Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

13" MacBook Pro i5 or i7

J

JackMoore94

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Nov 7, 2012
2
0
Hi I am going to buy a MacBook Pro and was wondering which one I should get, the i5 or i7. I have worked out that it will end up costing me around £50-£100 more for the i7. I am not some hardcore video editor or photo editor just play the odd game such as minecraft, left for dead 2 and a few others, and every day things like going on the Internet (mostly YouTube), college work (no graphic designs) just word processor and the others. I just thought since its not loads ect should I just go for it. I will probably be upgrading to a SSD pretty soon after I get it.
Thanks Jack
 
JackMoore94 said:
Hi I am going to buy a MacBook Pro and was wondering which one I should get, the i5 or i7. I have worked out that it will end up costing me around £50-£100 more for the i7. I am not some hardcore video editor or photo editor just play the odd game such as minecraft, left for dead 2 and a few others, and every day things like going on the Internet (mostly YouTube), college work (no graphic designs) just word processor and the others. I just thought since its not loads ect should I just go for it. I will probably be upgrading to a SSD pretty soon after I get it.
Thanks Jack
Click to expand...

The i5 model will be fine. Use the money you save to upgrade to 16GB of RAM. Crucial, Corsair and g.skill make good stuff.
 
The i5 will probably be fine for what you need. I got an i7 as a refurb from the Apple store online, so it only cost me $1269 as opposed the the $1499 retail for new.
I highly recommend a SSD. The 8GB of RAM is probably sufficient although since it was so inexpensive, I swapped mine out for 16GB. :)
I love everything about the machine and the Mac OS ( this is my first mac ) but I am disappointed in the claim of 7hrs. of battery life. I don't get anything approaching that.
 
So if you guys had to choose one of these;
13" - i5 - 16GB RAM (upgraded) - 256GB SSD (upgraded)

Or

13" - i7 8GB RAM - 750 GB HDD

Both work out at the same price, which one would you go for.

I would be able to upgrade to an SSD on the i7 about a month after.
 
JackMoore94 said:
So if you guys had to choose one of these;
13" - i5 - 16GB RAM (upgraded) - 256GB SSD (upgraded)

Or

13" - i7 8GB RAM - 750 GB HDD

Both work out at the same price, which one would you go for.

I would be able to upgrade to an SSD on the i7 about a month after.
Click to expand...

You can always upgrade to 16GB of RAM (which is not needed) down the road. Right now it's what, $70 and will just get cheaper. Same goes for the SSD, 256GB drives can be had for about $140 on sale, and will probably be $99 after Christmas. You won't be able to upgrade your CPU down the road, though.

I bought a guy at work the 13" Pro with 8GB and SSD from the refurb store for like 1300, it's a rocket. Apple is using the Samsung 830 SSD's instead of the old 470's that were much slower than aftermarket drives.
 
who cares about upgrading the ram to 16gb? you don't do ANYTHING that remotely needs it. ssd is a nice-to-have but certainly not necessary for your usage. youtubing and word processing is not going to be any faster.

the i5 is MORE than enough for your needs.
 
^

This.

The i5 is a great machine. I'd upgrade the RAM on my own and save a bunch of money compared to getting it from Apple. Storage can be upgraded if, as, and when you need to. As stevelam wrote, SSD is nice to have, but not essential, despite what some folks here claim.
 
Naimfan said:
^

This.

The i5 is a great machine. I'd upgrade the RAM on my own and save a bunch of money compared to getting it from Apple. Storage can be upgraded if, as, and when you need to. As stevelam wrote, SSD is nice to have, but not essential, despite what some folks here claim.
Click to expand...

I agree that the i5 is plenty sufficient for most tasks. And I would certainly by the absolute base cMBP and then DYI upgrade as that will be far cheaper and better than Apple upgrades. But once you have used a good hybrid or SSD, regular HDDs are just unbearably slow, definitely budget for at least a Seagate Momentus XT.

Also, others have pooh-poohed 16GB RAM, but if you plan on running a VM, it's gotta be nice to have 8GB a side these days.
 
NewishMacGuy said:
I agree that the i5 is plenty sufficient for most tasks. And I would certainly by the absolute base cMBP and then DYI upgrade as that will be far cheaper and better than Apple upgrades. But once you have used a good hybrid or SSD, regular HDDs are just unbearably slow, definitely budget for at least a Seagate Momentus XT.

Also, others have pooh-poohed 16GB RAM, but if you plan on running a VM, it's gotta be nice to have 8GB a side these days.
Click to expand...

Agreed - I have the "base" model cMBP, i5, and I updated the RAM myself to 16GB from Crucial - in the UK, its currently around £55 for the RAM upgrade.

The performance of the i5 is fine, I've not seen a beachball or had any performance drags since upgrading the RAM (and I saw very few before with the stock 4GB).

If using VMWare or Parallels, the 16GB is a real boon, and it allows you to run lots of concurrent apps at the same time (very useful as it saves having to constantly juggle apps, shutting them down and opening them up again).

I'm currently saving (slowly!) for an SSD, but will upgrade that myself - I want one of a comparable size to the 500GB hard disk I currently have though.
 
chriscl said:
I'm currently saving (slowly!) for an SSD, but will upgrade that myself - I want one of a comparable size to the 500GB hard disk I currently have though.
Click to expand...

Ooh - that's the painful way to do it. Go hybrid or fusion. It's MUCH cheaper. And you don't really need all that extra speed for ALL of your stuff, do you?

750GB Momentus XT = $120 and 12-15 second boots with your most used software opening instantaneously. Or you can ditch your Superdrive and have a DIY Fusion drive for just a few quid more...

http://tomasz.korwel.net/2012/11/04/apple-fusion-drive-on-late-2010-macbook-pro/
 
NewishMacGuy said:
Ooh - that's the painful way to do it. Go hybrid or fusion. It's MUCH cheaper. And you don't really need all that extra speed for ALL of your stuff, do you?

750GB Momentus XT = $120 and 12-15 second boots with your most used software opening instantaneously. Or you can ditch your Superdrive and have a DIY Fusion drive for just a few quid more...
Click to expand...

Good point, but I really want to retain the SuperDrive (it was one of the reasons I bought a cMBP, rather than a retina).

I've currently used around 300GB of the 500GB HDD, and whilst there is some stuff on there I could offload to external storage, I thought originally of going for the 256GB SSD, but then looked at the cost and thought if I was going to spend that much, I may as well save a little more and go for the bigger SSD, for more future-proofing...

The Fusion might be an option, but I'd all but set my mind on a full SSD - decisions, decisions!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back