Buying advice: MBP or MBA?

[Ankaa]

Hello,

I currently have a 2016 13' MBP with 2 GHz i5 256 GB SSD, so basically the non-touch base model with bumped up disc space.

For many many years before that I had MBAs.

I keep having issues with my MBP (I basically had to have almost everything repaired just last summer after a logic board failure - but it's still slow and seems really hot most of the time; I had 2 kernel panics out of nowhere just today alone) and look to update earlier than my usual 4-5 years average.

And I keep wondering if I want to go back to a MBA. I prefer the form factor. But I see, the MBA "only" comes with 1.6 GHz. I do need to run the occasional Matlab, R, and Parallels (ArcGIS - though so far I've mostly been doing this on my iMac, but I do like to keep the option as I anticipate to start traveling more again), and also do light graphic/photo editing (LR, PS). Otherwise, I mostly run office software. I'm worried the 1.6 GHz might not be up to the task and will continue causing me having to deal with lagging systems.

At 1.6 GHz, would bumping up the RAM to 16 GB be overpowered, aka would the processor become the bottleneck?

Does the current MBA already have the improved keyboard?

I'm a student, so I'm looking at the most reasonable balance between "affordable" and "required computing power". If there's one thing I hate it's slow computers even during basic tasks. (my system had a clean install and is up to date, so it's probably hardware that's causing my issues more than anything else)

Any advice is much welcomed.

 

[cmaier]

Hello,

I currently have a 2016 13' MBP with 2 GHz i5 256 GB SSD, so basically the non-touch base model with bumped up disc space.

For many many years before that I had MBAs.

I keep having issues with my MBP (I basically had to have almost everything repaired just last summer after a logic board failure - but it's still slow and seems really hot most of the time; I had 2 kernel panics out of nowhere just today alone) and look to update earlier than my usual 4-5 years average.

And I keep wondering if I want to go back to a MBA. I prefer the form factor. But I see, the MBA "only" comes with 1.6 GHz. I do need to run the occasional Matlab, R, and Parallels (ArcGIS - though so far I've mostly been doing this on my iMac, but I do like to keep the option as I anticipate to start traveling more again), and also do light graphic/photo editing (LR, PS). Otherwise, I mostly run office software. I'm worried the 1.6 GHz might not be up to the task and will continue causing me having to deal with lagging systems.

At 1.6 GHz, would bumping up the RAM to 16 GB be overpowered, aka would the processor become the bottleneck?

Does the current MBA already have the improved keyboard?

I'm a student, so I'm looking at the most reasonable balance between "affordable" and "required computing power". If there's one thing I hate it's slow computers even during basic tasks. (my system had a clean install and is up to date, so it's probably hardware that's causing my issues more than anything else)

Any advice is much welcomed.

The current MBA does not have the improved keyboard - only the 16” MBP has it at the moment.

If you are going with a MBA I would definitely upgrade the RAM, as 8GB is sure to be a bottleneck.

Office and *light* photo editing should work ok with the 1.6GHz CPU and 16GB RAM. Won’t be snappy, but if you don’t do it too much it should be acceptable. Office will be fine.

Matlab - depends on how big your projects are. Parallels would probably not run great, though I haven’t played with it in many years.

You may want to wait and see what the coming MBP 13/14 refresh brings. If nothing else, the price of last year’s model should go down when the new models are announced.

 

[MacRazySwe]

The current MBA does not have the improved keyboard - only the 16” MBP has it at the moment.

If you are going with a MBA I would definitely upgrade the RAM, as 8GB is sure to be a bottleneck.

Office and *light* photo editing should work ok with the 1.6GHz CPU and 16GB RAM. Won’t be snappy, but if you don’t do it too much it should be acceptable. Office will be fine.

Matlab - depends on how big your projects are. Parallels would probably not run great, though I haven’t played with it in many years.

You may want to wait and see what the coming MBP 13/14 refresh brings. If nothing else, the price of last year’s model should go down when the new models are announced.

While I'm not the most demanding user, I don't necessarily agree here. I have the base model with 8GB RAM (256GB storage) since 2018. It handles Office, Photo editing and SketchUp with ease. It's only when editing video while having several apps open that I have managed to stress mine.

Remember, the Single Core performance of the MBA and MBP is essentially the same. If you're not using apps that take advantage of the Quad Cores of the MBP, they will feel similar.

That said, I agree that Parallels would be quite taxing, so for that the MBP is probably the better choice.

Either way, I would wait for the new keyboards!

 

[Ankaa]

Thank you for your input!

The current MBA does not have the improved keyboard - only the 16” MBP has it at the moment.

Either way, I would wait for the new keyboards!

Yep, this is a deal breaker for me either way. I assume the MBA isn't expected to see this update until into the Fall, though?

I really prefer the MBA form factor over the MBP. The only reason I went with the MBP at the time was the lack of update/retina display for the MBA until basically last year.

Any sense of how my current 2016 MBP compares to the MBA in terms of computing power? I stopped keeping up to date in terms of CPU development, so really am out of the loop in terms of specs and improvements etc. -- doesn't help that Apple doesn't actually say the chip type on their details page, only "i5" - which these days can be everything or nothing.

 

[cmaier]

Thank you for your input!





Yep, this is a deal breaker for me either way. I assume the MBA isn't expected to see this update until into the Fall, though?

I really prefer the MBA form factor over the MBP. The only reason I went with the MBP at the time was the lack of update/retina display for the MBA until basically last year.

Any sense of how my current 2016 MBP compares to the MBA in terms of computing power? I stopped keeping up to date in terms of CPU development, so really am out of the loop in terms of specs and improvements etc. -- doesn't help that Apple doesn't actually say the chip type on their details page, only "i5" - which these days can be everything or nothing.

I think your 2016 mbp is probably overall faster than the current MBA, for most things. Certainly not any slower for most things.