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Did anyone get the new 11" fully loaded?

M

Magpie-23

macrumors member
Original poster
Oct 18, 2011
31
0
I noticed that if you get the new 11" with:

2GHz i7
8GB RAM
512GB Flash

you end up spending nearly as much as a base rMBP?

Has anyone out there been prepared to get this spec for that price and if so how's it working out for you?

As an owner of a 2011 11" with a piddly 64GB Flash and 2GB RAM (not my main machine) I think a 11' with this top spec would be one hell of a machine. Throw in a 27" TB display and it could be (nearly) perfect. But for that price? Any takers?
 
I've just change my MacBook Pro 13" mid-2009 for a fully loaded 11". And I can say to you : it's a great machine !!! Performance is awesome !!! Battery life is very fine for this size of computer and my needs. I have to carry my computer around all day long... 5 days a week... so I'm VERY glad having a computer that's weight 1 Kg !

I'm surfing on the web since 2 hours now and I have 76% battery that indicates over 5 hours yet :cool:

The 512 Gb SSD was VERY expensive but regarding the OWC disks I thought it wasn't overpriced from Apple. So I've got it just to keep cool as I'll have to work with this computer for 3 or 4 years. I don't want to regret not getting the best configuration I could. And as I had 2K to spend...

I was just looking to the lighter and fastest computer I could buy with 2K and that was the new 11" Air. It's beautiful, it's light, it's powerful for my needs ! I'm just very happy with my choice as you can see... :D
 
Kinda...

This first two, yes.

But in no way can I justify spending $500+ (may have been $700) for a 512gb ssd.
 
26139 said:
This first two, yes.

But in no way can I justify spending $500+ (may have been $700) for a 512gb ssd.
Click to expand...

That depends on your needs! I was searching to a VERY light solution. So, no point in getting a light 11" computer but have to take an external disk all the time... that's the reason I've got the 512 SSD. And again, the OWC 480 Gb solution is $795. So Apple's price was correct IMHO.

Even more, with this battery performance, I won't even have to take my Magsafe charger either :rolleyes:
 
just so you know...most of the stores have the i7/8/256 in stock, which is $1649 before tax i believe with the student discount.....big difference from the retina
 
I stopped at 256GB.

It is a wonderful machine. I would have no problems using it as my main computer.


mattopotamus said:
just so you know...most of the stores have the i7/8/256 in stock, which is $1649 before tax i believe with the student discount.....big difference from the retina
Click to expand...

That's before the discount. :) I think I saved another $104 from that price. (My gf is still a student) Apple care was also $66 cheaper.
 
Oh, well yeah

Monkeyat said:
That depends on your needs! I was searching to a VERY light solution. So, no point in getting a light 11" computer but have to take an external disk all the time... that's the reason I've got the 512 SSD. And again, the OWC 480 Gb solution is $795. So Apple's price was correct IMHO.

Even more, with this battery performance, I won't even have to take my Magsafe charger either :rolleyes:
Click to expand...

No no, I (myself) can't justify spending that much on storage. If you're looking to eliminate anything external, it makes sense.

But I'm a writer. Nothing I do requires a ton of disk space anyway.
 
I did! It is my main computer and I'm into video, photo, and a little audio production. I figured 256gb won't be enough in the long run. I also invested in AppleCare and the SuperDrive so I'm hoping the investment is worth it.

I would not consider the 512gb for general use though. 256 gb should be plenty for Internet, email, text, iTunes and iPhoto.
 
Yep!

Reha said:
I did! It is my main computer and I'm into video, photo, and a little audio production. I figured 256gb won't be enough in the long run. I also invested in AppleCare and the SuperDrive so I'm hoping the investment is worth it.

I would not consider the 512gb for general use though. 256 gb should be plenty for Internet, email, text, iTunes and iPhoto.
Click to expand...

With iTunes Match and very minimal video (plus a c2d Mac Mini connected to six hard drives), 128 ssd is enough for me!
 
Reha said:
I would not consider the 512gb for general use though. 256 gb should be plenty for Internet, email, text, iTunes and iPhoto.
Click to expand...

I got the maxed out 11" and am so happy I did! Performance is great. I can hook it up to my 27" cinema display if I want more screen real estate.

The fans have only kicked in high when it was compiling.

I got the 512 ssd because I just did not want to think about space concerns. I like to dj and have a large mp3 collection. If you are hesitant to go with that, the ssd is the only upgradable component so you could wait a year or two until prices are more reasonable to get a larger ssd.

But I definitely recommend maxing out the processor/ram.
 
26139 said:
With iTunes Match and very minimal video (plus a c2d Mac Mini connected to six hard drives), 128 ssd is enough for me!
Click to expand...

Good for you, and you just reinforced my argument. ;) Unless you have a second computer with 6 hard drives and everything else in the cloud, the bigger SSD makes sense. Adobe CS6 and Ableton live with plugins, samples and loops is probably already close to 128 GB, plus render files use a lot of hard drive too.

The 512GB is VERY expensive, yes, but it was worth it to me
 
I ordered my fully loaded 11" macbook air last week, and am waiting for it to be delivered. There was a delay in the shipping date, which had me bummed out.

As for why I ordered the fully maxed out version, in 2010, I got the 128 GB SSD, and found I was running out of room. In 2011, I got the 256 SSD and found that I was running out of room. Now, with 512 GB, I am hoping that this will address my concerns.

I use my macbook air as my main machine. We have an iMac at home, which holds all of our iTunes movies and photos, but that computer serves as a server of sorts. My macbook air is where I do my video and photo editing. With a photo library of nearly 12,000 pictures, I had 85 GB of storage left on the 256. I know that seems like a lot, but I am taking more and more pictures and with more megapixels in the newer cameras as well as using a digital SLR, the space gets eaten up quickly. All that is the long way of saying that for my needs, I can never have enough storage space and since I love the form factor of the 11" macbook air, I maxed it out.

I'll let you know how it performs, when I get it.
 
mattopotamus said:
just so you know...most of the stores have the i7/8/256 in stock, which is $1649 before tax i believe with the student discount.....big difference from the retina
Click to expand...

This is the exact machine I am getting tomorrow. My Apple store has them in stock as well.

I bought the 2011 13" i5 128GB, but decided since I already have the 27" iMac that the 11" will fit my needs perfectly and with a big performance boost to boot! I just love the MacBook Airs, they are surprisingly powerful. I use mine for field editing my Canon 5D MkII RAW files in the field.
 
Nice....hope it meets your needs. I went with the 13" 8gig 128. I'm interested to hear how it performs with a photo library that size. What are you using? iPhoto? Aperture?
 
rscott505 said:
I ordered my fully loaded 11" macbook air last week, and am waiting for it to be delivered. There was a delay in the shipping date, which had me bummed out.

As for why I ordered the fully maxed out version, in 2010, I got the 128 GB SSD, and found I was running out of room. In 2011, I got the 256 SSD and found that I was running out of room. Now, with 512 GB, I am hoping that this will address my concerns.

I use my macbook air as my main machine. We have an iMac at home, which holds all of our iTunes movies and photos, but that computer serves as a server of sorts. My macbook air is where I do my video and photo editing. With a photo library of nearly 12,000 pictures, I had 85 GB of storage left on the 256. I know that seems like a lot, but I am taking more and more pictures and with more megapixels in the newer cameras as well as using a digital SLR, the space gets eaten up quickly. All that is the long way of saying that for my needs, I can never have enough storage space and since I love the form factor of the 11" macbook air, I maxed it out.

I'll let you know how it performs, when I get it.
Click to expand...

I use my iMac for storing all of my Aperture library, now sitting around 550GB :eek:. The MBA serves as the in-between step.
 
The 8GB RAM was a definite, the i7 was added because of the gains the 11" (~20%) gets with it compared to the 13" (~5%).

To add 384 GB, you end up paying $2.08 per GB, and the upgrade cost is 80% of the base system.

I don't mind having multiple computers so for now I'm using my MBP as more of a desktop solution which I'll eventually replace with an iMac (If/When they come out) which will do some of the heavier lifting/storing like for my photos/videos/music.
 
Oooh super torn on whether to get fully loaded 11" or 13" air. Leaning towards the 13" as I can stick in a 128gig SD card if I need more storage. Need at least 512 HD as I have a ton of uncompressed music...

11" is very sexy but i think it is too similar to my ipad in terms of screen size and I will enjoy having a little bit of extra room to play with on the 13" when I'm traveling. 90% of the time though it will be in clam shell mode hooked up to an external monitor...
 
I got the almost-fully-loaded config offered in the Apple Store (i7/256/8). It's a beast that handles everything I've thrown at it so far -- leaps and bounds more capable than my old MacBook 2010 2.3/128 SSD/8.

I've got VMs running of Chrome (just for laughs) and Ubuntu (and soon Win 7 - Win 8 doesn't work on install for some reason), tested out Call of Duty 4 (although I don't really know how to play this game I decided to test it anyway), Civ V (a favorite) runs beautifully. Really spectacular performance from something so tiny.

Also worth nothing with four finger swipe between apps and full-screen apps, it's really not an issue at all to only have 11" of real estate. I keep Safari and Mail in full screens and swipe between them, with my chat windows and Pandora and such hanging out on the main desktop. I put the dock to the left of the screen rather than the bottom (hardly use the dock anyway - spotlight launch most of my apps).
 
hempcamp said:
I got the almost-fully-loaded config offered in the Apple Store (i7/256/8). It's a beast that handles everything I've thrown at it so far -- leaps and bounds more capable than my old MacBook 2010 2.3/128 SSD/8.

I've got VMs running of Chrome (just for laughs) and Ubuntu (and soon Win 7 - Win 8 doesn't work on install for some reason), tested out Call of Duty 4 (although I don't really know how to play this game I decided to test it anyway), Civ V (a favorite) runs beautifully. Really spectacular performance from something so tiny.

Also worth nothing with four finger swipe between apps and full-screen apps, it's really not an issue at all to only have 11" of real estate. I keep Safari and Mail in full screens and swipe between them, with my chat windows and Pandora and such hanging out on the main desktop. I put the dock to the left of the screen rather than the bottom (hardly use the dock anyway - spotlight launch most of my apps).
Click to expand...

If you're into using gestures, you can also do the 3 finger + thumb thing to just pull up all of your apps.
 
Okay...

Reha said:
Good for you, and you just reinforced my argument. ;) Unless you have a second computer with 6 hard drives and everything else in the cloud, the bigger SSD makes sense. Adobe CS6 and Ableton live with plugins, samples and loops is probably already close to 128 GB, plus render files use a lot of hard drive too.

The 512GB is VERY expensive, yes, but it was worth it to me
Click to expand...

Sure, but those six hard drives cost less than one 512 SSD upgrade.

And no, I'm not doing any design or music creation.
 
I bought a 2012 11" 2.0/8/256. The stores carry it.

Awesome fast. But I couldn't sell my 2010 11" 1.6/4/128 (ultimate for its time) machine without a huge drop in value, down 55% from original value. I've seen folks on eBay pay more for a base machine ($700) than the ultimate ($635). It boggles the mind.

I'm afraid the upgrades lose their value, especially SSD over time. In 2 yrs the 2012 ultimate ($1650) may not be worth much more than the base ($999) model. Ouch.

So I ended up returning the 2012 and sticking w my 2010 for the time being. And when I buy, I'm leaning towards getting whatever the base model is and flip it in a year.
 
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