making entry level iMoves: 13 inch rMCB bs 15 inch rMCB?

[edavt04]

Hey there!

I would like to get into editing videos (taken on iphone 6) on a beginner's level using iMovie app. I hear different people saying different things. I hear some people say 5th gen dual core (13 inch MCB) renders smoother iMovies than 4th gen i7 quad core (15 inch retina MCB).

All I want is to make entry level iMovies, without overpaying...
Here are 2 models I was looking at on amazon (both early 2015):

Apple MacBook Pro MF840LL/A 13.3-Inch Laptop with Retina Display (256 GB, 2.7 GHz dual-core Intel Core i5 processor, 8 GB 1866 MHz LPDDR3 RAM), Silver
VS
Apple Macbook Pro MJLQ2LL/A 15-inch Laptop (2.2 GHz Intel Core i7 Processor, 16GB RAM, 256 GB Hard Drive, Mac OS X)

What would you recommend?

 

[Dave Braine]

I use the non retina 13" MBP and do quite a lot of iMovie stuff. It copes with it easily. No real need to pay that extra for the Retina screen.

 

[ColdCase]

I don't think you will see differences in the finished product. It just a matter of how much patience you have. The most powerful processor and fastest hard drive (SSD) will go a long way to smoother more responsive editing and quicker. It may be a more gratifying experience. That being said, time is not as much money for a beginner as it is for a pro. So the decision quickly becomes subjective and subject of opinion.

Retina displays are better for text, better but not so much for video work. A larger screen is much more useful, if given a choice, IMHO. So any modern Apple laptop works well with iMovie and iPhone video source. Buy the largest screen, with the fastest and most hard drive space (internal or external TB) for your active project files that fit your budget. Then add as much CPU and GPU power you can afford. These affect transcode/render time lines, which one often lets run overnight. So if it takes two hours or 4, you probably won't notice it. If you have a tendency to make mistakes that you don't pick up until final product QC review, however, it will be less frustrating having a powerful machine that can quickly turn around your revision.