Contemplating purchase of a MBA, never had one.....

[reese2147]

Good afternoon,

I am thinking about purchasing a MBA to replace an aging iMac I use. I have concerns that the "power" (for lack of a technical term) in the MBA isn't enough considering my iMac seems to pack a lot more "punch".

Does the SSD in MBAs help with its computing power?

I run photoshop and illustrator along with very light gaming.

Part of me just wants to get another iMac, but I was hoping to have something a little more mobile.

 

[GGJstudios]

Does the SSD in MBAs help with its computing power?

Not computing power, as in CPU/GPU, but it significantly improves performance of any operation that involves reading or writing to the drive, which most operations do. You will definitely notice an overall performance improvement by moving from a HDD to a SSD.

I run photoshop and illustrator along with very light gaming.

The MBA, like any Mac model, can easily handle those tasks.

 

[reese2147]

Not computing power, as in CPU/GPU, but it significantly improves performance of any operation that involves reading or writing to the drive, which most operations do. You will definitely notice an overall performance improvement by moving from a HDD to a SSD.

The MBA, like any Mac model, can easily handle those tasks.

Thanks for the input, its just a little scary having 32Gb RAM in my iMac and bumping down to just 8GB in a MBA.

 

[GGJstudios]

Thanks for the input, its just a little scary having 32Gb RAM in my iMac and bumping down to just 8GB in a MBA.

It's not the amount of RAM that's most important. It's how much you actually use on a regular basis. A great many users never max out their RAM or processing capabilities. If your workload is as you describe, there's no way you need 32GB of RAM.

 

[reese2147]

It's not the amount of RAM that's most important. It's how much you actually use on a regular basis. A great many users never max out their RAM or processing capabilities. If your workload is as you describe, there's no way you need 32GB of RAM.

I'm sure I'm just a sucker who bought too much

 

[truettray]

Aesthetically the MBA is just incredible. I inherited the 13" model from my late grandmother this year, and it quickly became my main machine. The screen is gorgeous (for non-retina..), it's quick, it's light, and just pleasant. I was able to carry it around NYC in my backpack with 2 DSLRs and a slew of lenses for a week and hardly even noticed it. For years the 12" Powerbook was my favorite Mac ever, but I'm thinking that the MBA is the first machine to steal that place in my heart. So yeah, I recommend it.

 

[capathy21]

As someone else stated the 32GB of ram in your current machine seems like overkill for your usage. I think you'd be fine with an 8GB Air.

 

[SusanK]

Do it

 

[John marts]

The Air punches far above its weight. Very fast and capable for its specs.

The SSD is the best aspect of the computer. I would NEVER go back to a standard hard drive. Id rather have this 128 gb ssd and have to manage storage space carefully, then to ever have a slow standard HD with tons of space.

 

[Meister]

Im gonna take a wild guess that even the base air with 4gb would perform better than your imac, but depending on your Ps usage the 8gb upgrade is probably a good idea.

 

[John marts]

Im gonna take a wild guess that even the base air with 4gb would perform better than your imac, but depending on your Ps usage the 8gb upgrade is probably a good idea.

my 4gb base 11' air performs much better than my 2012 mac mini with 8 gb and a faster processor. So I wouldn't doubt it that it could at least perform as good.