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Mid 2012 Macbook Pro (Non Retina): The Last of the Easily Customizable/Swappable/?

alohamade

alohamade

macrumors regular
Original poster
Sep 13, 2012
143
13
Hey all!

So, I recently put 16GB of RAM and a 256GB Crucial M4 SSD into my mid 2011 Mac Mini and I am tremendously happy with it. For the longest time, I wanted to get a MacBook Air to compliment it but I'm now backtracking on those thoughts because of how easy it would be to just buy a mid 2012 MacBook Pro and swap the HDD for an SSD and the standard 4GB for 16GB RAM for little cost.

With that said, do you guys think that the Mid 2012 MacBook Pro (Non Retina) will be the last of the MacBook Pros we see that are easily opened up and customizable? The thing with the MacBook Air/Retina MacBook Pro is that they're hardly user serviceable, something in which I see to be lacking for a guy like me that loves swapping parts. Do we expect the MacBook Air line to take the place of the current MBPs?

Thanks!
 
P

Ploki

macrumors 601
Jan 21, 2008
4,309
1,560
There was an article by iFixit guy... can't find it now.

basically, when Macbook Air 13 was offered with the same pricetag as baseline Macbook Pro 13, apple consumers were given a choice:
Air - ultraportable, slim, fancy, better screen, no expandability, hard to service
Mbp - less portable, very expandable, decent screen, easy to service

Air sales went through the roof. result? Same choice for the "Pro" line:
rMBP - ultraportable, slim, fancy, better screen, no expandability, hard to service
MBP - not so portable, very expandable, decent screen, easy to service

What will get killed off? All depends on the sales, which I believe due to current pricing will be in favor of rMBP. There simply is no rationale in getting the old unibody. To get it on par with RAM and SSD with Retina, you're paying the same money. What you are getting? Another internal Sata3 port in favor of a thunderbolt port, which has more total bandwidth.

If apple were giving the old unibody a fair chance, they would have replaced the FW800 port with another thunderbolt. That's how we have it.
 
E

Essenar

macrumors 6502a
Oct 24, 2008
553
186
The difference is in the pudding, my friend.

The MacBook Air was the same price as the MacBook Pro. And it also depends on where the consumers are. Power users bought the Pro, no questions about it. If it was their single computer to use, then it was a no-brainer because of how cheap it would be to self-upgrade.

But power users aren't the majority of Apple owners.

I believe Apple will continue to push out classic MacBook Pro's because, let's face it, the majority of owners aren't going to just throw $1700 at a 13" integrated graphics laptop that can't be upgraded.

But if you're right, I'm certainly glad I own a mid 2012 MacBook Pro 13" Classic. Maybe it will be worth good money on Ebay after I upgrade the ram to 16GB to complement my SSD and optical tray mechanical drive.
 
richnyc

richnyc

macrumors regular
Nov 8, 2012
180
1
NYC
Ploki said:
There was an article by iFixit guy... can't find it now.
Click to expand...

THE RETINA MACBOOK PRO WAS ‘VERIFIED’ EPEAT GOLD, BUT IT’S NOT GREEN

The New MacBook Pro: Unfixable, Unhackable, Untenable

Essenar said:
I believe Apple will continue to push out classic MacBook Pro's because, let's face it, the majority of owners aren't going to just throw $1700 at a 13" integrated graphics laptop that can't be upgraded.
Click to expand...

^^^ Agreed, until the rMBP prices come down but that might take some time;)
 
F

Freyqq

macrumors 601
Dec 13, 2004
4,038
181
Ploki said:
There was an article by iFixit guy... can't find it now.

basically, when Macbook Air 13 was offered with the same pricetag as baseline Macbook Pro 13, apple consumers were given a choice:
Air - ultraportable, slim, fancy, better screen, no expandability, hard to service
Mbp - less portable, very expandable, decent screen, easy to service

Air sales went through the roof. result? Same choice for the "Pro" line:
rMBP - ultraportable, slim, fancy, better screen, no expandability, hard to service
MBP - not so portable, very expandable, decent screen, easy to service

What will get killed off? All depends on the sales, which I believe due to current pricing will be in favor of rMBP. There simply is no rationale in getting the old unibody. To get it on par with RAM and SSD with Retina, you're paying the same money. What you are getting? Another internal Sata3 port in favor of a thunderbolt port, which has more total bandwidth.

If apple were giving the old unibody a fair chance, they would have replaced the FW800 port with another thunderbolt. That's how we have it.
Click to expand...

Until the rmbp costs the same as the cmbp, this correlation is irrelevant. I foresee the rmbp coming down $100 in the next rev to make it more competitive.
 
Wicked1

Wicked1

macrumors 68040
Apr 13, 2009
3,283
14
New Jersey
There is no way Apple will make the rMBP the only game in town, if they did, then I would say they are not focused on what customers want.

The rMBP models are meant for a select few, the MBP meet the needs of the majority of users. I can not see them forcing people to spend more money on less power with limited upgrade functions.

I would love to see my 2012 13" MBP morph in the size of the rMBP 13"

I am ready to give up my superdrive for a thinner and lighter system, however only if I can upgrade the ram and SSD, otherwise I will keep buying the 13" units as the 17 and 15 are a tad too big and I do not do anything that requires a dedicated GPU. I wish I never got rid of my 2009 15" 2.53 with 4GB/500GB the ones with the nVidia 9600GT it was such a nice machine, but I never regret going wi thebase 13" alwas a good machine for the price.
 
Tonsko

Tonsko

macrumors 6502
Aug 19, 2010
293
1
So if I was to buy the base 13" 2012 MBP now, then I could upgrade the HD with my own SSD and plug in a load of ram as well?

What about installing SL? Will that work too?
 
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