Bought the 13" MBP but now I'm thinking...

[pr33tz]

...should I have gone with a Dell laptop instead? [/joking]

No seriously, should I have gone for the last gen 15" model? I have the 13" 2.26GHz MBP which has been a joy to use so far but now I have the chance to get a refurbished previous gen 15" 2.53GHz MBP for £200 more than what I paid for the 13" model.

I mainly use the MBP for surfing, iTunes, running VMWare, Aperture and Photoshop. The latter two is as a hobby, nothing professional yet.

I'm very tempted to go for the 15" model but only thing stopping me is the RAM limitation and battery life. I mainly use my MBP away from the desk so 6-7 hours battery life is great. I guess I can get over it by getting a spare battery if I really need one but the RAM is still a sticking point.

I know 8GB is more than what I need right now but I'm looking at 2/3 years down the line. Will there be apps that require more than 4GB to run? How long before the price of 2x4GB is equal to 2x2GB today?

I need to decide quick so I can get on with enjoying my MBP.

So in short...

13" MBP 2.26GHz
4GB RAM
500GB HD
9400M
7hr Batt Life

vs

15" MBP 2.53GHz
4GB RAM
320GB HD
9600GT
5hr Batt Life

Thanks for reading if you made it this far!

 

[davidwarren]

I'd stick with the 13 unless you needed the graphics bump.

 

[yaroldb]

The 2.53ghz 15inch will run 8gb of ram (unofficially). I use Lightroom and Photoshop a lot. I came from a first gen white macbook. Went to the 2.4ghz Unibody pro in January. The screen size and resolution was reason alone to upgrade. I hardly use the dedicated video card, but the screen size makes working on photos so much eaiser and nicer. Battery life is about 4.5 hours. About 3 hours if I am only working in photoshop/lightroom. I do not use an SD card, my Olympus camera only uses CF. So I use my Express card to CF adatper that works great.

I'd go with the rerurb 15inch.

 

[pr33tz]

I'd stick with the 13 unless you needed the graphics bump.

I'm not sure I'd need now but again as I become more fluent with Aperture/Photoshop my needs may change.

The 2.53ghz 15inch will run 8gb of ram (unofficially). I use Lightroom and Photoshop a lot. I came from a first gen white macbook. Went to the 2.4ghz Unibody pro in January. The screen size and resolution was reason alone to upgrade. I hardly use the dedicated video card, but the screen size makes working on photos so much eaiser and nicer. Battery life is about 4.5 hours. About 3 hours if I am only working in photoshop/lightroom. I do not use an SD card, my Olympus camera only uses CF. So I use my Express card to CF adatper that works great.

I'd go with the rerurb 15inch.

I've got a Canon 40D and again it uses CF cards so no need for an SD slot. I think the extra resolution would be quite convenient too as I work away from my desk alot and therefore don't have always have the option of using an external monitor. Do you know if it's a hardware/software limitation with the RAM?