You should have no issues running both at the same time. In fact, you could run those two, plus iTunes, plus Safari, Messages, VLC, MS Word and still be fine. It's the 8 GB RAM that will really help you here.
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For an art student: 13" Macbook Pro or Air?
- Thread starter mfa39
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You should have no issues running both at the same time. In fact, you could run those two, plus iTunes, plus Safari, Messages, VLC, MS Word and still be fine. It's the 8 GB RAM that will really help you here.
And it doesn't get hot when using all those programs/apps? Whoa. If that's the case, then... Air wins? (Although I'll more likely use Sony Vegas Pro 9 on Boot Camp but I think that eats up less memory and space and all that stuff less than Final Cut Pro)
Can do the work I need smoothly and w/o problems - both the Pro and the Air
Better screen resolution - Air
Upgradeability - Pro; but already decided this isn't necessary at all for me so, irrelevant
Portability - Air
Performance - Pro, but Air's close
Did I get these right? Anything else I gotta consider?
With these it does feel like Air's winning...
I just really wanna make sure because people outside of this community seem to generalize that if you're doing video/photo editing, the choice is automatically Pro. Given my situation and these factors, I seem to be good to go with the Air, no?
It should get warm, that's normal. The fan should keep things from getting out of hand though, haha.
You'll notice the heat when you're pressing the CPU during rendering tasks, which tend to pin the cores to 75-100% for several minutes at a time. General tasks like browsing, chatting, typing, watching movies, etc aren't going to affect the temperature much. The temperature will really only rise when there is CPU/integrated graphics activity, so programs simply being open aren't going to affect things too much.
That list looks about right. I think when people recommend the Pro for video/photo it comes down to several things:
-performance (which is better, but not by that much)
-ports (but you'll be using USB anyway which is on the Air)
-expandability (but you said you don't need to upgrade)
-screen (colour accuracy and gamut is technically higher on the Pro, but you'll have more resolution on the Air)
And I think a lot of those reviews recommend the 15" Pro due to screen size. At the 13" size, the choice between the Air and Pro is less clear because the screen on the 13" Pro is not as great as the screen on the 15" Pro, and other things like the SSD and weight of the Air come into play. Additionally, the discrete GPU advantage of the 15" Pro disappears with the 13" Pro. It sounds like you will be perfectly fine with the Air, given what you've said about how you will use it and your plan for the next several years of your life.
The Air is more than enough for your needs.
Many design professionals work only with an Air. Some don't even use a 2nd screen.
Many design professionals work only with an Air. Some don't even use a 2nd screen.
I use the MBA 13" 2012, I forgot to mention sorry! It's really good machine and it's definitely a lot more powerful since the last two generations. But I would need the external screen since the colour reproduction and better screen resolution for working is a priority since the screen is too small for me personally.
If you can't swing the cash for the 8 GB air, then * don't* get the air.
The pro can be upgraded to 16 GB ram at any time. That's really your best bet.
(actually, the quad core 15" refurbished for ~$1380 is your best bet, but that's probably too much money for you).
The pro can be upgraded to 16 GB ram at any time. That's really your best bet.
(actually, the quad core 15" refurbished for ~$1380 is your best bet, but that's probably too much money for you).
She's already stated she is getting the 8 GB upgrade. This comes to $1300.
I doubt $1380 would be too much for her. She doesn't want the bulk of the 15" Pro as she's already stated.
Read the thread. Bro.
And it's the same for the MBP, right? That it gets just as hot when working with heavy programs?
That's very concise, thank you, again!
I AM getting the 8GB... Also already mentioned a lot of times that I'm not interested in upgrading. I would prefer selling over upgrading if it comes to it. Also only comparing the 13" models.
That's really good to know! Thanks!
That's alright, thanks!
And your advice is to get the Macbook Pro but I think your advice was focused more performance and designing-wise? For general use, and then a few hours of Photoshop and a video editing program, like, 3 days a week, does that advice still stand? I'm leaning more towards the MBA now considering it CAN do my work fine and it's more portable, which will benefit me in the long run.
Anyway, thanks for the answers everyone! I'll play around in an Apple store soon to get a feel of both. But yup I'm kinda leaning towards getting the 8GB Air. Thanks again, appreciate it!
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Some of your words make little sense to me. A $600 Acer laptop could not have contained 8GB of ram in 2006. Even if you went the mobile workstation variety, 4 was likely as high as it would have gone. At that point the price would have been far more than $600. I think this is a somewhat extreme exaggeration saying that coreduo era notebook hardware did such a thing. I also know that many of the common applications used in these areas wouldn't have officially supported this in every revision over a 6 year period. Open source apps are often a little more friendly in this regard, but if the OP is going to college, they're most likely being taught on very industry standard applications.
In terms of the mini, it's still on Sandy Bridge, and it's not that favorable relative to the other choices. The mid range model has a cpu that might be marginally faster than some of those in the notebooks, but it can still heat up and potentially throttle in its current design. The gpu is kneecapped for this kind of work. You mentioned 3d work. The gpu makes a bigger difference there than it would for the OP, but you should note that the CS6 creative suite requires at least 256MB of vram. Some functions are disabled with less than 512. At 256 OpenGL drawing can be used. Within a version or two on a year to a year and a half release cycle, it will likely not be supported at all. For anyone doing this kind of work, I actually suggest they avoid the mid mini for that reason. It's not like this stuff is really gpu intensive. It's just that the things that matter are not the same things that would affect gaming.
And it's the same for the MBP, right? That it gets just as hot when working with heavy programs?
That's very concise, thank you, again!
Yeah, they'll both get warm. The Pro might get a little hotter since it would have a higher voltage on the CPU, but it's also possible the fans are effective enough to make them the same temperature in the end.
And it's the same for the MBP, right? That it gets just as hot when working with heavy programs?
That's very concise, thank you, again!
I AM getting the 8GB... Also already mentioned a lot of times that I'm not interested in upgrading. I would prefer selling over upgrading if it comes to it. Also only comparing the 13" models.
That's really good to know! Thanks!
That's alright, thanks!
And your advice is to get the Macbook Pro but I think your advice was focused more performance and designing-wise? For general use, and then a few hours of Photoshop and a video editing program, like, 3 days a week, does that advice still stand? I'm leaning more towards the MBA now considering it CAN do my work fine and it's more portable, which will benefit me in the long run.
Anyway, thanks for the answers everyone! I'll play around in an Apple store soon to get a feel of both. But yup I'm kinda leaning towards getting the 8GB Air. Thanks again, appreciate it!
Do you know what size of the photoshop files will be? Dpi/size it'll allow us to see what size you require and will benefit on defining which of the two is better suited to you. What kind of video editing are you doing, are you just stitching scenes or are you adding effects via after effects?
If your working on A5/1280x1024/72 dpi files you're fine. You may work with files slightly higher but these are just recommendations with the size your dealing with. I'm a UI/UX designer so I can manage with these requirements as I can adapt multiple files for complete work.
After effects will prove tricky if you want to use it, it'll run fine and will be most suitable for you, unless you require ALOT of processing and rendering of scenes, use iMovie, as it's got a lot of juice for new and novice users, use iMovie as much as possible before moving into Final Cut Pro or Premier Pro, as it has a lot of tricks that you can use to achieve beautiful edited videos.
If you want more bang then buck, then get the Pro, if you love the portability then get the Air. It seems you're learning towards Air which is also good, since it's an awesome machine and don't underestimate it's power, just try and see if it adapts to your needs, and either keep or return it under the 14 days grace period, where you can choose to return it at no restocking fee charge.
Order soon too for the 75 GBP itunes card. You can buy some neat program's like iWork and other graphical refinement apps. Really browse and do some research on these apps as, it's a good chance you can get some good tools for your art classes.
Ohhhh, I see. Thank you!
I usually work with 8.5x11" 300dpi. My 2GB RAM computer has no problem dealing with those, so I assume an 8GB RAM Air will have no problems as well? I'll actually most likely install Windows and work on Sony Vegas Pro for my video editing. And yup it's going to require effects and stuff like that.
Ah but I don't see how the Pro gets me more bang for the buck than the Air considering their performance is almost the same (?) and Air has more pros (better screen resolution, portability, SSD, etc)? D:
Oh cool! Thanks for the info!
That was over 8 years ago and I've already given that laptop away to a friend so my memory is a little sketchy, but I believe it had an Intel Centrino or whatever they called their mobile chips back then. It came with 4Gb which I later upgraded to 8Gb myself.
Also, I bought it while I was in Singapore at around S$999, which converts to around US$625 at the time. Again, we're talking about prices almost a decade ago.
I used Adobe CS1 and CS2 with it, as well as Lightwave 3D I think it was called. It's been a long time and my memory's quite bad. However, the point is that, sucky as it was, it worked well enough for me as a multimedia designer back then. Was it the best machine?
No, but it was cheap and it allowed me to do my job as well as keep me fed and clothed for 6 years before I got another machine.
Which is the whole point of my post. The OP is still a student, she probably has loans and other more important things to worry about than getting the best, most up to date equipment, more so when she isn't even planning on pursuing design as a full time career.
Regarding the VRAM in the Mini, the guys in the Mini forum might have more details but I remember reading that doubling your ram to 8Gb effectively also doubles your VRAM, and since you can go up to 16Gb on the Mini that means you can get somewhere around 1Gb VRAM maybe?
Get the Air. The portability matters to you. The performance difference isn't that great for what you'll be doing.
Video editing was fine for me on a older Macbook Pro (2.4Ghz C2D, 4GB ram) that's slower than the Air anyhow. So at that point in time, the extra CPU speed is just a luxury, not a necessity.
(my incoming footage was 1080p)
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For the OP the screen wouldn't actually be better. Viewing angles and gamut are inferior, so it's arguably a worse choice. People still use it. That doesn't make it better. Regarding the 2010 15", on cpu power the 2010 is about the same. On gpu power I think it's pretty flat, but the 2012 Air can take on more vram assuming an 8GB version. Both support the same version of OpenCL. If it feels noticeably faster, you're likely exceeding the ram, at which point the ssd reads and writes data faster than the HDD which most likely resides in the older one.
This is simply inaccurate. I can trace the centrinos back as far as 2003. I don't recall any prior to that. I don't think they existed during the pentium 3 era, but I could be wrong there. Looking at the ones from 2003, a notebook would have used PC-2700 so-dimms. Notebooks typically fit 2 sodimms, and there are no 4GB sodimms in that ram type. The 1GB ones are mostly desktop type ram (dimms). Beyond that I don't think the memory controller even supports them.
First of all OSX caps it at 512MB of vram assuming 8GB installed on the models that use integrated graphics. The middle one with discrete is capped at 256, which is extremely low. It's one of those things that should be a non - issue, except when it's really quite low. The OP also wanted a notebook, yet you pointed her toward something inferior. The base mini is a better choice than the one you suggested for longevity, but you don't seem to understand that. Overall it's not a machine I'd touch prior to a refresh anyway, and obviously a display, keyboard, and mouse would have to be tacked on to that purchase (although a tablet would be good for photoshop). Yours was simply a bad recommendation to get the OP through college as it's likely to hit a wall too soon, where the cheaper one most likely will not. Just as an fyi, that vram configuration is lower than any other brand uses on that discrete card.
Oh, thanks!
Btw, will the difference in GHz matter? I have no idea what that means haha but the two I'm comparing have 1.8 (Air) and 2.5 (Pro), is that going to be noticeable?
Noted, thanks so much!
Ghz is a measure of clock speed. For a given CPU design, you can use Ghz as a way of relating the performance of the CPU between two CPUs of the same family.
Suppose you have two Core i5 CPUs. One's rated 2.0Ghz, one's rated 2.5Ghz. This means that the 2nd one is 25% faster than the first one. (because it's got 25% more Ghz)
Then suppose you have a Core 2 Duo (old) and a Core i5 (newer). Both at 2.0Ghz. Comparing the two is less meaningful because while they have the same clock speed (Ghz), they're different CPU designs.
The simplest analogy I've heard is one of row boats. You've seen the old boat races where there's a guy beating the drum, and the rowers row to the beat of the drum, right?
The drum is clock. Beat faster == increase in clock speed == increase in number of times you row/calculate.
The rowers are the core. Different sets of rowers perform differently, just like differently designed cores perform differently.
So 1.8 vs 2.5 (assuming both Core i5) means that the Pro is 38% faster when it comes to pure CPU (photoshop and video renders are all CPU). While this sounds like quite a bit, know that most of the time, the CPU is already done and waiting for the user. So when you're talking about the computer doing PS filters that take 3 seconds on the Pro, they'll take about 4 seconds on the Air. You save a little over a second in this case. Paying more to shave off a second doesn't sound so grand anymore, eh?
And in general, most actions never take that long to begin with. Hence why I say from experience, that the performance really shouldn't matter that much to you.
The only time I really notice the difference is during the final render for videos. In this case, I'd be running the system at full blast for an hour. I'd save maybe a half hour when comparing against my old system. It'd be nicer to have it faster, sure. But then again, it'd not like I sit there and watch the machine during the batch. I'd go off and get lunch or something and it's done by the time I get back.
If I were in a big studio and my renders needed to be done same day and ready for broadcast, then yes, I'd buy the biggest most awesome machine ever. But, I'm not time constrained like that. And as a student, I'd venture to assume you're not time constrained like that either.
Ad high temperatures on Air: that's ********. Before you guys start to give advice to somebody maybe you should make sure you know about what you speak or else it's better to shut up
Macbook Air uses ULV CPU which means low energy consuption & low temperature. Macworld did series of tests and Macbook Air actually won as the coolest (by temperature) notebook. Google it.
Macbook Air uses ULV CPU which means low energy consuption & low temperature. Macworld did series of tests and Macbook Air actually won as the coolest (by temperature) notebook. Google it.
Ad high temperatures on Air: that's ********. Before you guys start to give advice to somebody maybe you should make sure you know about what you speak or else it's better to shut up
Macbook Air uses ULV CPU which means low energy consuption & low temperature. Macworld did series of tests and Macbook Air actually won as the coolest (by temperature) notebook. Google it.
Relax there.
I've already made it clear to the OP that the Air is cooler than the Pro for exactly those reasons. (read complete thread before posting please).
Though they both get warm, the Air is less warm.
13" MacBook Pro; you currently can't afford upgrades to either machine and the 13" Air (as well as the 11" Air) can't be upgraded post-purchase, at least, not in ways that aren't both nominal and expensive. The 13" Pro can last you as you can upgrade both RAM and boot drives and extremely easily at that. Therefore, the 13" Pro is the much better buy.
Ad high temperatures on Air: that's ********. Before you guys start to give advice to somebody maybe you should make sure you know about what you speak or else it's better to shut up
Macbook Air uses ULV CPU which means low energy consuption & low temperature. Macworld did series of tests and Macbook Air actually won as the coolest (by temperature) notebook. Google it.
It actually stands for ultra low voltage. This is combined with smaller fans and a thinner enclosure. In terms of Apple notebooks, they all run hot under load. This means all of them. There isn't one that is incapable of reaching peak temperatures internally. Some of them can draw more power at peak load than their chargers are capable of delivering, but this isn't likely to affect the OP going by the nature of their use. In terms of heat, any of these are likely to run hot given the OP's usage patterns. I've tested them. While I'd prefer they ran cooler, this is something to accept if you're going to buy one.
Sorry for being little harsh, I just read it many times in this thread and then found the actual test which prove it wrong. I am currently also trying to choose between Air and Pro 13" (for web and mobile applications development) and it just make me angry little bit when somebody is posting "expert" opinions (not only that one about temperature) which are not true. This confuse people like me and OP and can lead to wrong decision.
She actually will be able to afford the upgrade to 8 GB for the 13" Air. So she will have 8GB and an SSD. This is better than the Pro assuming NO further upgrades.....especially with the higher res screen on the Air.
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How do you define hot? What temperatures?
The ULV processors consume less power (P=IV) so less voltage means less power, thus less power is dissipated across the cores, thus the heat emitted is LOWER than the 13" Pro under heavy load.
While they both get warm, the Pro gets much warmer than the Air.
Right, but given the price disparity between a maxed out Air and a non-upgraded 13" Pro is large; also it's unfair considering that you can get a 13" Pro to the same specs (save for display resolution) for a similar cost. And unlike the Air, you can upgrade the Pro...also a bad RAM chip on the Pro doesn't mean the replacement of the whole logic board.