac they can take home as needed when I can just procure one for them to use with an external display at work.When you can do this with an older model, but cannot do this now due to a limitation of ram capacity, that is just stupid design. Not even mentioning the adaptor problems.

> if you are actually needing more than 16gb of ram, then a laptop is a weird choice.I tend to agree, but my duties require me to travel and be on-call a lot. I don't want to leave everything sitting on the desktop because VNC/Remote Desktop/NoMachine is just brutal on slow connections, so I want as much power as I can carry with me at the lightest weight and most capability. AND an ass-kicking desktop for bigger jobs.Right now my mobile solution is that's a 2011 Macbook Pro upgraded to 16GB RAM, and an 8-core Xeon back at the office with 128GB RAM :-) Saving money for a newer model Mac model, but kind of hoping by the time I get enough dough the spec-bump model will be out with 32GB RAM...

For developers, not at all. I've had 16 GB in my work laptop for years, and I consider that the bare minimum for a new machine now. If you're running some VMs for testing or building large projects etc you really need that memory.The problem with new Macbooks is that the memory is not upgradeable, and that you have to pay Apple's premium for extra RAM when you first purchase it. So if you expect your laptop to last for 3 years, and consider the fact that you may need 16 GB RAM in that time (for whatever the next version of OS X needs or whatever) you need to pay for it today. It may be OK in a professional setting, but Apple is not getting my money that way.

Yep. And developers tend to use those a lot, which makes the pathetically small SSDs a huge problem too.The 740GB (SSD+HDD in a 2011 MBP) I have is a constant hassle for me already. 256GB is a sick joke, especially at that price.