Do I need a new Macbook Pro?

[softwareguy256]

I am a daytrader and software developer. I have a white macbook 2 ghz core2 duo with 4 gb ram. I'm thinking about going "pro." From experience will a top end macbook pro 17'' with 16 GB RAM give a major speed boost for the following usage?:

3 external monitors 1 Mini DVI + 2 diamond USB adapters 21'' screens minimum 1680x1050
several java trading clients
Windows parallels with yet another trading client
multiple browsers
XCode Interface bulder
Safari, email, skype, ichat, etc...

Since a new macbook pro would cost me well over $3000, I would only buy if I get no stutter no beachballs etc... Otherwise I'll keep my existing setup, which is slow but somewhat sufficient. How low can I go with a tradein?

 

[alphaod]

With all these external monitors, I'd just get a Mac Pro instead. It doesn't sound like something you would be moving around much. The Mac Pro make more sense in this case and it would put you well into $4000 for a MacBook Pro, you might be better off with the Mac Pro and get better performance out of it.

 

[softwareguy256]

With all these external monitors, I'd just get a Mac Pro instead. It doesn't sound like something you would be moving around much. The Mac Pro make more sense in this case and it would put you well into $4000 for a MacBook Pro, you might be better off with the Mac Pro and get better performance out of it.

Actually, mobility is important and I do travel occasionally and proud to say that I have never missed a market day in the past year. Even when "stationary", I move around quite a bit like when making lunch answering the door...

I think the macbook pro is the only option for me, I just don't want to fork over a significant amount of cash and still be getting beach balls or stutter.

 

[AkuskaUK]

Actually, mobility is important and I do travel occasionally and proud to say that I have never missed a market day in the past year. Even when "stationary", I move around quite a bit like when making lunch answering the door...

I think the macbook pro is the only option for me, I just don't want to fork over a significant amount of cash and still be getting beach balls or stutter.

If portability is what you need, you have answered the question yourself, Go MBP

 

[alphaod]

Actually, mobility is important and I do travel occasionally and proud to say that I have never missed a market day in the past year. Even when "stationary", I move around quite a bit like when making lunch answering the door...

I think the macbook pro is the only option for me, I just don't want to fork over a significant amount of cash and still be getting beach balls or stutter.

If mobility is important you should have bought the MacBook Pro already, not asking on a forum if it's a good idea (seeing you really have any other options).

Good luck

 

[cluthz]

It will be a lot faster.
But do you need the 17 inch?
A 15 inch with SSD would most likely be faster.
Since you are using a USB video card I guess that video performance isn't what you are after and the base 15 will most likely be best value for money.
The difference between the 2.0 and 2.2GHz is like 5-10% at best, and they both are at least 5 times faster than your old one.

 

[softwareguy256]

It will be a lot faster.
But do you need the 17 inch?
A 15 inch with SSD would most likely be faster.
Since you are using a USB video card I guess that video performance isn't what you are after and the base 15 will most likely be best value for money.
The difference between the 2.0 and 2.2GHz is like 5-10% at best, and they both are at least 5 times faster than your old one.

thanks, can you put 16 GB in the 15''? I read somewhere you can only do that in the latest 17''.

Is there a big diff between 4GB and 8GB ? 8GB and 16 GB? Experience needed. Parallels is a monster even if i allocate it 256 it takes up a lot of RAM. And the new safari with that web content process eats up 2x as much memory as the old one. RAM seems to be my major bottleneck I think.

 

[cluthz]

I don't know. Chipset are the same, so I guess if the 17 inch can, then the 15 can too.

The system itself uses some RAM, same with the graphics on your old machine, so in fact 8GB RAM will give you more than double the effective RAM to use on applications.

Giving parallels only 256MB RAM will make it be slower than necessary unless you run windows 98 or something. WIth XP you should give it at least 512MB and 1GB for windows 7 or vista.

I still think SSD would be the best option. I recently exchanged my 2010 MBP with 8GB RAM and 2.40GHz i5 for a MacBook Air with 1.7GHz i5 and 4GB RAM.
Since the MBA has a SSD disk it actually feels faster. I haven't seen the beach ball yet and on my MBP I saw it quite often. Apps just loads twice as fast and you never wait for the HD spinning up (this is a relief)

With a SSD disk you also have much faster virtual memory, so when you use up all your RAM you're reading from a disk that is many times faster.

 

[scoobydoo99]

From experience will a top end macbook pro 17'' with 16 GB RAM give a major speed boost for the following usage?:


Since a new macbook pro would cost me well over $3000, I would only buy if I get no stutter no beachballs etc... Otherwise I'll keep my existing setup, which is slow but somewhat sufficient.

So you are asking if a quad-core i7 with 16GB of RAM is a "major" speed boost over a C2D with 4GB?

yes

Then you say that a huge speed boost is not enough to upgrade, you also want NO beachballs.

If that's the case, I say forget about ever upgrading to anything. Every current and future computer will beachball in certain cases, depending on the load. You can't have perfection. Why are you even asking this?

 

[charliex5]

I recently purchased a 13" MBP i5 and added 8gb of RAM and used the Optibay to install an SSD for the OS. This thing flies! I have a desktop with 16gb RAM/i7/SSD and haven't been using it at all since I got the MBP. I'm an architecture student and use some pretty demanding modelling programs and my MBP has been a beast. For rendering I will probably use my desktop. Parallels runs great and I split the RAM with 4 gigs to each OS.

Point being, I'd get a 15" MBP, upgrade the RAM to 8gb and throw an SSD in there and you should be good to go for years.