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Greetings and MBP upgrade advice

T

The Mitchelli

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Dec 23, 2014
9
0
Hi Everyone I'm Steve and a recent MacBook convert.

6 months ago I bought a 2009 unibody MBP which I quickly upgraded to 8gb and a SSD. It would have been perfect but it got very hot (warning messages) when doing video editing. For everything else it was amazing.

I sold it this week to put funds towards a brand new MBP.

I had settled on the i5 2.8 ghz, however to upgrade to i7 3.0 ghz is + £150 or 16gb ram is +£160. I can only afford one upgrade so which should I choose to future proof my MBP for the longest period?

Thanks in advance

Steve
 
Thanks for the reply. Any reason for RAM over CPU? I don't know enough hence the questions.
 
The Mitchelli said:
Thanks for the reply. Any reason for RAM over CPU? I don't know enough hence the questions.
Click to expand...

You'd be hard pressed to notice the difference unless you are running artificial benchmarks all day, everyday.

Usually, the rule of thumb with computers: if you have to ask, you don't need it.

The actual performance difference is on the order of 5% or so, you'll notice the performance drop of running out of RAM long before your processor holds you back.
 
I'm under no illusions, I know I don't need it now. I'm sure a mid spec MBA would be more than adequate for my needs today. My goal is future proofing as best I can. I would have guessed ram, but my 2009 MBP was definitely CPU bound.

I'm sure after 5 years I will hit a bottleneck somewhere, I wanted to expand my knowledge to manage any future issues the best I can.

Cheers Steve
 
The Mitchelli said:
I'm under no illusions, I know I don't need it now. I'm sure a mid spec MBA would be more than adequate for my needs today. My goal is future proofing as best I can. I would have guessed ram, but my 2009 MBP was definitely CPU bound.

I'm sure after 5 years I will hit a bottleneck somewhere, I wanted to expand my knowledge to manage any future issues the best I can.

Cheers Steve
Click to expand...

In the 13" rMBPs, all CPUs are dual core with hyper threading, so all CPUs have 4 threads regardless of it being an i5 or i7.

The only time you'll notice the difference is in Geekbench scores.

Get the RAM upgrade instead.
 
If you're going to an upgrade, then pick the ram. While you may not need the ram (you have not stated your usage), the CPU upgrade will help you the least imo.
 
As far as usage goes, I'm a blogger. I mostly just write articles although periodically I do create basic videos. I'm not a gamer but my son has played WOW on my last MBP but he preferred to use his PC because of the graphics capabilities of the 2009 MBP was low for gaming. I'm sure he would want to try again on any new laptop.
 
I had a 3.0 i7 for about a week and then saw an i5 on the refurb store with 1TB flash for the same price is paid. I returned the i7 and now I have the i5 I've noticed zero performance difference. The CPU would be the last upgrade given the option of RAM and SSD. The geekbench scores of the i5 and the i7 put the i7 at around 150 points ahead and we're talking 2900 ish vs 3050 ish.
 
I am in the RAM camp also. I used a plain old i5 with 16 gigs of ram and a 512 gig SSD. Very fast and I really can't tell the difference between it and one of the i7 models.
 
The Mitchelli said:
As far as usage goes, I'm a blogger. I mostly just write articles although periodically I do create basic videos. I'm not a gamer but my son has played WOW on my last MBP but he preferred to use his PC because of the graphics capabilities of the 2009 MBP was low for gaming. I'm sure he would want to try again on any new laptop.
Click to expand...

I don't think an i7 is going to drastically improve game playing, I'd say that the MBP's Achilles' heal is the GPU - at least in terms of game playing. Its not a gaming machine and thus you're going to see poorer or results then a windows machine.

In real world usages, I don't think you will notice a difference between the i5 and I7
 
The Mitchelli said:
My goal is future proofing as best I can. I would have guessed ram, but my 2009 MBP was definitely CPU bound.

I'm sure after 5 years I will hit a bottleneck somewhere, I wanted to expand my knowledge to manage any future issues the best I can.

Cheers Steve
Click to expand...

If you were able to compare the performance between the 2009 that you have/had to the top CPU model 2009 MBP, and use them to do what you do, they will both be CPU bound doing what you're doing.

Besides, both CPU choices in the new model are only dual core. Now, if it was a choice between dual core and quad core, or more RAM ... Then I would say get the quad core CPU.

So, all cores being equal, get the RAM before the CPU.
 
Based on what you've said, here are my recommendations:

1. If you really want to spend money on an upgrade, choose RAM over CPU. I echo what other people have said about the negligible performance improvement of the i7.
2. Getting the i7 will not improve gaming performance. Gaming performance on the 13" rMBP is limited by the Intel Iris iGPU which is the same for every 13" model.
3. Honestly, for blogging and only occasional video editing, I think the standard 8GB will be fine for a long time. I don't think you're going to hit a RAM bottleneck unless you're one of those people who opens 100 Safari tabs and never closes them.
 
I have taken on board all your comments thank you.

I have just placed an order for a :

2014 MacBook Pro Retina 13"
2.8 GHz i5
16GB RAM
512GB SSD

I went for RAM over CPU. Can't wait for delivery!
 
The Mitchelli said:
I have taken on board all your comments thank you.

I have just placed an order for a :

2014 MacBook Pro Retina 13"
2.8 GHz i5
16GB RAM
512GB SSD

I went for RAM over CPU. Can't wait for delivery!
Click to expand...

Congrats and good luck with your new baby :)
 
The Mitchelli said:
I have taken on board all your comments thank you.

I have just placed an order for a :

2014 MacBook Pro Retina 13"
2.8 GHz i5
16GB RAM
512GB SSD

I went for RAM over CPU. Can't wait for delivery!
Click to expand...

Nice work, you'll love it

----------
The Mitchelli said:
I have taken on board all your comments thank you.

I have just placed an order for a :

2014 MacBook Pro Retina 13"
2.8 GHz i5
16GB RAM
512GB SSD

I went for RAM over CPU. Can't wait for delivery!
Click to expand...

Did you order new or refurb?
 
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