13in or 15in Retina

For Adobe Premiere you would probably profit from the high end 15".
If that's worth the extra $$$ for you, noone know except you.

From your usage, unless you're editing multiple RAW files in Lightroom (which you may be), 8GB RAM should be enough. Don't be put off if in Activity Monitor it says 7 or 7.5GB used, as as long as the memory pressure graph is green, there isn't anything to worry about.

Having said that, since the 15" now comes with 16GB standard, it may be a moot point. For editing, Photoshop, Lightroom etc a dual-core i5 or i7 would work perfectly well, however obviously it would be markedly slower when transcoding, exporting etc.
The actual day to day use may not be that different however.

Having never used an Iris/Iris Pro GPU I can't say first hand how they perform, however by all accounts they are very capable chips (especially the Pro) and as such should be able to handle Premiere, FCP, Photoshop etc fine. Gaming is the only place you may feel the pinch, but usually running at half resolution makes it fine without a massive decrease in quality.

Personally, I'd go with the base 15" (possibly with upgraded SSD depending on how much storage you need), as the processor, amount of RAM and GPU are all very, very capable. I wouldn't splash on the high end 15" as I personally wouldn't touch another MBP with a dedicated graphics chip again after all the problems Apple have had historically. The Iris Pro is a very good chip and will work fine for photo and video work.

I wouldn't get the 13" as it is quite a bit smaller when you're not working at the external monitor, it only comes with 8GB RAM standard, a worse iGPU and it uses a slower, dual core processor. Speccing up a 13" MBP fully (apart from storage) puts is fairly close to a base 15", where you also get a quad core i7 and Iris Pro GPU.

Good luck with whatever you choose, I'm sure you'll enjoy it.

The base 15" rmbp should be enough. The dGPU is more for rendering 3D, which you aren't doing. The quad core and the 16GB of ram are the big improvements that you will notice.

Freyqq said:

The quad core and the 16GB of ram are the big improvements that you will notice.

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I don't think the OP would except for some aspects of Premier (e.g. encoding video files). If Premier is a daily or weekly activity, then the quad core and RAM will be of good use. If it's more like a monthly or few times a year activity, then it's probably not as important, and just a matter of budget.

I'm not trying to talk the OP out of the 15" - I like to have some performance leg room myself, but it may be more computer than they need.

ixxx69 said:

I don't think the OP would except for some aspects of Premier (e.g. encoding video files). If Premier is a daily or weekly activity, then the quad core and RAM will be of good use. If it's more like a monthly or few times a year activity, then it's probably not as important, and just a matter of budget.

I'm not trying to talk the OP out of the 15" - I like to have some performance leg room myself, but it may be more computer than they need.

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I agree with this advise.
"Video editing" is a broad term and any macbook sold today is capable of it.
Of course for permanent multitasking with premiere, the high end 15" might show it's capabilities, but if that is worth the extra $$$ only the OP knows for himself.

I would go 15. I have 13. But 15 must be nice.

I also agree with ixxx69
Personally, because i am not a professional video editor or graphic artist i think that the low end 13" model would be very good for 90% of peeps needs.

I would take the extra $1500.00 in savings and max ram out to 16G then throw in a 1T SSD drive i think this would be a monster machine for a laptop. Should even have enough money to add a 4K monitor.

IMHO.

ixxx69 said:

I don't think the OP would except for some aspects of Premier (e.g. encoding video files). If Premier is a daily or weekly activity, then the quad core and RAM will be of good use. If it's more like a monthly or few times a year activity, then it's probably not as important, and just a matter of budget.

I'm not trying to talk the OP out of the 15" - I like to have some performance leg room myself, but it may be more computer than they need.

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Yeah, it depends how much rendering he is doing in premiere. The 16gb of ram is also good for premiere. Premiere eats a lot of ram. For photoshop, 8gb and a dual core are probably enough.

photoshop can utilize as much ram as you can throw at it....it doesn't really benefit from a dGPU though, although it does work better with the multiple cores

you can get the 13" model with 16gb RAM. Might want to consider building our a setup for Premier only. Max out a Mac Mini i7 set it up with Premier then get a 13" retina 8gb or 16gb and you portable machine.

I have a similar setup where my Mac Mini handles on my video and intense debuging with 16GB of ram. Then my rMBP 8gb is my everyday coding machine connected to two 22" monitors and it portable to take onsite to clients with no hassle. Work within your budget and be smart about it, sure you can max out a 15" but do you really need everything to happen on one machine? You can easily Screen Sharing into the Mac Mini and run your process there (heck you don't even need another monitor).

Hieveryone said:

I would go 15. I have 13. But 15 must be nice.

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It is.

I just got the base 15" and it blows the doors off my old MBAir... AutoCAD runs great.

If you're used to the speed of a quad core you will definitely notice the decrease in transcoding/exporting speed when going to a dual core.

But that doesn't at all mean the dual core is a slouch by any means. It's perfectly fine for editing go pro footage.

With adobe products - I prefer the larger display, you just have more screen real estate to work with.