Two years ago, I made the decision to buy the still expandable, still containing firewire, still containing optical drive 2012 model of the MacBook. No regrets. It’s still under AppleCare, actually, which has been great because I’ve gone through two mag safe adapters already and Apple just gives me new ones.
Now I think it’s time to go up to 16GB of RAM and a bigger SSD (it’s a 64GB, although reports only as 58.somethingsomething because Apple).
What brands should I be looking at here?
Corsair RAM, Samsung SSD.
/topic
Much obliged. What should I expect cost wise?
$150 for RAM, $300 for SSD.
What am I, Google?
…If I had wanted what a search engine could have given me, I’d have used a search engine.
Instead, I was asking people I actually trust, members of AppleTalk. Google only tells me what people I don’t know if I can trust say, and what cost is to be found at the biggest retailers, but not if, in the opinion of people I trust, that cost is a good value or not.
tl;dr Wow, dude. You were asked because I value your opinion and the opinion of other regulars, I’m not sure how that’s anything but a compliment.
Uhh… those are the prices what you can expect to pay for 16GB RAM and an 512GB SSD? Even though you didn’t specify a particular capacity?
I’ve got the same machine and I’m quite happy with my Samsung SSD 
Its a 1TB 850 EVO.
Ah, yes, I didn’t. Sorry. That was silly of me. For some reason I thought I had. I think maybe 512GB is overkill. I have 2TB in externals. Maybe 128 is probably sufficient.
And I’m not sure why you’re "uuuh"ing at me. If had already known what was a good price, I wouldn’t have asked here. I’d have simply done an Amazon search and said, “Oh, wow, well, this looks like a good price!” But having no idea what a good price should be…
Frankly, I always think these things are too expensive, and so I wait and I wait and I wait to see if the prices drop. Problem is, then I lose track of just how quickly specs are changing and therefore how much pricing should be cut, and I no longer have enough information I trust to determine whether a price has dropped low enough for me to pull the trigger.
What are you? A member of a forum with a lot of really smart, experienced, and knowledgeable people that have never steered me wrong before (I’m counting the immigrants from MacTalk). Far better than being Google.
Glad we’re all on the same page
Now, with regards to price, and whether one is “a good one” or not: pricing these days is pretty similar across the board, if you compare a few different retailers. Even just looking at Amazon and the first few hits in Google for “mac ram and ssd site:.au”. That said, you may have a personal favourite online retailer for whatever reason, so you may consider buying with them even if they’re a little more expensive than the overseas online store you’ve never heard of before.
With RAM, given that most of the reputable companies all carry lifetime warranties, (Corsair, Crucial, Kingston, etc), it pretty much doesn’t matter what brand you go for. What might matter is where you get it from, and how that affects shipping time, how hard it would be to claim warranty, and so on. Buying from Amazon may be marginally cheaper, but is that enough to offset how long it’ll take to get here or how annoying claiming warranty will be? That’s your call.
SSD pricing is all pretty similar. Get a Samsung, and even if you don’t think you need the extra capacity, get it anyway. I personally wouldn’t be buying anything smaller than 256GB, even if was for my parents.
Hope this helps!
Very much so. This is the type of information I expect from AppleTalk members.
It’s quite true that Google searches could have revealed a number of articles which would have told me the same. And maybe some of them would seem reliable enough, maybe. But I think a lof of times I come across tech blogs of which I have never heard, and have no real way of verifying.
I had a similar issue recently as I have attempted to figure out my solar panel, portable battery, etc system. Lots of tech blogs with various opinions, prices, recommendations… and no one I have any kind of history trusting.
I had one of these MacBooks for a couple of months. I put 16GB of Crucial RAM into it and never had a problem.
I still have the RAM which I removed when I had to return the machine.
I could sell it to you if you want. Purchased about 6-8 months ago and used for 3 months before having to give machine back.
I’m not currently in Straya, I’m in Tokyo, Japan, so with shipping, probably not worth it. But I appreciate the offer!
How much are you looking for? I’ve been on 8GB of ram since around December 2012 and I’m starting to feel constrained. The SSD helped a lot but I think I should finally go for the big 16 
@kionon - Amazon has had great SSD prices for me in the past, not sure what the exchange/shipping for you would be though…
Looking at MSY, an 8GB single of Crucial DDR3 1600L is $75 (I presume 1.35V is the low voltage RAM).
What would you be willing to offer?
Get Crucial RAM from Amazon US…I picked up 16GB (2x8GB) for AU$85 delivered. Keep an eye out for when they’re on special is the key.
As for SSD go with a Samsung EVO Pro SSD, as they generally reliable & have a longer life cycle.
Hell, if you’re looking for speed…why not go the whole hog & grab yourself an upgraded 11AC uCard from quickertek!!!
While most of commercial brand SSD should work with MacBook Pro 2012m Apple originally supplied with Intel and Toshiba only, I guess if you can source them will be native supported by TRIM without Sudo trimforce…in terminal.