With all the battery life and graphics glitches of the TB models, I went with the nonTB version. I was worried about the lower TDB proc but it looks ok in real life usage. I came across a good deal (I wanted space grey but I felt this was a good price) You hardly see discounts on 16GB on CTO processor upgrades and only minor with edu. For $200 off and no tax + free shipping and future proofing with 16GB was a no brainier. However, I am not sure what I am getting with the 2.4 i7 vs 2.0 i5. Yeah I know the frequency is higher but some questions: Will it throttle more often? Will it impact battery life? How much faster is it than the 2.0? Will it be warmer to use compared to the 2.0? Is there anything else I gain with the i7?
I bought 2 new MacBook pros both without touchbar one stock and 1 upgraded with i7 and 16gb ram. I compared the 2 doing a conversion of on a 3GB video file the stock model converted it to a MP4 file in 38 minutes the i7 did it in 30. For me that wasn't much of a difference so I took the i7 back and switched it for another stock one and I love the computer.
Thats not bad at all. Seems like around a 25% increase in price and 21% increase in performance in that specific task. edit: why not keep the 16GB ram?