Keep santa rosa macbook pro or get a new one?

X

Xil3

macrumors regular
I currently have a santa rosa macbook pro (2.4mhz, 4gb ram, 160gb hd), which i bought in Nov. 2007, and was considering buying a new one. Problem is that I can't justify buying the new one and was just trying to weigh the pros and cons.

Should I just wait for another model that's really distinguished and keep my santa rosa till then, or go for the current model?
 
I don't see a reason worth upgrading until next year as it is. We're still seeing faster Core 2 Duo machines. I'd wait until Arrandale.
 
I ran into this very same situation, and ultimately did get a better machine.

I'd say keep it in your case, since you haven't really given any reason that you need to upgrade.

I know your situation may be different, but in case it helps...

For me, I decided to upgrade for a variety of reasons.
1. Graduating college soon. Pretty much my last chance to get a student discount w/ free ipod. After sellling the Ipod that amounts to about an extra $400 in savings. Not a huge amount by any means, but still pretty significant.
I know I could just grab a class at a CC later on, but I figured, heck, who knows if I'll have time for that?

2. Old MBP was loosing value fast. Tried to sell for $900 and that was with extras like Iwork, timbuk2 bag, leopard(originally came with tiger). I had to settle for $30 less, if we're talking about the package in whole, but I only got $840 for the computer and I got lucky in selling the bag.

I thought, better to save an extra $800 now, than possibly nothing later.

3. After taking a video course, I discovered a somewhat upsetting thing, that my old MBP doesn't handle video editing well. It may have very well been a software issue, but I found apps were constantly crashing left and right. Being able to edit video is important in what I'm studying.

4. After seeing how much real estate the new MBP provided in resolution, I thought itd be nice to occasionally, not have to rely on spaces in order to see everything I'm working on at at any given time.

5. Battery life: I was only getting about 2 - 2.5 hours on the old MBP. When you're a student, it can, often times, be a frustrating experience finding an outlet. True I could buy a new battery, but I knew i was only getting about an extra hour, maybe hour and a half when the computer was brand new, so that doesn't really do THAT much good with what I'm doing. Also I didn't think it'd be worth the trouble considering reason #2.

hope that helps!
 
Ride9650 said:
I ran into this very same situation, and ultimately did get a better machine.

I'd say keep it in your case, since you haven't really given any reason that you need to upgrade.

I know your situation may be different, but in case it helps...

For me, I decided to upgrade for a variety of reasons.
1. Graduating college soon. Pretty much my last chance to get a student discount w/ free ipod. After sellling the Ipod that amounts to about an extra $400 in savings. Not a huge amount by any means, but still pretty significant.
I know I could just grab a class at a CC later on, but I figured, heck, who knows if I'll have time for that?

2. Old MBP was loosing value fast. Tried to sell for $900 and that was with extras like Iwork, timbuk2 bag, leopard(originally came with tiger). I had to settle for $30 less, if we're talking about the package in whole, but I only got $840 for the computer and I got lucky in selling the bag.

I thought, better to save an extra $800 now, than possibly nothing later.

3. After taking a video course, I discovered a somewhat upsetting thing, that my old MBP doesn't handle video editing well. It may have very well been a software issue, but I found apps were constantly crashing left and right. Being able to edit video is important in what I'm studying.

4. After seeing how much real estate the new MBP provided in resolution, I thought itd be nice to occasionally, not have to rely on spaces in order to see everything I'm working on at at any given time.

hope that helps!
Click to expand...

Just keep your college ID and show it to them at the Apple store. They will only look at the ID and your license and that's it. Not really much verification.
 
I have the same machine with 4 GB RAM just like you
I upgraded the HD to the Scorpio Blue and I feel good about my system
(I also added a 23" ACD, so it feels like "new")

It does everything I need quite well, and I can run Vista (Boot Camp), Windows 7 (Fusion) and Ubuntu (Fusion) with no problems too.

If you have no compelling reason to buy, then my advice is to wait
If you buy now, you will start the cycle again and you will want the next best thing as soon as it comes out too

I am not one to buy and sell every year though
I keep my Macs until they don't do what I need any more, then I upgrade

Woof, Woof - Dawg
pawprint.gif
 
I would suggest that you wait for the time being until some major new updates appear, then sell the old and buy a new having given Apple a few months to sort out teething problems and glitches. As things stand, you appear to have no compelling reason to get a new computer just now.

Cheers and good luck
 
Xil3 said:
I currently have a santa rosa macbook pro (2.4mhz, 4gb ram, 160gb hd), which i bought in Nov. 2007, and was considering buying a new one. Problem is that I can't justify buying the new one and was just trying to weigh the pros and cons.

Should I just wait for another model that's really distinguished and keep my santa rosa till then, or go for the current model?
Click to expand...

I have the same 2.4 Ghz Santa Rosa MBP. I actually bought the new Macbook Pro 13" but returned it before Apple fixed the SATA problem (just my luck). Before I returned it I cloned the disk from the 13" back to my Santa Rosa and I ran some rough tests. My old Santa Rosa MBP with 2.4 Ghz, 4GB of RAM booted considerably faster. I will admit I have a 7200 RPM drive in my SR MBP vs the 5400 stock drive in the 13" uMBP.

I liked the battery life and the newer trackpad and keyboard, but I also like my matte screen in my SR MPB. Also, I just bought a Patriot brand 4GB DDR2 PC-5300 ram stick from Fries for $129 to give my SR MBP 6GB of ram. 4GB sticks for the new uMBP cost 3 times as much so I would not have been able to upgrade the ram in he new uMBP. This ram upgrade did the trick and gave me the performance I needed for when I code .NET in my VMWare vm.

Also, consider to really gain an advantage in the new uMBP you'd need to buy an expensive SSD to take advantage of the 3 Gbps SATA. We only have 1.5 Gbps in the SR MBP. Its just not practical at this time unless you have the money to burn.

An extra battery for the SR MPB is much cheaper than buying a new uMBP. I'd wait until next year, based on my experience above.
 
MacDawg said:
I have the same machine with 4 GB RAM just like you
I upgraded the HD to the Scorpio Blue and I feel good about my system
(I also added a 23" ACD, so it feels like "new")

It does everything I need quite well, and I can run Vista (Boot Camp), Windows 7 (Fusion) and Ubuntu (Fusion) with no problems too.

If you have no compelling reason to buy, then my advice is to wait
If you buy now, you will start the cycle again and you will want the next best thing as soon as it comes out too

I am not one to buy and sell every year though
I keep my Macs until they don't do what I need any more, then I upgrade

Woof, Woof - Dawg
pawprint.gif
Click to expand...

I have a older machine, only 2.2Ghz with 4Gb. I use mine for HD video work. So far besides the slightly slower CPU clock speed and all my applications are as stable on this machine, as they are on the MacPro. Therefore I don't see any point in upgrading yet.. besides, the current range don't have ExpressCard slot - how annoying!!

I don't use FCP, instead I opted for PPro & AFx CS4

I also have a 2.6Ghz 17" but i don't use it.. it's just that bit tooo heavy to lug about.
 
Eidorian said:
I still have mine and it doesn't have an expiration date.
Click to expand...

Sweet.. haha, I wish I could keep mine. Mine doesn't have an expiration date either, but it explicitly says "This card is the property of.." etc and Im pretty sure I signed a form saying I'd return it.

Who knows, maybe I'll sneak it by anyways, but at my old school, they did have a procedure set up for students to return IDs and actually checked, knowing my luck it'll be the same once I graduate..*sigh..
 
Until they bring out a matte screen option on the 15 inch then I'd keep your one if I were you.

I have the 2.2 MBP santa rosa and am still very happy with it.

Although I do look enviously at the 7 hours + battery life!!!
 
yahoodlums said:
Until they bring out a matte screen option on the 15 inch then I'd keep your one if I were you.

I have the 2.2 MBP santa rosa and am still very happy with it.

Although I do look enviously at the 7 hours + battery life!!!
Click to expand...


I know how you feel...
But we can gloat, cause we still have matte displays, full sized DVI port, FW400 and a useful ExpressCard Slot!
 
I have the same machine. The only reason I can think of for selling it is to avoid the 8600GT timebomb in your machine. Mine is currently in the shop for that reason and am afraid it will go out again after my applecare has expired.
 
phooi said:
I have the same machine. The only reason I can think of for selling it is to avoid the 8600GT timebomb in your machine. Mine is currently in the shop for that reason and am afraid it will go out again after my applecare has expired.
Click to expand...

I have had not problems with the 8600 GT to date (knocks on wood)

Woof, Woof - Dawg
pawprint.gif
 
Thanks for all the advice guys!

I think I'm just going to wait for the new 'Arrandale' systems, whenever that comes out - hopefully Q4 of this year.

My battery life is down to 1 hour on a full charge, which is pretty bad, and I don't really want to spend 100 on a new one.
 
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