Can't decide - 3.2 i5 or 3.4 i5?

[SteelBlueTJ]

Can't decide on which one. I plan on getting the 256 GB SSD regardless, but don't know which one to go with. How much more powerful is the 3.4 over the 3.2? Is the 775 2Gb GPU double the power of the 755 1GB GPU? I'm not a gamer, so I don't know if I would benefit from the 775 2GB GPU all that much. I mainly do web browsing, email, itunes and some light photo editing in photoshop and aperture. The difference is about $200 after tax for the 3.4 with the 2GB GPU. My other concern was "future proofing." I plan to keep it for at least 4 years so would you assume the 775 would really be all that more valuable over the 755 in 4-5 years? Also I would love to order it with the vesa mount, which costs a little extra plus the cost of a good arm mount. I am leaning toward the 3.2 and putting the $200 towards that stuff and upgrading the memory. But its still a tough decision. Thanks for any advice.

 

[buster84]

Can't decide on which one. I plan on getting the 256 GB SSD regardless, but don't know which one to go with. How much more powerful is the 3.4 over the 3.2? Is the 775 2Gb GPU double the power of the 755 1GB GPU? I'm not a gamer, so I don't know if I would benefit from the 775 2GB GPU all that much. I mainly do web browsing, email, itunes and some light photo editing in photoshop and aperture. The difference is about $200 after tax for the 3.4 with the 2GB GPU. My other concern was "future proofing." I plan to keep it for at least 4 years so would you assume the 775 would really be all that more valuable over the 755 in 4-5 years? Really a tough decision. Thanks for any advice.

I do alot of video editing with final cut pro. I might look for a new software now that i have the I7 though. I started off like you, thought about buying just the basic model, but then i wanted an SSD drive which forced me into customization over buying it at the apple store. Then i noticed the 3.4 with the 2gb memory card and was instantly sold. Then as i started to purchase i got more fancy options allowing me to get the 3.5 I7 and the 4gb video card for only $315 more. Thats when I said screw it and upgraded. I really didn't need it but $315 seemed like a very small amount compared to the total I was already paying.

I got the educational discount, if you can buy it that way its cheaper for the upgrades. If not its only $350 more. If you do Alot of video encoding and plan to use final cut pro get the 3.4 system since you get the bigger video card. If you want to take advantage of the hyper threading buy the i7 model and use something else other than final cut pro. The upgraded video card isn't to much needed for video encoding although it does help. If $150 is to much for you, then skip it.

Its all upto you, but if you budget can afford the I7, 4gb setup then get it as a "future proof" setup. This will also help with video encoding. I'm very happy with my imac and don't regret the purchase one bit. I've already done some encoding and Man is it fast compared to my old 2.3 I5 macbook pro. I probably would have regretting not upgrading since its not something that you can upgrade later after you buy it. I do wish i had gotten the 500gb or 1tb SSD instead of the 256 now, but at least thats an easy fix with external drives vs a faster processor and video card.

Also skip the ram. I took the 2x4gb for a total of 8gb and upgrade to the crucial 32gb setup (4, 8 gig sticks) then I took my 8gb ram from my Imac and tossed it into my Macbook Pro giving me 1600mhz speed and 8gb over my 1333 mhz 4gb ram setup. It was a much better deal doing it this way than paying them to upgrade, plus my macbook pro got an upgrade too haha.