13" MBP Questions

Not sure about the RAM/graphics question but I would not get Apples SSD or RAM, get the HDD and upgrade to the SSD with an outside company.

 

I got the base model 13-inch, Mid-2012 MacBook Pro, and then I bought third party RAM (16 GB) and a 256 SSD.

The SSD makes it much faster to boot up, shut down, launching apps, and opening files.

The 16 GB RAM I added is actually slightly slower (1333 MHz) than the 4 GB of RAM (1600 MHz) that comes with the MBP by default. However, having more RAM allows the computer to have more apps running at once.

Most importantly, you can save several hundred dollars by getting third party RAM and an SSD than ordering directly from Apple.


I would get at least 8 GB RAM, I usually use about 150 GB of storage on my drives, so I went with the 256 GB SSD for more storage. The SSD is really great.

Since you're also in college, I recommend that when you purchase your MacBook Pro, get the educational discount to save you $100.

My MacBook Pro with the third party hardware and the discount cost me about $1,400.

For third party RAM and SSD, I recommend Crucial:http://www.crucial.com

 

I waited for a sale, got 80$ corsair force 3 ssd 120gb.
55$ for a corsair vengeance 1600mhz 8gb ram.

Opted for the cheaper ssd, since I thought ssd prices are still dropping and probably gonna ugprade to 512gb when prices go down more. Bought a external enclosure for stock 500gb hdd from mac, and used it to store music and videos, also as a back up

 

I'm in the same boat, only I want the 13" MBP as opposed to the 15" mainly for space saving.

But as others say it's cheaper to get more ram and an SSD from 3rd party suppliers.

As far as gaming goes, I've asked around and a lot of peeps say the HD4000 still wont cut it as far as gaming is concerned, even an older discrete GPU say in a 15" MBP refurd would better serve gaming purposes than the HD4000 with more machine ram(which btw takes shared ram for the GPU to 512MB max, regardless of 8GB or 16GB system mem)