Best value MacBook Pro?

[memo90061]

Hello!
I had an old MacBook Pro from 2015 that I was using and was stolen recently. I thought about upgrading that laptop, but was still kinda working for what I was using it for. I have an iMac Pro at my house, so the laptop is only needed when I'm outside of my house.

The laptop is used for the following:

• Browsing the web, watching videos, youtube
• Photoshop to edit some Panasonic S5 raw files
• Basic video editing on Adobe Premiere Pro

Was thinking of the 16 inch MacBook Pro from 2019, but the new MacBook Pro with M1 sounds nice. The max I would want to spend is $1500, so the M1 seems to be out of range? What do you all think is the best value right now for a MacBook Pro? Would you still buy the i9 MacBook Pro or no?

 

[Bigwaff]

Yes, I did nearly a year ago on eBay for just less than $1400. Excellent condition too.

2.4 GHz 8-core i9, 64GB RAM, 1TB SSD, AMD Radeon Pro 5500M 8GB

Actually more computer than I need since I don't edit RAW or video files but the price was so right.

 

[smirking]

If you don't need the larger screen, I'd opt for a refurbished M2 Air. That might edge you just over $1500 though, so if you really wanted most bang for the buck, a refurbished M1 Air is probably the best deal for your needs.

 

[Toutou]

There are basically no low-end Apple Silicon machines, even the Air packs a serious punch, nothing like a few years ago. You don’t have to automatically go Pro unless you specifically need the Pro goodies (screen, ports) and don’t mind the baddies (weight, fan, thickness). Performance-wise the Air’s got your back, and then some.

 

[memo90061]

So the new MacBook Airs are good? I never thought about them in the past because of specs.

Right now I'm leaning towards the i9 because I found one with good specs at a good price.

 

[smirking]

So the new MacBook Airs are good? I never thought about them in the past because of specs.

Right now I'm leaning towards the i9 because I found one with good specs at a good price.

Yeah, any of the M1's are really really good. Don't get fooled by the expectations of the Air being the kiddie computer. It's not. The only drawback of the Air is that it doesn't have a fan so if you're doing sustained high workloads it could bottleneck once it starts to run hot.

Still, it runs way cooler than an Intel. I used to count on my MBP to warm my hands in the winter. Now that I have an M1, my hands are freezing.

 

[AbsurdlyJames]

A refurbished 14” MBP can be had for $1539.

 

[Toutou]

So the new MacBook Airs are good? I never thought about them in the past because of specs.

Right now I'm leaning towards the i9 because I found one with good specs at a good price.

Yes, the M2 Air has more power than the i9 Pro.

 

[tstafford]

I would for sure go for an M2 Air over any intel Mac.

 

[memo90061]

I'm very undecided because I saw a 16 inch with 4tb ssd and 64gb ram.

 

[mrfunnypenguin]

I would not buy an Intel machine now, because of software support. It is possible that after the transition to Apple Silicon is done, Intel Macs won't be supported any more.

This is the pattern:
Big Sur 11 = 2013 (for some 2014) or later
Monterey 12 = 2015 or later
Ventura 13 = 2017 or later
macOS 14 = likely 2019 or later, and this may be the last update the Intel models get, but the 2019 Mac Pro should continue to get support because it is still being sold
macOS 15 = Only Apple Silicon MacBooks, iMacs, and Mac Minis, but 2019 Mac Pro should get this one

But it is possible that this may not be the case because macOS typically supports Macs for 6-7 years. But I would not hold my breath on a 2019 or 2020 Intel Mac getting macOS 15. After all, I don't think there was any promise that Macs would get 5 - 7 years of support.

 

[gpat]

Was thinking of the 16 inch MacBook Pro from 2019, but the new MacBook Pro with M1 sounds nice. The max I would want to spend is $1500, so the M1 seems to be out of range? What do you all think is the best value right now for a MacBook Pro? Would you still buy the i9 MacBook Pro or no?

Used base model 14" should be within your range.

 

[memo90061]

If I could find a used 14 inch it would be nice, but I do like the bigger screen. I also want minium 1tb of storage and 32gb of ram.

 

[gpat]

If I could find a used 14 inch it would be nice, but I do like the bigger screen. I also want minium 1tb of storage and 32gb of ram.

Just search for an used 16" M1 1TB, allocate the extra budget, and be done with it.
It'll be well spent money if you keep your computer for a long time.
You're unlikely to find a model with 32GB RAM but you really don't need it.
If you use your Mac as a desktop replacement, you're right to only look for 16" models, I once downsized from a 16" Intel to a M1 Air and the screen size was traumatic.
Anyway steer clear from the Intel, I couldn't wait to get rid of mine.

 

[Allen_Wentz]

If you don't need the larger screen, I'd opt for a refurbished M2 Air. That might edge you just over $1500 though, so if you really wanted most bang for the buck, a refurbished M1 Air is probably the best deal for your needs.

MBAs have much lesser display quality, much lesser audio quality, less ports, drive less external displays and are only available with much less RAM. If those compromises suit you, you may save money choosing an MBA, but personally not my choice.

RAM needs have climbed by orders of magnitude steadily since the birth of the personal computer, and one should choose RAM for the planned life cycle of the box, not simplistically for what works today. IMO 32 GB is an absolute minimum for a new MBP purchase.

 

[ian87w]

Back to my mantra again, if you have to ask, you don't need the power of the Macbook Pro.

RAW image and even 4k editing are now easily done on an iPad, so even the M1/M2 Macbook Air are already more than capable in doing those tasks. Those are no longer "heavy pro" tasks that we used to think like in the intel days.

So I'm guessing it's the typical want than a need . For the budget, I would get the M1 Macbook Air, maxed out the RAM, and spend the extra money for accessories.

 

[smirking]

RAM needs have climbed by orders of magnitude steadily since the birth of the personal computer, and one should choose RAM for the planned life cycle of the box, not simplistically for what works today. IMO 32 GB is an absolute minimum for a new MBP purchase.

I’m a developer and I run servers. I believed that too once, but RAM dependency isn’t a linear line that exists in a vacuum based on a slope plotted in the late 90’s where most of our RAM anxiety is from.

The whole system matters. In the days when machines had endless thirst for RAM we also had slower RAM, much slower storage, slower buses, high latency interfaces. Processors were slower. Everything was much much slower.

SSDs are a game changer. Fast interfaces are a game changer. Hardware instead of software based protocols are a game changer. Low latency interfaces are a game changer.

A few years ago, I spent several weeks downsizing my 32GB workflow to run off of an 8GB M1 Pro as an experiment.

The results blew me away. My memory pressure was lava red the whole time, but I barely noticed anything wrong. I had Parallels, Win 11, Capture One Pro, a VM Webserver, PHPStorm, XDebug, MS Office, and tons of accessory programs running side by side. And this was before everything was optimized for M1’s!

The amount of swap I was generating was the only thing that unnerved me, but otherwise there was barely a blip.

Now, different programs may respond more severely to resource constraints, so I don’t think 8GB would have been a wise choice for someone with needs as heavy as mine. 32GB was previously the lowest amount of memory I’d accept, but I’ve since lost my decades of RAM anxiety and rolled back to concluding that 16GB is a very safe amount of RAM to have for the foreseeable future.

Most people do not need to shovel gobs of extra cash to Apple to have very well performing machines capable of highly advanced tasks.

For your average everyday user, 8GB is plenty! You don’t need 32GB to open 16 tabs in Safari. You can even edit short 4K videos on 8GB just fine. It’s not ideal, but it’s not horrible either.

 

[gpat]

Just reporting my experience, I managed to consistently bring to its knees an M1 system with 8gb.
All you have to do is heavily multitask, even with internet/productivity applications, and the system will eventually choke.
It's not as bad as swapping on an old school HDD, not crippling, but definitely noticeable.
I still think that 16GB is the Goldilocks amount for the thread opener. The swap is fast and you still have lots of headroom from the RAM.
Yeah 32GB would be better, but it would be so marginal that you're better off exploiting a 16GB system and then getting a full fledged update when it doesn't fit your workflow anymore (5 years give or take).

 

[JamesMay82]

I've been looking at replacing my 2015 model and I've watched every review made on all the recent MacBooks and I've decided I will go with the M2 Air 16 Gig Ram and 2TB storage. The same config pro was coming out at a grand more for me so while I would love the screen, its tough to justify the price.

My use case is similar to yours and all the reviews say the M2 Air is full capable, sure it might throttle after 10 mins but my stuff isn't massively time sensitive. with you having the iMac Pro for home use you can do time sensitive stuff on there as well.

 

[smirking]

Just reporting my experience, I managed to consistently bring to its knees an M1 system with 8gb.

Was it an Air or a Pro.

Anyway, I believe you. My point isn't that nobody needs more than 8GB or 16GB. It's that 8GB is more capable than most people acknowledge and we're all running around with outdated expectations and fears. Anytime something runs slow, people blame RAM.

It's more complex than that.

 

[Spaceboi Scaphandre]

Hello!
I had an old MacBook Pro from 2015 that I was using and was stolen recently. I thought about upgrading that laptop, but was still kinda working for what I was using it for. I have an iMac Pro at my house, so the laptop is only needed when I'm outside of my house.

The laptop is used for the following:

• Browsing the web, watching videos, youtube
• Photoshop to edit some Panasonic S5 raw files
• Basic video editing on Adobe Premiere Pro

Was thinking of the 16 inch MacBook Pro from 2019, but the new MacBook Pro with M1 sounds nice. The max I would want to spend is $1500, so the M1 seems to be out of range? What do you all think is the best value right now for a MacBook Pro? Would you still buy the i9 MacBook Pro or no?

Oh that's an easy question. The obvious choice is the base spec 14 inch M1 Pro Macbook Pro. On Backmarket, eBay, the Apple Refurbished Store, and other places used and refurbished models start around $1400-1600. I got one and it's the best laptop I ever used. In fact, here's a listing for one right now https://www.apple.com/shop/product/FKGR3LL/A/refurbished-14-inch-macbook-pro-apple-m1-pro-chip-with-8‑core-cpu-and-14‑core-gpu-silver?fnode=8da56f4729b0c7aa43a0a33603d88c4e29f2e33838e45179176223f33774f5f908d497151fa674d9c9d38f384117148dce297095b376f4401c9438f99f233821299da1516fa2e03894cbbe5111fd948b

-The display is a gorgeous Liquid Retina XDR 1440p120hz screen with the ProMotion adaptive refresh rate found in pro iPhones and iPads.

-The speakers? Best speakers I've ever heard in a laptop. In all of LMG's ShortCircuit videos, the 14 inch MBP is used as the referee for laptop speaker tests because of how good they are

-It comes with 16 gbs of RAM and a 512gb SSD in base spec

-The chip in it is a base spec M1 Pro, which is a 8 core CPU (however it's not the same CPU that's in vanilla M1, as it trades two of the efficiency cores out for high performance cores which those two replacement cores cause a massive boost in performance.) The GPU is a 14 core and handles Photoshop with zero issues.

-Since you do video editing now would be a good time to mention the Media Engine in M1 Pro.

This little segment of the chip does basically the same thing the 2019 Mac Pro's Afterburner Card does, but it outperforms it in encode and decode and exporting in a laptop that costs less than the Afterburner Card, effectively turning it into retroware.

-And of course, you got legacy ports back. HDMI and SDXC, as well as the glorious return of Magsafe. (I should note the HDMI port on the M1 Pros is only HDMI 2.0. The M2 Pro/Max MBPs are the ones with HDMI 2.1. That's not a complaint, that's a warning.

So yeah, the choice is obvious. For your needs the 14 inch base spec M1 Pro is the perfect Macbook Pro for you.

But don't take my word for it. Here's what these fine Youtubers have to say:

 

[StrollerEd]

Hello!
I had an old MacBook Pro from 2015 that I was using and was stolen recently. I thought about upgrading that laptop, but was still kinda working for what I was using it for. I have an iMac Pro at my house, so the laptop is only needed when I'm outside of my house.

The laptop is used for the following:

• Browsing the web, watching videos, youtube
• Photoshop to edit some Panasonic S5 raw files
• Basic video editing on Adobe Premiere Pro

Was thinking of the 16 inch MacBook Pro from 2019, but the new MacBook Pro with M1 sounds nice. The max I would want to spend is $1500, so the M1 seems to be out of range? What do you all think is the best value right now for a MacBook Pro? Would you still buy the i9 MacBook Pro or no?

Just search for an used 16" M1 1TB, allocate the extra budget, and be done with it.
It'll be well spent money if you keep your computer for a long time.
You're unlikely to find a model with 32GB RAM but you really don't need it.
If you use your Mac as a desktop replacement, you're right to only look for 16" models, I once downsized from a 16" Intel to a M1 Air and the screen size was traumatic.

I'd second that recommendation for 16" M1: I upgraded to the 16" M1max from the 2015 15" MBP and have never regretted that. I use it in place of a desktop and as a portable laptop; screen size is just dandy - could not bear thinking of less.

 

[gpat]

Was it an Air or a Pro.

Anyway, I believe you. My point isn't that nobody needs more than 8GB or 16GB. It's that 8GB is more capable than most people acknowledge and we're all running around with outdated expectations and fears. Anytime something runs slow, people blame RAM.

It's more complex than that.

It was an Air, but not really CPU constrained... it rarely warmed up.
My feeling is that these base spec M1s are killer machines for single-task workflows (like video editing), for their price at least, but more RAM and more CPU cores pay themselves off quickly when you need any kind of versatility.

Also, swapping to a fast SSD rather than an HDD really changed the world, but there is something that everybody should know, and I don't hear around quite enough:
Any mass storage slows dramatically if you're filling it for more than 75% of its space, and if you're rocking the typical 256GB Air or Mini, swapping to an SSD with 40GB free will slow your system a lot more than if you're doing it with the ~200GB free you usually have after a clean install.
And this fact obviously never comes out from YouTube reviews, or if you're not using that system as your daily driver for a prolonged timeframe.

 

[Fishrrman]

MAKE SURE you get 16gb of RAM, minimum!

That said, I think the above-mentioned Apple-refurbished m1pro MacBook Pro 14" (base model) might be the "best value".

Also... be aware that there is a rumored M2 MacBook Air 15" that could be released in April.
Not sure of pricing. Again, just a rumor that's been posted on the macrumors front page within the last few days.

 

[memo90061]

Thank you so much for the replies. I think I would choose the 14 or the 16 MacBook Pro because of the speakers and the screen. Been looking at Apple refurbished's page and Best Buy open box.