Costco's got the 2019 MBP for $999 starting today

[Nick A]

I can confirm that Best Buy will price match Costco for $999 plus you get 18 month financing because I recently purchased the 128gb model. I was in the market for the 256 but nearly a 25% discount (and under a grand) was too good to pass up. Costco will offer a similar discount that comes out to 20% off for the 256gb model later this week, bringing it down to $1199.

I use iCloud anyways and currently only used 90gb of my 256gb hard drive (which shows 250gb total capacity), so I assume 90 of 128gb won't be so bad (which will likely show around 120gb total capacity). Also, of this 90gb, half is taken up by iCloud storage which probably also I'm assuming includes files I downloaded from the cloud.

I should mention that I'm the type of person who changes my laptop nearly every year, so I'll be looking to get the new thinner bezel 13" MBP whenever it releases later next year and will sell this one off at that point.

The ad link for the 256gb version is here but you will have to wait till Thursday: https://bestblackfriday.com/ads/costco-black-friday/page-8#ad_view

Where do you typically sell off your old model? I was thinking of doing the same thing because I want a 13" Pro but I don't want to wait to Q2 2020 to buy one. Was thinking of selling the 2019 model at the time and upgrading.

 

[amitdoc2b]

Where do you typically sell off your old model? I was thinking of doing the same thing because I want a 13" Pro but I don't want to wait to Q2 2020 to buy one. Was thinking of selling the 2019 model at the time and upgrading.

In the past, I have sold on Gazelle, eBay, or friends. In the latter 2 options, I don't think I would have any problem selling this retail price $1299 laptop ($1420 after tax) for $750 in mint condition after owning it for less than a year. That's not too bad of a hit after buying it for $999 and having financing for up to 18 months.

I'd like to mention that I am a bigger fan of the 13" MBA form factor, battery, and the gold color, but I was noticing a bit of the speed lag when using my 2018 November model. I wanted to upgrade it to the 2019 MBA version (and it's $899 on Best Buy right now), but with nearly no speed differences I was hesitant. It also uses its fan a lot and gets loud if using it too long.

The speed and fan issues were enough for me to want the front-side thicker quad core MBP (now w/ touch bar), which in reviews also shows the base 2019 MBP battery is nearly equal to the 2019 MBA.

 

[amitdoc2b]

Need to get me a Costco membership.

Just heads up you don't need Costco membership to take advantage of the sale. If you're not a member, you can still buy it for a 5% up charge. That's not too bad because you still save big.

 

[furbzv1]

Just heads up you don't need Costco membership to take advantage of the sale. If you're not a member, you can still buy it for a 5% up charge. That's not too bad because you still save big.

yeah I saw that but that 5% is about $62. So at that point, might as well get the membership.

 

[tanik310]

I'm trying to decide between getting one of these for 999 or buying a NIB 2017 15" MBP from a friend (he wants 1600), it has the 3.1GHZ quad core i7, 16 GB RAM, 1TB SSD, etc

What would the experts here do?

 

[amitdoc2b]

I'm trying to decide between getting one of these for 999 or buying a NIB 2017 15" MBP from a friend (he wants 1600), it has the 3.1GHZ quad core i7, 16 GB RAM, 1TB SSD, etc

What would the experts here do?

That depends on how you personally plan to use it. If you care about form factor, there may be a slight redesign next year with slimmer bezels, an updated touch bar, and possibly slightly thinner MBP (but not as thin as a MBA at its thinnest points). The current MBP has a four year old look and a 2 year old used battery, so you can future proof some specs with the 2017 but you cannot future proof aesthetics and the battery unless you get next year's version (since MBPs typically seem to have the same look for about 4 years or so). This matters to me, so I took the cheapest 2019 MBP that happens to be under $1000 and is still a quad core that shows to have over 10 hour battery life in most reviews.

Not to mention you get 1 year of AppleCare with the new laptop that can be extended to 2 years more coverage on top of that if you opt to have it (which I assume the 2017 doesn't come with since you didn't mention it and it would have needed to be renewed by 2018 to cover it through 2020). Personally, the 2019 MBP will be quite a good stop gap with decent resale value by its age and heavy holiday discount alone when the new ones come around.. just keep in mind that I use a 2TB iCloud so can handle having a 128gb hard drive on my computer.

 

[tanik310]

That depends on how you personally plan to use it. If you care about form factor, there may be a slight redesign next year with slimmer bezels, an updated touch bar, and possibly slightly thinner MBP (but not as thin as a MBA at its thinnest points). The current MBP has a four year old look and a 2 year old used battery, so you can future proof some specs with the 2017 but you cannot future proof aesthetics and the battery unless you get next year's version (since MBPs typically seem to have the same look for about 4 years or so). This matters to me, so I took the cheapest 2019 MBP that happens to be under $1000 and is still a quad core that shows to have over 10 hour battery life in most reviews.

Not to mention you get 1 year of AppleCare with the new laptop that can be extended to 2 years more coverage on top of that if you opt to have it (which I assume the 2017 doesn't come with since you didn't mention it and it would have needed to be renewed by 2018 to cover it through 2020). Personally, the 2019 MBP will be quite a good stop gap with decent resale value by its age and heavy holiday discount alone when the new ones come around.. just keep in mind that I use a 2TB iCloud so can handle having a 128gb hard drive on my computer.

I am mainly doing a lot of spreadsheets in Excel and office type work which I do think a bigger screen helps with (I am using a 2014 MBP now that I got used on Ebay for ~800 last summer).
Travel is really only a couple times per year so I don't care about the weight of the laptop at all.

There is also a fair bit of browsing and occasionally I'll put something together in iMovie for a YouTube video etc

I'm concerned about the keyboard issues in both the potential 2017 one and the new 2019 as well.
It just seems like if I can get a much better spec'd machine for a few hundred more with the one from my friend it would be worthwhile.

 

[furbzv1]

Just chatted with BestBuy and you are able to Price Match online or at the store.
If online, they will charge you whatever BB has for the price and they will issue a refund.
Or, you could go to the store with ad, sign in to your Costco account and they willl adjust the price.

From BB Price Match Website (https://www.bestbuy.com/site/help-t...at297300050000.c?id=pcmcat297300050000#jl-faq)

Does Best Buy match the prices of a Warehouse club?
Yes. We do match the prices of Warehouse clubs as long as the Warehouse club is a local retail competitor, has an identical immediately available product and all other price match criteria are met. If the Warehouse club website price requires a membership ID or login to view, price match is only available in a Best Buy store (not via phone or chat) and must be a live offer (not a screenshot).