Just about to pull trigger is it okay?

[thepominlaw]

Hi all, finally persuaded she who must be obeyed that I can have new mac. Helped she upgraded her iphone so she couldn't say anything really.

Anyhow I currently use a base 2009 C2D 21.5" imac. That's getting a bit long in the tooth now and I need a bedroom back so I need to downsize. Thinking of getting mid spec 13" rMBP but I have a few concerns

Will it be any faster than my imac (I would like to play bio shock) as that won't run anything hardly with its 9400m gpu. Even mine craft stutters.

Is the i5 going be be good enough for photoshop 2014 CC? Or will I need the i7?

Only upgrade was going to be 16gb ram. For future really and photoshop.

How do you manage with 256gb storage. My 500gb is constantly full.

Cheers

 

[Samuelsan2001]

Well it will be faster.....

But it is only a dual core chip and so is the i7, also the graphics (for bioshock) are good for a iGPU in a slim 13 inch notebook but not the best for gaming.


To be honest 16gb of ram will do you no good unless you are using vm's and/or doing large numbers of huge photo files in Photoshop, 8gb will be enough. The money will probably be better spent on AppleCare or storage.

I would think that unless you need the portability you will be better off with a new iMac for the same price you could get a 750m graphics card for gaming, a bigger screen for gaming and an ssd or fusion drive and a quad core i5 desktop class processor.

If you go that route you may want to wait to see if there is an update in October.

 

[Qaanol]

Any new Mac—even the base model MBA—will completely outpace your 5-year-old iMac with no sweat.

The choice you should be making is between the 2014 mid-spec 13.3″ rMBP (2.6 / 8 / 256) and the October 2013 mid-spec 13.3″ rMBP (2.4 / 8 / 256). They will perform identically in every regard: the CPU bump is negligible. Just look around to see what the best prices you can find are, whether refurb or third-party, or with various discounts.

 

[thepominlaw]

Thanks guys, to be honest i doubt i will ever game on it would just like to have the option one day if I'm bored. So don't let that influence you views.

Spent the evening looking at some options. Call me mad i know but even been looking at non retina MBP with the i7, 8Gb ram and the 1Tb hard drive in there. Only reason i am considering this is storage and i know i can install a SSD one day as its really the only mac thats user accessible. I just cannot get the 256Gb out of my head and wondering how i could manage. So thats one option for me buying through work would cost me £1039 with all the upgrades. (I also have 6 HDDs all firewire 800).

The only other option i am considering is a bit of a curve ball for my finances, the entry level retina 15" MBP. Its a lot of money but if i was to upgrade a 13" rMBP to the hilt it would cost the same. But i see it has a few benefits 15" screen, iris Pro graphics, it already has 16Gb ram and its a quad core i7. Probably the perfect computer for me just not sure i can afford it.

Oh yeah iMac out of the question need to clear desk out of spare room as my god daughter is coming to stay.

 

[Samuelsan2001]

FireWire??

No more FireWire without an adapter I'm afraid. I would suggest trying to get all that external storage set up as wifi access for a MacBook Pro.

The internals in the old MBP are pushing three years old, the ssd is only SATA III, GPU is quite underpowered, battery not as good, screen not even in the same league, no thunderbolt 2, no AC wifi, in short is much less of a computer for nearly the same price, once after market ssds are included it's almost the same.

I think the base 15 would be absolutely fine for you if you can set up some networked storage.

Any of them will do the job I think you need to get into an apple store and have a play, one of them will just suit you more and you won't know until you give them a good test drive.

Also check the refurb store and get a late 2013 model instead you will save a fair few hundred dollars and get the configuration you want. Also check amazon in the uk it's about £400 saving to buy on amazon.....

 

[thepominlaw]

Thanks I have finally decided to go for the base 15" with no upgrades. As my main interest is photography (lightroom and PS CC) I think I will benefit from the quad core processor. Just not sure how I will manage my data at this stage.

Photos at present 45Gb so that can stay with libraries on SSD. Music 150Gb am thinking this needs to be on external drive with library on SSD. Only issue is if I want to listen to some music will I have to have the drive connected? Docs 10Gb most in icloud.

Going to sell all my hard drives 3 x raid enclosures with FireWire 800 connection and buy one USB 3 raid enclosure for time machine. Plus I have a 120gb SSD in a USB 3 enclosure I am sure I can use for something even if it's a backup copy of the photos and libraries.

 

[maflynn]

Enjoy your new machine, I think the base 15" is more then enough horse power for your stated needs

 

[Samuelsan2001]

Good Choice

Thanks I have finally decided to go for the base 15" with no upgrades. As my main interest is photography (lightroom and PS CC) I think I will benefit from the quad core processor. Just not sure how I will manage my data at this stage.

Photos at present 45Gb so that can stay with libraries on SSD. Music 150Gb am thinking this needs to be on external drive with library on SSD. Only issue is if I want to listen to some music will I have to have the drive connected? Docs 10Gb most in icloud.

Going to sell all my hard drives 3 x raid enclosures with FireWire 800 connection and buy one USB 3 raid enclosure for time machine. Plus I have a 120gb SSD in a USB 3 enclosure I am sure I can use for something even if it's a backup copy of the photos and libraries.

I would look at some sort of NAS storage so you can access over wifi.

If you are in the UK check out prices on Amazon much better that apple that model is £1263 rather than £1599.

 

[aoaaron]

Get the base 15'' MBP if you're thinking about upgrading RAM and have any processor intensive tasks IMO. Just makes life a lot easier (well faster).

I wouldn't worry about storage. In the next 1-3 years, SD card prices and SSD hard drive prices are going to plummet.

I got the base 256GB model and I already have an 10TB server at home for media file storage. For anything I need mobile, I'm going to buy an SD card wallet and a few cut-price SD cards. My music is on iCloud.

 

[thepominlaw]

Cheers all. Order placed today base 15" rMBP bought from apple via my works employee purchase programme so I saved just over £150. Bought on finance just waiting for status to change from awaiting payment.

Loan was approved and electronically signed so I suppose it's just a matter of waiting as I have all my documents now they were emailed through.

 

[Moshe1010]

But it is only a dual core chip and so is the i7, also the graphics (for bioshock) are good for a iGPU in a slim 13 inch notebook but not the best for gaming.


To be honest 16gb of ram will do you no good unless you are using vm's and/or doing large numbers of huge photo files in Photoshop, 8gb will be enough. The money will probably be better spent on AppleCare or storage.

I would think that unless you need the portability you will be better off with a new iMac for the same price you could get a 750m graphics card for gaming, a bigger screen for gaming and an ssd or fusion drive and a quad core i5 desktop class processor.

If you go that route you may want to wait to see if there is an update in October.

I don't agree. I'm using Chrome on 2012 rMBP (8GB RAM) and my RAM is getting to 500-1000MB free at times (only). If many tabs are open + music + MS Office/powerpoint/acrobat reader, my RAM is done. Not to mention Flash videos or youtube (even HTML5 based crappy player).
16GB RAM is what I would go with these days and not a single GB less.

 

[aoaaron]

Yeah I'm using like 9.5GB of app memory and 13GB in total.

I have about 16 tabs in 2 safari windows open, ical, iTunes playing music, a few push notifications coming from various sites, reminders open, evernote open, mail open and iMessages.

 

[Samuelsan2001]

I don't agree. I'm using Chrome on 2012 rMBP (8GB RAM) and my RAM is getting to 500-1000MB free at times (only). If many tabs are open + music + MS Office/powerpoint/acrobat reader, my RAM is done. Not to mention Flash videos or youtube (even HTML5 based crappy player).
16GB RAM is what I would go with these days and not a single GB less.

Yeah I'm using like 9.5GB of app memory and 13GB in total.

I have about 16 tabs in 2 safari windows open, ical, iTunes playing music, a few push notifications coming from various sites, reminders open, evernote open, mail open and iMessages.

I think you guys need to read up on memory management in osx. That 9.5 of app memory is just osx using what's available to keep things as fast as possible it is available for use by new apps as soon as needed. Unused RAM is wasted RAM and so osx uses all it can.

When checking your ram it is only the pressure graph and page outs that are important. As long as the graph is in the green or even yellow and page out are zero you are fine.
my 8gb will even show 12gb being used without turning yellow due to clever RAM compression.

 

[Moshe1010]

I think you guys need to read up on memory management in osx. That 9.5 of app memory is just osx using what's available to keep things as fast as possible it is available for use by new apps as soon as needed. Unused RAM is wasted RAM and so osx uses all it can.

When checking your ram it is only the pressure graph and page outs that are important. As long as the graph is in the green or even yellow and page out are zero you are fine.
my 8gb will even show 12gb being used without turning yellow due to clever RAM compression.

I'm using "Memory Clean" to check my RAM. It divides the section clearly to app memory and OS X memory. My app memory is 5-7GB occasionally.

 

[alphaod]

Cheers all. Order placed today base 15" rMBP bought from apple via my works employee purchase programme so I saved just over £150. Bought on finance just waiting for status to change from awaiting payment.

Loan was approved and electronically signed so I suppose it's just a matter of waiting as I have all my documents now they were emailed through.

Congrats on the computer.

It's definitely something I would have recommended, but wouldn't normally spell it out being it's a pricier than the 13". For your needs this is definitely a solid performer and you'll be very happy with it. It will run your Bioshock and Minecraft fine and dandy.