2018 13 inch MacBook Pro: should I buy it?

[AppleHater]

I'm considering upgrading aging 2003 13 inch Macbook Pro. There is a sticker shock of the new Macbook Pro as it will cost me 2 grands for the one with 512GB SSD; 256GB is simply too small for my use nowadays. I spent $1400 for the 2003 Macbook Pro back then, so it's $900 increase of the cost for a similar but with SSD upgrade and the TouchBar that I don't want - evil Apple.

How much can I expect to get for my 2003 Macbook Pro base model with 256GB SSD and 8GB RAM?

Would I notice the improvements over my 2003 easily? Mine is serving me well still but I'm starting to worry that it'll get too old if I hold on to it longer.

 

[Bending Pixels]

Check either Adorama or B&H - they have a couple of excellent deals going on.

 

[Howard2k]

You'd be going from dual core to quad core. For single threaded tasks you won't notice much difference, assuming you have an SSD in the current one too. It will be faster, but it may not be "slap you in the face with a dead fish" noticeable. For multi-threaded tasks it will be significantly faster.

You don't really provide any information on what you'd use it for, so almost certainly you'll notice a difference. But possibly not. You also don't provide any information about where you're located. I have no idea what the used MBPro market is like in Croatia, for example. I'm assuming that you're in the US, so I would look on your local craigslist and search eBay for completed listings.

In terms of storage size, you don't have to pay Apple's crazy storage charges. You can go external, NAS, or Cloud, depending on how you use your machine.

Is it worth it? Again, without information it's difficult to say. I don't use mine in a professional capacity. The most taxing work I do is some photo editing and occasional video stuff, and it doesn't really matter to me whether a Lightroom HDR merge takes 15 seconds or 30 seconds. For me I won't be migrating from a 2015 to a 2018, even though the dual core to quad core move would give significant gains in photo editing and video work.

 

[camelphace]

I'm considering upgrading aging 2003 13 inch Macbook Pro. There is a sticker shock of the new Macbook Pro as it will cost me 2 grands for the one with 512GB SSD; 256GB is simply too small for my use nowadays. I spent $1400 for the 2003 Macbook Pro back then, so it's $900 increase of the cost for a similar but with SSD upgrade and the TouchBar that I don't want - evil Apple.

How much can I expect to get for my 2003 Macbook Pro base model with 256GB SSD and 8GB RAM?

Would I notice the improvements over my 2003 easily? Mine is serving me well still but I'm starting to worry that it'll get too old if I hold on to it longer.

Do it, if you can afford it. I just went from a early 2011 MacBook Pro to the 2018 i7, 16GB RAM, 1TB SSD and it feels like this machine came from the future. No complaints or problems at all. I am loving it.

 

[Upeo]

Going to a quad core you’ll obviously notice the performance boost, but this wasn’t simply a core increase, even the single core performance is a lot better. The i7 on the 13” this year is a very, very good processor that outperforms last years 15” by quite a bit at times. It’s not my decision to say what or when you should buy things obviously, but unless you’re doing GPU intensive tasks, performance will not be an issue with this laptop.

 

[Fyrrwin]

Just picked up the model you're looking at and I absolutely love it. If you can afford it don't over think it and just pull the trigger. This is my favorite MBP I've owned. Having owned exclusively 15'' MBP's I'm actually really blown away by how much I love the size of the 13. I find myself actually being more productive on it. I personally also love the feel of the new keyboard - took a couple days to get used to the travel, but once I did it just feels so much more solid than my mid 2015 did. I also may be in the minority here, but I generally really enjoy the touch bar - once I realized I could just swipe at the volume/brightness key that was game changing.