I’m looking to purchase a new 2019 13” MBP and was wondering if I should swing for the additional $180 to upgrade the ram from 8g to 16g or should I spend $200 extra to get 256g of disk space? I won’t likely be using it for anything processor intense. Some website design/development and some photo editing. Thanks in advance for any constructive advice!
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Advice for new MBP purchase
- Thread starter Treva03
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Yeah the CPU upgrade for the 13" 2TB3 model is entirely unnecessary. I think most people on here will say 16GB RAM, but I'm more on the side of 256GB SSD if you can only choose one. It's entirely based on your use though. Figure out what Applications you want to install, add up their size, and if its only 30-40 GBs of stuff, the 16GB RAM option might be better for you.
Of course, if you can get your hands on a student ID or email address, you get a free pair of Beats that you could resell for the cost of the other upgrade!
Of course, if you can get your hands on a student ID or email address, you get a free pair of Beats that you could resell for the cost of the other upgrade!
Given the choice between 8/256 and 16/128, I'd go for 8/256. If 8GB of RAM is an issue you'll swap to SSD and you'll ned to close programs to improve performance, but to me that's easier that constantly shuffling files. I use 8/256 and do some light photo work and it works great. I do see some swapping if I look but I don't notice swapping and don't have memory pressure issues. With 256 I can keep files local while I work on them, but then I move them to NAS when done. Whatever you decide, either could be limiting, so I'd consider how I'd work around each issue.
This. ^. Go with the additional RAM and then pick up one or more external SSDs as needed. The price has come down significantly on those and you can add 1 TB of storage for a fraction of the cost of getting it built in by Apple.
I think 8 ram is just fine! Many people think they need much more than they actually need...
This. I would always rather update the storage than ram. 8 GB is more than enough, if you ain’t doing heavy video editing. I have seen people going crazy about ram(thinking it will make the machine a lot faster in every day tasks). But in reality they end up using only about 6GB of ram max at any given time when not doing professional editing etc.
Depends on usage. The iGPU uses a fair amount of RAM allocation so it can benefit from some extra head room especially if you use an external 4/5K monitor.
Of course. The OP was saying he will be using it just for light stuff and for that I won’t recommend upgrading the ram, instead go for more storage
Tough question
More ram or more storage and if you can't (or don't) want to pay for both then you have to figure out what works best
On one hand, I can see 8GB being constrained, but 128GB of storage will not offer much free space due to the OS taking a big chunk of it. I also played the external drive game, and that's no fun, especially if you forget to pack it away. If it were me, I'd probably opt for the 256GB drive,as macOS is excellent with memory management.
To put it another way, if you run out of ram, you computer won't stop working, it will slow down. If you run out of storage your computer will shut down.
Also consider how SSDs don't like to be nearly full, and with that tidbit of info, its my opinion that selecting the storage is a better option.
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In your case, I wouldn't think twice about it: I would get the larger SSD. 8GB RAM will be very sufficient, but 128GB storage probably won't be. As Mike Flynn noted, nearly full SSD's run more slowly. Get the 256GB.
Thanks for all the replies! There are obvious advantages for going either route. It’s just not in my budget to get both though. I’m currently using a 2013 13” MBP with 4g of ram and 128gb hd. My MBP works great and I wouldn’t consider it to be slow by any means. I have used a lot of disk space though. Currently only have 4g free. And that’s mostly being used up by Xcode, photoshop, photos, and I have some software defined radio apps installed as well. I’m going to be starting school for web/app development. Is 8g enough ram to run virtual machines well enough? I’ve never ran any VMs on my current machine. I thought about trading in my current MBP towards the purchase of the new one but I don’t think I want to part with it yet. Beyond a couple of scratches on the case it’s in excellent shape. I seem to be getting a bit off topic now. But I’m still torn on the decision. I’m leaning towards upgrading the disk space since currently that’s what I’m low on with my current MBP. Thanks again for all the great advice!!
You’ll need more RAM if you plan to run virtual machines. And disk space as they eat that as well.
But not in his budget.
I had said 8/256, but if running VMs I would be 16/128 for sure. And external storage.
On the 2019 13” mbp you will only need to assign 2gb ram, and 2 cpu’s of the available 8 to windows 10 pro, runs just fine and dandy.
(Disclaimer, 2gb OS assigned will be fine for web/app testing environment only, not for developing web or apps in vm itself)
You should however go for the higher storage, 128gb will not cut it if you want windows 10 et al, in parallels etc.
(Disclaimer, 2gb OS assigned will be fine for web/app testing environment only, not for developing web or apps in vm itself)
You should however go for the higher storage, 128gb will not cut it if you want windows 10 et al, in parallels etc.
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Budgets have a way of bringing reality to our desires!
OP, it you don't have the funds to buy a machine with both 16GB RAM and at least 256GB SSD, seeing that your present MBP is serving you okay, I believe I would keep it until I could save enough to get both the RAM and the storage.
Also, consider buying Apple-refurbished. 2019 Apple-refurbished MBP's should be out this fall, perhaps October. I set up my refurbished 13" 2018 yesterday and love it.
OP, it you don't have the funds to buy a machine with both 16GB RAM and at least 256GB SSD, seeing that your present MBP is serving you okay, I believe I would keep it until I could save enough to get both the RAM and the storage.
Also, consider buying Apple-refurbished. 2019 Apple-refurbished MBP's should be out this fall, perhaps October. I set up my refurbished 13" 2018 yesterday and love it.
TB3 SSDs are as fast as the internal ones - arguably faster, given that the highest speeds are only achieved with a >512GB SSD in current Macs.
I meant in terms of memory management. 128 SSD is slower than 256 SSD by quite a bit. And that is what is used for swap space. That is more likely to impact performance (starting apps, swapping to disk) than not having 16 GB. 16 GB may lower the need for swapping, but it won't eliminate it.
Your argument for less ram is so that you’ll have marginally faster swap?
Now I’ve heard everything.
Thanks for everyone’s advice and insights! The decision was a tough one but I think I’m going to go with 16gb of ram and also upgrade the hd to 256 gigs. I decided I can just sell the beats headphones even though I’d like to keep them I think I’d be better off just selling them so I can afford to get a better setup that will last me for a few more years. I do have another quick question though. The new usb c charger that comes with the new MBP doesn’t look very long to me. And it looks like the power block itself plugs into the outlet instead of the way my current one the block has a removable cord that plugs into the outlet. Can I remove this cord and use it on the power block that comes with the new one?
Yes, it's the same as the old one, just missing the extension cord that used to be shipped with the machine.
I would say since you're doing photo editing, I would go for the additional 256GB of storage rather than an additional 8GB of RAM. I don't have that many photos on my 256GB MBP and I'm constantly running out of space.