I am still looking to buy a MacBook Pro however the only one that is in my price range is the MacBook Pro without the Touchbar. I heard that it is supposed to be towards MacBook Air users which makes me wonder if it is powerful enough. So how does this model compare with MacBook Air, the 2015 MacBook Pro, and the current ones?
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Is MacBook Pro w/out Touchbar good
- Thread starter Aditya_S
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Thanks for the reply, but what I was asking was how the base model MacBook Pro 2016 compares to the higher end MacBook Pros and the MacBook Air in terms of power and capability. I'm definitely not going to get the MacBook Air cause it's not as powerful and doesn't have as good as a screen. Since the base model Pro was directed towards Air users, I was just wondering if it's power was more comparable to the Air than the higher end Pros with touch bar. Sorry for not being clear.
If you are going to use it simply for learning to write swift code and for school, the higher end pro computer with the touch bar is definitely more powerful, but I don't think you will make a mistake buying the lower end model without the touch bar. I have been learning swift as well and write swift code on my MacBook Pro from 2012 with no problem.
Agree the ntb should be fine. I also agree that I wouldn't touch the MBA, but mostly because of the screen. But for most uses, the MBA is powerful enough. There are also a ton of improvements the '16 has over the MBA and the CPU is actually one of the least important ones. ntb is a worthy MBA replacement and it amazingly comes very close in size and pretty good and consistent battery. When I was shopping, I found the ntb pretty much checked all the boxes as an MBA replacement. The TB model adds slightly better specs, 2 more usb-c ports on other side (surprisingly handy), and the TB itself of course. Depending on use, these aren't must-haves.
The new MBP w/o TB is more powerful than the lower end rMBP from 2015, in short its still a very good powerful computer. It also has a better screen and thunderbolt three not to mention some of the best laptop speakers available.
I love everything about my 2016 MPB non-Tb except the keyboard, which is an unreliable, embarrassing mess (I've already had mine replaced once, and now I need it replaced again because the spacebar just stopped working most of the time).
The machine runs SOOO cool, which means the fans rarely kick on, your lap doesn't get warm, and the battery life is great. I easily get 10 hours of use from this machine, 12 if I'm really trying.
The screen is great, the speakers are great. In short, it's an amazing machine hobbled by its godawful keyboard.
The machine runs SOOO cool, which means the fans rarely kick on, your lap doesn't get warm, and the battery life is great. I easily get 10 hours of use from this machine, 12 if I'm really trying.
The screen is great, the speakers are great. In short, it's an amazing machine hobbled by its godawful keyboard.
The non-Touchbar model is plenty capable. It's CPU is a reasonable upgrade over last years MacBook Pro (the base 2.0 GHz i5 CPU on the 2016 MBP generally compares to the mid-tier 2.8 GHz i5 on the 2015 MBP, both of which are superior to the flagship 2.2 GHz i7 on the MacBook Air), and its graphics are a considerable upgrade.
The CPU differences among the touchbar and non-touchbar models aren't night-and-day significant IMO, and some of the CPU and RAM speed gains on the touchbar models may be partially offset by having to drive the touchbar.
Compared to the MacBook Air, it's a reasonably substantial performance upgrade. Additionally, you can frequently find the MBP without the touchbar on sale for prices not all that much more than the MacBook Air was priced at with the comparable tier, leaving some extra funds for something else
The CPU differences among the touchbar and non-touchbar models aren't night-and-day significant IMO, and some of the CPU and RAM speed gains on the touchbar models may be partially offset by having to drive the touchbar.
Compared to the MacBook Air, it's a reasonably substantial performance upgrade. Additionally, you can frequently find the MBP without the touchbar on sale for prices not all that much more than the MacBook Air was priced at with the comparable tier, leaving some extra funds for something else
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Not to discredit anything that parsonsmike has said above, but I also have the 2016 mbp ntb and I have had zero keyboard issues. Might be just luck of the draw, but I love the new keyboard and haven't suffered from any keyboard failures (*yet*).
I agree that it's a fantastic machine and should be plenty fast for what you are intending. In benchmarks, it is less than 10% slower than it's more expensive TouchBar counterpart, but you would never know it in day-to-day usage.
Also as parsonsmike mentioned, the battery life on the ntb models is fantastic. 10-12 hours is also standard for my machine. It's also been rock solid from a system stability standpoint.
All in all, besides losing out on the the 2 extra ports and touch id, I really think this is the best laptop in apple's lineup when you compare price/performance/battery life/screen quality/stability. It is very much a worthy successor to the much-lauded 13 MBA - just with added performance that rivals pros.
Thanks for all the responses everyone! I'm also thinking of getting one of those hubs that add full size USB ports, SD card slots, and more but I want to know since it's all coming from one port, does that make the performance of each added port slower than it would be if it was built into the computer?
To my understanding, it depends on the product you buy, and if/what display and secondary storage you use with it.
If you get a Thunderbolt 3 hub, even if you are connecting a very high resolution display(s) and are using multiple fast external SSDs simultaneously, everything is going to be plenty fast because TB3 supports such insanely high transfer speeds. If you get a USB-C hub that tops out at 5 Gbps, if you connect a very high resolution display to it, then you are likely going to have slower transfer speeds.
I don't I think they'll update any time soon, sometime in fall is most they'll leave it at least a year its very rare that they update any sooner than that. The price may drop when they update but I wouldn't count on it.
This fall, for kaby lake. Price reduction can happen any time. People have reported seeing discounts at bestbuy for the new MBP so deals can be had now.