Not worth the cost even if you find someone to do it. Dosdude (YouTube him) has done this. It’s not worth the cost/gain for a tech that knows how when you factor in liability.

Apple engineering wins again!

I have a 2011 MBP and upgraded my ram to 16gb despite the official limit being 8 gb or something to that effect. The older macs really are better in these respects... /humblebrag

​

There were 2 models sold in 2012, the retina is not upgradable. There are no ram slots.

You can't upgrade the ram on the retina MacBook Pro's, the ram is soldered to the logic board unfortunately.

The MacBook Air has had soldered RAM since it was first released in 2008. The Retina MacBook Pro followed suit in 2012.

Mac laptops are now like buying iPhones and iPads. There are no RAM upgrades. That’s a decision you must make at time of purchase. There is no upgrade path on current shipping Apple Silicon computers. You’ll have to buy a new computer.

The ram is not upgradable. Need to change the whole machine

You should prolly be using a16gb machine at this point. If you need it or have money to blow I would upgrade. Go 32 if you need to. I got 16 back in 2018.

Make sure you have at least 25% of your internal ssd free (the M1 uses the ssd a lot). The RAM is doing its job and this behavior seems fairly typical for the M1. If you are thinking of upgrading I would wait for the M2 due out later this year (or, so I read).

Depends. Normal use aim for 16, but if you are a extensive user just go with 32

Return it. I had an 8gb M1 air and it was almost useless for what I needed. All I did was web browsing and opening aircraft maintenance manuals and it would slow to a crawl. I have an M2 air 16gb/1tb and I'm much happier

The RAM is soldered to the logic board, it is not upgradable. There are no SODIMM slots like on the 2012 Unibody MBP.

For the SSD, you will need either an mSATA or M.2 2260 SATA SSD, along with the appropriate adapter to Apple's proprietary 7+17 pin "NGFF Gen 2" blade connector. An M.2 NVMe SSD will not work in the 2012 Retina, and the M.2/mSATA connector (despite looking very similar) is not compatible on its own.

Are you currently using a hard disk? Upgrading from an HDD to an SSD is one of best upgrades you can do (I did this to a 2007 MBP a few years ago, it was a night and day difference). It might be enough to give your Mac a newish lease of life - or you might end up polishing a turd

Not that SSD. Check out macsales.com. They have SSDs that are the same size as you 2.5” and will plug right in.

Is 2025, there is no way you can speed up a 2012 machine. Spending money on trying to get small speed bump -> get cheap M1

I used to upgrade/repair/diagnose these MacBooks everyday for a little over 3 years, back when people were still using them regularly.

Since this is the Late 2012 model, you unfortunately cannot upgrade the RAM since it's soldered into the logic board. The only way to upgrade is to solder a different chipset (do not recommend) or replace the logic board with a higher RAM logic board. Replacing the board is difficult if you've never done it before, but it can be done, and the logic board can be bought for around $200ish if you can find one.

Replacing the SSD will very likely not have a large performance difference, but you can replace it with a regular M.2 SSD, you just need an adapter for it. The one we used was called (on Amazon) " 7 + 17pin mSATA to a1398 a1425" by a brand called "GODSHARK". Again, you can replace the SSD, but performance wise, you won't see much of a difference at all, unless your storage is completely full, then you'll see a slight difference due to having more free space.

All in all, I 100% do not recommend doing any work on your MacBook, as it's only marginal difference, and after buying parts to "upgrade" it, you could've gotten an M1 MacBook Air, for around the same price.

Let me know if you have any questions still though!! 🙌

You should probably try upgrading to an SSD, would make it so much faster, and try Open Core Legacy Patcher (OCLP) to update to newer versions like Sequoia

Too late to return yours? I was used to having 64gb on my old x86 iMac, so 48 was a good middle ground.

Wrongest thing I have read all day and clueless people parroting along. Whether you have 8, 16, 24, 32, 48 it’s never “enough”
Give a Mac 128 GB and it’ll use all the available RAM to keep things running smooth. So when you run these resource checking programs, you’ll see RAM almost full. That doesn’t mean you’ve made a mistake or running out of RAM. macOS has excellent memory management. It also compresses things not in use to free up more ram. Therefore for an “IT” guy with a workload like you described 16 GB was also more than enough. Just don’t be a dumbass and keep 20 tabs open. Each tab is like an app in itself. Would you open 20 apps?

With an M4 Pro and 48GB, I have about 40 tabs running on Chrome and my memory pressure is about 20%. Glad I went with the RAM upgrade.

I contribute a lot to the r/lightroom forum and the common thread of performance complaints when people buy new Macs are they are base-level Macs. People would blame everything on the Mac instead of accepting that they bought an under-spec'd system.

RAM is more important than the CPU model.

It's great that you're interpreting what Activity monitor is saying about your Mac. If you're hitting 10GB+ on a swap file, that says a lot, and the yellow memory pressure situation. Sounds like a 48GB RAM system would have been more appropriate, and 64GB would provide plenty of headroom for years down the road.

24GB may sound a lot, but for what I do (hello Adobe) I would be in the exact same position as you. My M2 Max MBP has 64GB RAM and runs my Adobe apps smoothly, with zero swap file being created.

Yes... Apple charges extortion prices for RAM and it's really unfortunate. People will buy only what they can afford and accept the performance degradations because of it. Apple would sell so many more systems if their RAM / SSD prices weren't so ridiculous.

Now you know. :)

It is, I just searched it up and it says Maximum Ram supported is 4GB

if it's the Mid 2007(2,1) one, only 3GB at maximum possible. if it's the Late 2007(3,1), Early 2008(4,1), Late 2008(4,1), Early 2009(5,2) & Mid 2009(5,2) only 6GB at maximum possible. if it's the Late 2009(6,1) or newer, 8GB are possible👍🏽

also the Early 2009 is the first of all of them which gets macOS up to 10.11.6(El Capitan), Late 2008 & earlier are only getting macOS 10.7.5(Lion)

hope this will help you

Even with 4. Stick an ssd in it and run Linux

I’m old. My eyesight isn’t that great. I legit thought op was running vista….

Just youtube, as it can’t run anything else

This MacBook cannot do 8gb. It's limited to 4gb physically, limited to 3gb usable. It's a chip set limitation.

Sell it and buy a 16GB MBA second hand. The price difference is your upgrade cost.

You can't even do that really, there are so many serialized parts that will cause errors once swapped out. I would simply sell your laptop and buy a new one and count the price difference as your upgrade cost. Plus this way there isn't any risk of damaging anything during an "upgrade" not to mention logic board swaps aren't a cake walk, and the way this post was written it doesn't sound like OP has a ton of experience with electronic repairs and upgrades.

Sell your current machine and buy one with the specs you want. These computers really aren’t made to be upgraded.

Prolly start with apple.com before you start "TF"ing people

That’s the disadvantage of unified RAM. It’s permanently paired to the CPU and GPU. When you buy a Mac, the best course of action is to max out the RAM, or at least as much as you can afford. What’s absurd is how much Apple thinks RAM upgrades should cost. +$400 for +32GB on a 14” MBP is asinine. 96GB of DDR5 costs $300 on a desktop PC and Apple wants $1200

Sell your current computer and buy one with 16GB. That's the only thing you can do. MBAs are not upgradeable.

Could bring it to third party Mac repair maybe they able upgrade SSD.

In China it easily find service for upgrade SSD.

https://youtu.be/QZjmsXh5O2w

There is someone in the US changing the SSD in the MBA, but I have no knowledge of how much ...

https://youtu.be/M0ZmR6UU_8k?si=mRX-Hq2ToSJPrGpp

I bought a USB4/TB4 NVMe enclosure on AliExpress, it is Back to School, so tons of discounts and coupons

I installed a 4TB WD SN850X

BTW: I own a Midnight MBA M2 16/256

https://preview.redd.it/8gbnasx0nojf1.jpeg?width=3431&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=a5d2c9607f51df47ee21e076ce31ce14b468e52c

Hey. Memory refers to RAM and Storage to SSD. Based on your question I think you are talking about increasing storage.

In your case it might be worth having an external SSD, look at the Qwiizlab ES40UR, it is an enclosure where you can put your own SSD.

I dont think apple has a service to upgrade ssd storage but you can get an mobile ssd or a ssd from a pc in a case it costs like 110 dollars per tb and but depends whats the speed of it is.

Dude, the best color for a MBA or a MBP but the fingerprints its a seriously problem day to day 😂

Whatever, thanks for the option, think about this maybe is the best option or one of them.

Dude, thanks again with all my hearth