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macbook air? macbook pro? imac?

M

macfriend1

macrumors regular
Original poster
again, I need your help.

The story:
I bought a macbook (2GHz, 2RAM, 80HD) the boosted serie 2. (intelcoreduo) in July 2007. It's too crappy to do videoediting but I need a light, comfortable easy laptop for myself cause I'm traveling alot. On the otherhand I'd like to buy a more powerful machine for my private videoprojects..(with final cut)

what should I do? (I am willing to sell my old macbook, cause there are new ones out there🙂 hehe)
- buy a macbook pro, sell macbook? (disadvantage, too big for my travels)
- buy additional imac? (would need space somewhere... are they good enough to edit good footage?!)
- buy macbook air, sell macbook, buy i mac?!
- what about a refurbished-solution?!

this is just too weird...

thanks for your input in advance. :apple: for real!
 
The MacBook Air - definitely not. Will be as bad if not worse than the MacBook for performance.

Get yourself a MacBook Pro if you need extreme power on the go. It is a rapid machine for a laptop, and performance wise is as good as the iMac of equivalent specs. Just a bunch of extra cash.

I'd get the 17" model. Depending on how much you have to spend, if you are serious about video editing, get the HD screen. Just provides much more desktop space to work with, as well as letting you view true 1080P HD.
 
get another Macbook it will adress all of your needs. protable, fast, inexpensive and if u want get an external display as well.
 
If you travel a lot, then buy a MacBook Pro. It's probably only a little heavier than the MacBook, but if you really wanted good video editing, you would get it.

Since you travel a lot, it may seem like the MacBook Air is right for you right? No. It can't handle video editing any better than the MacBook you already own.

Although you are thinking about an iMac, if you travel, it is quite impossible to take this everywhere you go. I mean it is possible, but you wouldn't want to.

So go with the MacBook Pro. Sell you MacBook, you will probably get a decent price and buy the MacBook Pro. It has a good graphics card, they were recently updated and they are perfect for travel. You won't regret it!
 
Either buy an iMac or a 17" MBP and keep the macbook. I would recommend the 17" Hi-res MBP refurbished of those two options. Either will fit your purposes. If you want to sell your macbook and have just one machine, I would go with the 15" MBP, which is the best compromise. Without knowing the depth of your work, I can't recommend a specific model, but refurbished are usually good, though if you get a student discount I would buy new.

Hope that helps.
 
chrismac00 said:
If you travel a lot, then buy a MacBook Pro. It's probably only a little heavier than the MacBook, but if you really wanted good video editing, you would get it.

Since you travel a lot, it may seem like the MacBook Air is right for you right? No. It can't handle video editing any better than the MacBook you already own.

Although you are thinking about an iMac, if you travel, it is quite impossible to take this everywhere you go. I mean it is possible, but you wouldn't want to.

So go with the MacBook Pro. Sell you MacBook, you will probably get a decent price and buy the MacBook Pro. It has a good graphics card, they were recently updated and they are perfect for travel. You won't regret it!
Click to expand...

thanks for this useful advice. If I had to decide tomorrow I'd take your advice.
But I somehow always wanted this apple desktop... oahh soo oslick these imacs... anyways, I will be travelling till the end of 2008.. is it worth to buy a macbook pro only for this period? hmm
 
Adokimus said:
Either buy an iMac or a 17" MBP and keep the macbook. I would recommend the 17" Hi-res MBP refurbished of those two options. Either will fit your purposes. If you want to sell your macbook and have just one machine, I would go with the 15" MBP, which is the best compromise. Without knowing the depth of your work, I can't recommend a specific model, but refurbished are usually good, though if you get a student discount I would buy new.

Hope that helps.
Click to expand...

good idea. the only prolbem is I would need the extramoney from my macbook to buy another machine (my mb is in a very good condition, and I pimped it so it has a quite good refurbished price on the market) and 2machines at the same time would be kinda exagerating...
 
If you need it now and don't want two machines, as I said before, I think you should go with the 15" MBP. If you won't need a laptop after 2008, then wait and keep your MB and then sell it and buy an iMac at that time. Sounds like you really want an iMac, but you can't afford it without selling the MB, but you need the MB for portability now, but you don't want to wait.

So, again, sell the MB and buy a 15" MBP now, or wait and sell it and buy an iMac then. No one can make that decision for you.
 
Sacrifice the 2 extra lbs and 15" form factor - get the MBP for a perfect balance of portability and power.
 
Refurb MBP, I would get the 1600 dollar one because it has enough vram and has the 2.4ghz processor. Then I would suggest buying 3rd party ram and installing it.

ChrisN
 
Go all the Way...

... and do the MBP in 15 or 17 inch. I travel quite a bit and I take my 17 MBP for video editing. It is a bit more weight, but it really is worth it! The 17 inch will solve your longing for screen real estate as well.:apple:
 
macfriend1 said:
... It's too crappy to do videoediting but I need a light, comfortable easy laptop for myself cause I'm traveling alot. On the otherhand I'd like to buy a more powerful machine for my private videoprojects..(with final cut)
Click to expand...

If you're finding the MB lousy for video editing, then I'm afraid you're going to be disappointed with a MBP. As video editing a CPU-intensive app, there's very little difference between the machines - although these FCS tests on a MB and MBP - 2.0Ghz CD (which you say you have, but I suspect you have a C2D) versus 2.16GHz CD - is a little old, it will give you a good idea:

http://creativemac.digitalmedianet.com/articles/viewarticle.jsp?id=43717

If you wanted to use GPU-intensive apps in Studio, like Color, I would certainly say go with a MBP.

These more recent tests - http://www.barefeats.com/mbook3.html - are also useful for illustrating the performance of MBs and MBPs in CPU-intensive tasks.
 
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