Just got my refurb rMB 2016...

[Eggtastic]

So far I love it.

HOWEVER...

I got the open box from best buy. It was listed as certified excellent: 2016 rMB m5 with 512 SSD. The price was a little over $1200 and after tax around $1300ish. All in all I saved $300 or so going this route vs new.

When I got the open box, the charging cable came damaged which shocked me since it was "certified-excellent". So I had to run out to best buy to have this fixed. At this point I already had a bad feeling about this and was prepared to just return it and go either new or get a legit refurb from Apple. The gave me an off brand usb-c cable which is actually 3ft instead of apple's 6ft. I however didn't notice this until I got home.

Here is my dilemma, I got the rMB booted up and saw that there was only 9 cycles total on the battery. It works great, no blemishes what so ever. I am now having a bit of buyers remorse in terms of getting the wrong version. I was thinking how cloud storage is now becoming more apparent (or has), and was wondering if I should return my m5 / 512 for an apple refurb m7/ 256gb and go with an external hard drive thats wireless or use cloud storage for anything extra. That way I get the reliability of apple vs best buy, I get more speed, and not wasting all the extra space.

I have an 2011 11" MBA with 128 gb ssd and it is almost full with apps, music, photos, etc. So I just figured I'd go big with the m5/512.

My question is what would you do in this situation? I have 12 days to return this for a full refund to which will be applied to an apple refurb m7/256 if I decide to do so. Again, I am thinking I won't need all that extra space with an external harddrive / cloud set up.

I may be over thinking all this, but just wanted some input as a lot of you went with the m5.

 

[zhenya]

I would keep what you have. IMO the hard drive space is more noticeable for most people than the processor bump. Save yourself the hassle and relax and enjoy the new laptop.

 

[raqball]

In some cases the m7 is actually slower than the m5.. Look at benchmarks that compare them and see for yourself..

If I were you, I'd stick with the m5.. I had it and loved it! Ended up selling it though because I just could not deal with the 12" screen size..

 

[pugxiwawa]

I would keep the m5. I tried out the m7 refurbished from Apple and ended up returning that for the same geek certified m5 from BestBuy. The speed increase from m5 to m7 was very minimal and to be honest I really did not notice any difference in day-to-day usage. Actually in some instances I felt m7 was lagging a bit while I had no issue with the m5. I just couldn't justify the extra $200 difference between the 2 so I decided to keep the m5. I would definitely keep 512gb SSD instead of 256gb. While cloud is becoming more popular you just never know when you ever need that extra storage. Just my 2 cents...

 

[Eggtastic]

I would keep the m5. I tried out the m7 refurbished from Apple and ended up returning that for the same geek certified m5 from BestBuy. The speed increase from m5 to m7 was very minimal and to be honest I really did not notice any difference in day-to-day usage. Actually in some instances I felt m7 was lagging a bit while I had no issue with the m5. I just couldn't justify the extra $200 difference between the 2 so I decided to keep the m5. I would definitely keep 512gb SSD instead of 256gb. While cloud is becoming more popular you just never know when you ever need that extra storage. Just my 2 cents...

Thanks for the input. So I assume price and lack of space were the determining factors in your decision? Also, you went open-box with best buy?
[doublepost=1480650105][/doublepost]Thanks for all the replies. It seems the verdict is to just keep the MacBook that I have. I may however return the 3rd party USB-c cable they provided because it is shorter than the one apple provided.

 

[Kipchak]

Here are the geekbench ratings for the various 2016 Macbooks:


Macbook Early 2016 m3 2677 / 5093
Macbook Early 2016 m5 2994 / 5761 (+11.8% / +13.1% vs m3)
Macbook Early 2016 m7 3224 / 6413 (+7.7% / +11.3% vs m5)

100% increase to storage vs ~10% increase in processor top end - I'd stick with the m5/512GB.

 

[pika2000]

What's the warranty?
Refurbished from Apple has the same warranty as new Apple products. Plus you can get Apple care for it. I would rather get refurbished from Apple.

 

[c0ppo]

Keep it. 512GB is also faster then 256gb one, and filling up ssd all the way up is not so good for the ssd. Cloud is ok, but no way near the local storage. I would just ask them for 6ft cable, since that is the cable you were supposed to get in the first place.

 

[double329]

I would keep the M5. When I first looked into getting the 2016 rMB, I was doing a lot of homework and I was looking at M5 vs M7 version. Long story short, I decided to go with M5 version as many had stated with few different things. M5 is more of the sweet spot in my opinion amount the 2016 rMB line up. I have no regret with the M5 and loving it.