Macbook replacement

[ChairShot]

I haven't been looking at macbooks since about 2008 since I bought my black macbook and it is (was) a beast but unfortunatly, got wet due to a water leakage at home and insurance will (should) replace it.

What's the now equivalent of what I had.

Before: Black macbook, 2.4ghz, 4gig RAM, 13 inch

Now: Macbook air or mac pro?

 

[C_A_S]

The equivalent is probably the Air.

Whether that's what you want now is another question, as there's more differentiation down to processor a bit, graphics even a bit more these days.

If you are largely text/surf/email based, the air would be fine.

If this is your main, one and only, or you use photoshop, or want to future proof your self in terms of graphics capability, you will want to look at the pro line.

Within the pro line, there's a break at the 13 to 15 inch size as well, in both CPU and graphics

Also, you now want to spec ram on purchase beyond your needs, as this sadly is no longer user upgradable.

 

[ChairShot]

I use it mainly for photoshop as my on duty workstation and my old macbook was running CS6 efficiently for my needs.

I think the insurance will send a check and then I can buy whatever I want and add to the total amount if need be. We'll see.

 

[ggadrian]

If you're working with Photoshop you should get the pro, the extra pixels are really helpful and the difference in thickness and weight shouldn't be a problem.

 

[C_A_S]

I use it mainly for photoshop as my on duty workstation and my old macbook was running CS6 efficiently for my needs.

I think the insurance will send a check and then I can buy whatever I want and add to the total amount if need be. We'll see.

Without a doubt figure on a Macbook Pro, not an Air.

If I were you, I would consider the 13" retina, or the 15" retina, and I would max out the ram. This will feel much more expensive than your old computer. Its probably worth it for you if you are continuing to use Adobe CS.

All of them have integrated Iris Pro graphics bar the top spec 15" retina, which has a discreet AMD 750 as well.

 

[mmntech]

Yeah, MBP is better for photo editing. Especially with the Retina display. Base comes with a 2.4ghz i5 for $1299. Might be able to find refurbs for cheaper though.

 

[sa7an1]

if you never move the thing get a desktop as it will have a desktop CPU and not a low power mobile version. even a mac mini would be more powerful than most laptops

 

[Eug]

Yes, the equivalent is the Air, but the Pro is much, much nicer. The main advantage of the Air is that it's lighter.

I hope to see a lighter Retina MacBook model this year though.

 

[Tencntraze]

if you never move the thing get a desktop as it will have a desktop CPU and not a low power mobile version. even a mac mini would be more powerful than most laptops

The mini hasn't been updated in a while and I don't believe this holds true. Most new macbook pros will beat the mac mini, especially with the PCIe SSDs.

http://browser.primatelabs.com/mac-benchmarks

 

[ChairShot]

I will carry it around a lot... Pretty much at every photo assignment I get.

I'll look into the pro-refurb. There's a retina display 13inch now at 20% off.

But first, I'll wait and see how much the insurance gives me.

Thanks!

 

[onething]

The Air is very limited when it comes to capabilities and I/O ports. For what you need, definitely Macbook Pro. The MBP line is what replaces the regular Macbook line. Hit up the Bestbuys/Futureshops for open box MBPs. You'll often find last-gen ones that are heavily discounted, since a brand new current gen one is like $2000.

 

[TheStu]

The Air is very limited when it comes to capabilities and I/O ports. For what you need, definitely Macbook Pro. The MBP line is what replaces the regular Macbook line. Hit up the Bestbuys/Futureshops for open box MBPs. You'll often find last-gen ones that are heavily discounted, since a brand new current gen one is like $2000.

???

The MacBook Air replaced the MacBook. The MacBook was limited in terms of capabilities and IO ports compared to the MacBook Pro, just as the Air is (in your opinion).

In fact, having owned both I would say that the Air is much closer to the Pro than the MacBook was. Not by a huge margin, but definitely closer. The 13" rMBP is definitely a great way to go if OP's insurance will cover the cost (or most of it), and that starts at $1300, not $2000. And if he had a Core 2 BlackBook, then it cost about that much new.

 

[ChairShot]

Got the evaluation from the insurance... costs more to repair than buy a new one.

I'll probably hit the refurb apple store and go from there with a 13inch pro.

I estimate that they'll give me roughly 1000-1200!

 

[Tegeril]

Be careful with the refurb Late 2013 13" rMBPs. The RAM is now soldered on, like with the Airs, so don't expect you can upgrade for yourself.

 

[ChairShot]

Endend up with close to 1400$... so I got this:

13.3-inch MacBook Pro 2.4GHz Dual-core Intel i5 with Retina Display from the refurb... Asked the guy at the Apple store about adding RAM and he said I could... 4 gigs is allright for me for now.



SPECS:
Originally released October 2013
13.3-inch (diagonal) Retina display; 2560-by-1600 resolution at 227 pixels per inch
4GB of 1600MHz DDR3L SDRAM
128GB Flash Storage1
720p FaceTime HD camera
Intel Iris Graphics

edit:

Seems that it's not the refurb part that is the problem as far a adding RAM. It's the mac pro w/ Retina display that have the RAM soldered for these models!

 

[Spicedaddy]

Good choice on the October 2013 rMBP 13", but I would've went for the 8GB ram/256GB SSD.

 

[dave_the_nerd]

The October '13 rMBPs don't have upgradable RAM - it's soldered onto the logic board.

http://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/MacBook+Pro+15-Inch+Retina+Display+Late+2013+Teardown/18696

Apple Store guy was wrong?

 

[ChairShot]

Yes he was, but he might have been talking about the non-retina version... no harm done

I would have also liked to have the 8gig and 256 HDD ... but budget was tight, and it was not available on the refurb store. Besides, I mostly do some photoshop (no 3d, no video..) and maybe some Diablo3 on occasion

Thanks all for the replies. Mac was shipped today, should be arriving on friday!

 

[Tegeril]

Endend up with close to 1400$... so I got this:

13.3-inch MacBook Pro 2.4GHz Dual-core Intel i5 with Retina Display from the refurb... Asked the guy at the Apple store about adding RAM and he said I could... 4 gigs is allright for me for now.



SPECS:
Originally released October 2013
13.3-inch (diagonal) Retina display; 2560-by-1600 resolution at 227 pixels per inch
4GB of 1600MHz DDR3L SDRAM
128GB Flash Storage1
720p FaceTime HD camera
Intel Iris Graphics

edit:

Seems that it's not the refurb part that is the problem as far a adding RAM. It's the mac pro w/ Retina display that have the RAM soldered for these models!

Re: your edit, I was simply saying to be careful because refurb systems in the store don't give you any options to customize, so if you were to pick a specific price point, I was warning about making sure to check RAM quantities, not that there was a difference between regular and refurb.

But seems 4GB will be ok for you. And Mavericks does have compressed RAM which will help performance and combined with that SSD...should be a colossal upgrade for you.

 

[Koing]

Re: your edit, I was simply saying to be careful because refurb systems in the store don't give you any options to customize, so if you were to pick a specific price point, I was warning about making sure to check RAM quantities, not that there was a difference between regular and refurb.

But seems 4GB will be ok for you. And Mavericks does have compressed RAM which will help performance and combined with that SSD...should be a colossal upgrade for you.

I'm waiting on the WDCC next week to see if anything interesting turns up. If not I'll get a rMBP 13 with 8GB and 256GB SSD. I'd have liked more than 256GB SSD and 16GB but it's all adds up FAST. I can get away with a fast SD drive for added space but 256GB should be okay. 8GB should be a very healthy upgrade from my 3GB. My system literally chokes on 3GB and I have to manually remove apps from ram to free system resources up.

Koing

 

[manly]

If I was the OP, I'd refuse delivery and reconsider the 8 GB upgrade. Mavericks has nifty RAM compression, but that's a one-time benefit. We can safely assume the OS and apps are only getting bigger with each annual upgrade.

I'm waiting on the WDCC next week to see if anything interesting turns up. If not I'll get a rMBP 13 with 8GB and 256GB SSD. I'd have liked more than 256GB SSD and 16GB but it's all adds up FAST. I can get away with a fast SD drive for added space but 256GB should be okay. 8GB should be a very healthy upgrade from my 3GB. My system literally chokes on 3GB and I have to manually remove apps from ram to free system resources up.

Koing

I'm in the same boat, 3 GB has been limiting for a while now. Unfortunately I bought an SSD last year, which helped a lot; so I'm willing to be uber-patient. I don't think I'll pull the trigger before Broadwell.

The other thing that helped usability was ditching Safari, which turned into a memory black hole starting with version 5.1. Each tab in use will consume more RAM until there's none left for any other app. With Chrome, there's basically a ceiling on memory consumption. And tabs real memory use will be swapped out if I need enough RAM to fire up a VM.

 

[postmortemIA]

You can upgrade RAM to 8GB for $100, but usually you have to order those from apple as this is customization from the base model (4GB, 128GB SSD)
$1,299 is the price of base rMBP, $1399 is upgrade to 8GB.

 

[alkemyst]

Don't forget to check MacMall for deals.

 

[Tegeril]

...

The other thing that helped usability was ditching Safari, which turned into a memory black hole starting with version 5.1. Each tab in use will consume more RAM until there's none left for any other app. With Chrome, there's basically a ceiling on memory consumption. And tabs real memory use will be swapped out if I need enough RAM to fire up a VM.

Safari 7 brought with it tab isolation and a much more aggressive interest in not being a resource hog. You should definitely give it another look.

 

[Koing]

If I was the OP, I'd refuse delivery and reconsider the 8 GB upgrade. Mavericks has nifty RAM compression, but that's a one-time benefit. We can safely assume the OS and apps are only getting bigger with each annual upgrade.


I'm in the same boat, 3 GB has been limiting for a while now. Unfortunately I bought an SSD last year, which helped a lot; so I'm willing to be uber-patient. I don't think I'll pull the trigger before Broadwell.

The other thing that helped usability was ditching Safari, which turned into a memory black hole starting with version 5.1. Each tab in use will consume more RAM until there's none left for any other app. With Chrome, there's basically a ceiling on memory consumption. And tabs real memory use will be swapped out if I need enough RAM to fire up a VM.

I actually have 4GB of ram in my system but I have an old MacBook from 2008 and it only sees 3GB or a tad over. It has 880MB of ram inactive at the moment.

The SSD upgrade I made in 2013 has made a BIG difference to the speed of my laptop. It's still crippled to SATA 1 speeds though

Koing