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Is 2017 MBP w/Tb worth it over 2016?

M

manmit

macrumors member
Original poster
Jun 14, 2012
43
17
Toronto, Canada
Really struggling folks - based on my usage (office, statistical analysis, advanced excel, no video editing or gaming) , I am confident that 2016 or 17 MacBook Pro without touch bar (13 inch) will be sufficient. But the 2017 with 256gb SSD (I need 256) is costing $300 more when compared with refurbished 2016 model.

  1. IS 2017 worth paying extra? Besides kaby lake being 10% faster, don't see any other changes - could be wrong though.

Would love to hear your perspective and experiences.
 
4k compatibility and hardware support. = much better battery life when viewing 4k content and doing so with substantially less cpu / gpu power. Pretty important with the way media is inevitably moving if you ask me.
 
upandown said:
4k compatibility and hardware support. = much better battery life when viewing 4k content and doing so with substantially less cpu / gpu power. Pretty important with the way media is inevitably moving if you ask me.
Click to expand...

I understand but really don't have need for 4K as I don't do any photo or video editing.
 
The 2017 model without touchbar has faster RAM, a faster CPU, and a faster iGPU, with what could be assumed to be improved battery life due to better efficiency. It may or may not have keyboard improvements to enhance usability and/or longevity.

For your usage, it sounds like either will work just fine. The exception might be if you use statistical software in a fashion that is maxing out the CPU for extended periods (where the improvements of Kaby Lake would be more financially justifiable) or you are using statistical software in such a fashion and have access to versions that can utilize more than two cores, such as the four core Stata MP (in which case the 15-inch may be financially justifiable.) Further, if you are working with multiple extremely large datasets in conjunction with other Apps, IMO the 16 GB of RAM can come in handy! :)
 
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It won't make any difference to your use case by the sounds of it so basically its up to you, better 4K support may be useful in the long run other than that buy what you like at the price you are willing to pay.
 
ZapNZs said:
The 2017 model without touchbar has faster RAM, a faster CPU, and a faster iGPU, with what could be assumed to be improved battery life due to better efficiency. It may or may not have keyboard improvements to enhance usability and/or longevity.

For your usage, it sounds like either will work just fine. The exception might be if you use statistical software in a fashion that is maxing out the CPU for extended periods (where the improvements of Kaby Lake would be more financially justifiable) or you are using statistical software in such a fashion and have access to versions that can utilize more than two cores, such as the four core Stata MP (in which case the 15-inch may be financially justifiable.) Further, if you are working with multiple extremely large datasets in conjunction with other Apps, IMO the 16 GB of RAM can come in handy! :)
Click to expand...

Thank you.
Battery life - on apple website it says same upt 10 hours
When running large data sets, I often only have mostly excel and email open.
 
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