2012 Macbook Air vs. 2009 Macbook Pro?

[knznick]

I have a Mid-2009 Macbook Pro 15' 2.53GHz Intel Core 2 Duo, 8Gb Ram, 250 GB HDD. I'm very interested in upgrading to a June-2012 Macbook Air 13' 1.8Ghz, 8Gb Ram, 128 GB SSD. Would I see an increase/decrease in performance? I'm only a basic user that does primarily web browsing and *light* gaming. I'm also a student so portability is very important to me.

Thanks for the advice!

Also, what would my macbook pro sell for?

 

[blevins321]

You could buy an SSD for your Pro. For your usage that would make it almost on par with a new Air.

 

[iVeBeenDrinkin']

The new MBA, with the SSD and the new processors, would run much quicker than a core 2 MBP. Not to mention the thunderbolt and USB 3.0.

 

[dmelgar]

It's not even close. I had a 2.1ghz core 2 duo 2009 13" MacBook Pro, and I bought a 2010 11" MacBook Air that would run most every real world scenario faster than my MacBook Pro. By real world, I mean not benchmarks, but timing how long some activity took. Such as boot, compile and debug an app, switch userids, bring up the browser.

I all those cases, the speed of even the 2010 SSD more than outweighed the slower CPU. Sometimes making the action as much as ten times faster.

Now throw in the 2012 with a CPU that benchmarks 3x faster than my 2010 1.6ghz core 2 duo. An SSD that's 2x my 2010 etc. You have a machine that's much faster than a 2009 MacBook Pro.