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13" MBP Question for Refurb Units

Wicked1

Wicked1

macrumors 68040
Original poster
Apr 13, 2009
3,283
14
New Jersey
Looking to get my son a new MBP 13" for his B-Day, but just not sure which one I want to buy him.

I am looking at the three models in the Refurb section:

2.3 i5
2.4 i5
2.7 i7

I know there are minor differences but is it worth it to spend a few hundred more for the 2.7 or just get one of the other units, 2.3 or 2.4? I am looking for advice on those who own either.

I have the 2011 Mini with the 2.3 i5 and 8GB ram, it works fine, but this one has to last him thru college, also I am planning on a Intel 320 300GB SSD as his main drive, and a external for backups. It will be used for Browsing, email, some games that run on Mac OSX, nothing fancy, and all the basic stuff he does now with his 13" MBP 2.4

I am familiar with the CPU options on the 2011 Models, just wondering if there is a big enough diff between the i5 2.3, and 2.4 compared to the i7 2.7 otherwise he could go with the new 2.4 and get his student discount for $1,100.00 plus on new, he gets the discount on Apple Care?

How are the 2.7 i7 CPU's?
 
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I'll share my experience with this same topic and maybe it will help you as well.

I recently sold my 11" MacBook Air to buy a refurb 13" early 2011 MacBook Pro. I needed a longer battery for my school day, plain and simple.

When looking through the refurb section, I noticed it would cost somewhere around $300 more to have an i7 with a faster clock speed. I thought the extra $300 would be a "future proof" investment and I headed to Google to find out what other people thought of that extra investment.

From my research (I checked Anandtech's review, which is probably the best on the 'net) I gathered that the i7 model had a poorer battery life than the i5. I also read about the amount of heat the i7 produced was higher than the i5.

So, long story short, I saved the money and bought the i5. I think your idea of putting in an SSD and maybe a RAM upgrade will be sufficient for the majority of needs at college.

Cheers and happy deciding:)
 
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I just bought a refurbished 2.4 Core i5 from the refurb store. Should be here some time today so I'll let you know how it performs when I get it.
 
The 2.3 is plenty fast for your son's needs. The 2.4 is only 100 MHz (not GHz) faster, which is inconsequential and imperceptible to the user. It comes with a 500GB drive vs. a 320GB drive; I don't think that 180GB is worth the extra money unless you know that he has that much data. Everything else about the Macs is identical.

The 2.7 is an 8-10% speed boost over the other models. Is that worth $300? Not to me...

I am often in the minority regarding SSDs, but in this case I think that an SSD is not worth the cost. Here is how an SSD benefits a user:

It launches applications faster. It saves your ass to a degree when you're short on ram. It boots up faster. If you're working in a heavier application that can really benefit from cpu power while not constrained by ram in any way (as in the system isn't having to shuffle things around to make it work) the SSD won't do anything for you. It's been tested many times. For the people who are just opening up their laptop to quickly check email or do various short tasks, it makes a much bigger difference.

In short, average users gain around a 50% increase in speed when booting-up and opening applications. I think that SSDs are the latest must-have fad among Mac aficionados. When I do a cost-benefit analysis it simply doesn't pencil-out for me, and I am a heavy user of pro apps. Your money is better spent on adding RAM and I think that for many users 4GB is perfectly adequate if their primary use is e-mail, Web surfing and the like.

Keep in mind that when asking this kind of question on this forum that there are plenty of folks who are more than happy to recommend that you spend your money for no good reason. After all, it's not their hard-earned $$$.
 
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If your son won't be doing much that requires heavy processor usage, I'd say go with the 2.3 and use the money you would be saving for 8GB RAM and some accessories like a case and mouse.
 
Decided, to order a refurb 2.4 13" since there are no more 2.3's which they are about the same anyway, will give him my Seagate 500 GB SHD Hybrid, put the 500Gb that comes with the unit in an external chassis and use for TM, however I will let him run with 4GB for a bit, and if he needs more I will get him the Crucial 8GB kit I bought for my 2011 Base Mini.

Still curious why Apple went from 2.3 to 2.4 if your not gaining anything?

Would have been nice to put the 2.8 i7 in as the base and like a 2.0 G i7 Quad for their upper end 13", I could not see the cost going up for this.
 
Wicked1 said:
Decided, to order a refurb 2.4 13" since there are no more 2.3's which they are about the same anyway, will give him my Seagate 500 GB SHD Hybrid, put the 500Gb that comes with the unit in an external chassis and use for TM, however I will let him run with 4GB for a bit, and if he needs more I will get him the Crucial 8GB kit I bought for my 2011 Base Mini.

Still curious why Apple went from 2.3 to 2.4 if your not gaining anything?

Would have been nice to put the 2.8 i7 in as the base and like a 2.0 G i7 Quad for their upper end 13", I could not see the cost going up for this.
Click to expand...

Then what will differentiate the 15-17" if they all have the same processor?
 
azentropy said:
Screen size, screen options (glass vs. AG), GPU, audio options, ports/expansion and weight to begin with.
Click to expand...

True, but most of that is cosmetic/physical differences. Most people want a powerful computer because of a powerful CPU so that's what they may be looking at first.
 
AntJon82 said:
GET THE 2.7 i7 WITH TURBO BOOST AND 8 GIG OF MEMORY FROM CRUCIAL
Click to expand...

To surf the net? Sorry... the minimum is going to be OVERKILL for doing the things he's doing... I wouldn't shell out for anything faster than a simple dual core because it's STILL going to be fast enough for doing anything in PS or other apps. They are SATA 3, and 1.3 Ghz ram but this newer hardware walks the last generation.

----------
Mojo1 said:
The 2.3 is plenty fast for your son's needs. The 2.4 is only 100 MHz (not GHz) faster, which is inconsequential and imperceptible to the user. It comes with a 500GB drive vs. a 320GB drive; I don't think that 180GB is worth the extra money unless you know that he has that much data. Everything else about the Macs is identical.

The 2.7 is an 8-10% speed boost over the other models. Is that worth $300? Not to me...

I am often in the minority regarding SSDs, but in this case I think that an SSD is not worth the cost. Here is how an SSD benefits a user:

It launches applications faster. It saves your ass to a degree when you're short on ram. It boots up faster. If you're working in a heavier application that can really benefit from cpu power while not constrained by ram in any way (as in the system isn't having to shuffle things around to make it work) the SSD won't do anything for you. It's been tested many times. For the people who are just opening up their laptop to quickly check email or do various short tasks, it makes a much bigger difference.

In short, average users gain around a 50% increase in speed when booting-up and opening applications. I think that SSDs are the latest must-have fad among Mac aficionados. When I do a cost-benefit analysis it simply doesn't pencil-out for me, and I am a heavy user of pro apps. Your money is better spent on adding RAM and I think that for many users 4GB is perfectly adequate if their primary use is e-mail, Web surfing and the like.

Keep in mind that when asking this kind of question on this forum that there are plenty of folks who are more than happy to recommend that you spend your money for no good reason. After all, it's not their hard-earned $$$.
Click to expand...
It's a HYBRID hard drive he's using, not a TRUE SSD. The Momentus XT's are a great cost effective alternative to a regular hard drive. If I could use Velociraptor 10K drive in my MBP I would but they get way too hot and aren't designed for it but in a TB JBOD's it would TOAST you're analogies that you feel it isn't "worth" it... You said "pro" apps... as in? A pro app IMO is a DAW, FCP, PS, 3D Rendering apps etc. It all depends what you do to see HUGE benefits in using an SSD my friend. Audio and video pros will gain big-time but surfing the net and emails... NO! Battery life is better too using SSD so that's a HUGE consideration for mobile computing.
 
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