MBP 13" 2019 or wait for the future refresh?

[Tony01]

Idk if I should get it now or wait for the future refresh. MacRumors buyers guide shows that the last refresh was 100 days ago and the average is 300 days.
If I have to wait 200 days before buying it, I will get the current model.
But, If I understand correctly, there is a refresh coming soon, right?

My main concern is the new keyboard. In case I order now and the keyboard broke down, will Apple replace it with the new fixed keyboard?

The model I'm looking at now is the MBP 13" with 2 ports, 16gb ram, 256ssd.

Thank you in advance

 

[ls1dreams]

There has never been a more obvious time to wait for a new model than now. Current keyboards are a ticking $700 time bomb. Plus, in 2020, you'll also end up with wi-fi 6 (802.11ax) and av1 hardware decoding.

Unfortunately we are probably still 9-12 months out.

 

[Howard2k]

1) Buyers guide is rubbish.
2) I would wait. Rumour has it that we’ll get a 16” imminently and 13”/15” refreshes before mid 2020. If you can wait it would be worth doing so, unless you can get a spectacular deal on a used one perhaps.

 

[Tony01]

1) Buyers guide is rubbish.
2) I would wait. Rumour has it that we’ll get a 16” imminently and 13”/15” refreshes before mid 2020. If you can wait it would be worth doing so, unless you can get a spectacular deal on a used one perhaps.

I'm interested only in the 13" model. I have another laptop at home, but I wanted to make the switch to a macbook.
I can wait if necessary... but what do you mean by mid 2020? april?

 

[Howard2k]

Yeah I’d guess April.

In general I’m in the “there’s always something better around the corner” camp And suggest that it’s not worth waiting, but I wouldn’t jump on the current ones if I could avoid it. The 2019 seems like most of the niggles have been resolved, but all the same it’s not a gamble I’d take. Having said that, I have a 2015 and it’s running great so it’s not like I need to upgrade.

If I urgently needed something I’d likely buy used today and then resell it once the newer ones come out. Buying used you can still rely on the 4 year keyboard warranty (the remaining portion), pay less up front, and take less depreciation when you sell it.

Of course, April could turn into August. The new keyboard could be crap. Who knows.

 

[Tony01]

Yeah I’d guess April.

In general I’m in the “there’s always something better around the corner” camp And suggest that it’s not worth waiting, but I wouldn’t jump on the current ones if I could avoid it. The 2019 seems like most of the niggles have been resolved, but all the same it’s not a gamble I’d take. Having said that, I have a 2015 and it’s running great so it’s not like I need to upgrade.

If I urgently needed something I’d likely buy used today and then resell it once the newer ones come out. Buying used you can still rely on the 4 year keyboard warranty (the remaining portion), pay less up front, and take less depreciation when you sell it.

Of course, April could turn into August. The new keyboard could be crap. Who knows.

It will be the 1st gen of a new product and can have some issues as well....
the 2019 is the "perfected" version of the 2016 release
Waiting till April is a lot of time... I thought the refresh would have been much sooner

 

[Howard2k]

It will be the 1st gen of a new product and can have some issues as well....
the 2019 is the "perfected" version of the 2016 release
Waiting till April is a lot of time... I thought the refresh would have been much sooner

Yeah, the 2019 seems very solid overall. It's just that $700 if the keyboard fails after the four years that's the killer for me.

Plenty of folks happy with their 2019s and the 13" in particular is far better value now than it has been for a while, with quad core even on the lower end model. From a performance perspective the 2020 13" refresh can't bring too much to the table in terms of raw CPU upgrade I don't think, not like the jump from the dual core nTB 13" to the quad core 1.4Ghz TB model, that was a significant horsepower upgrade.

 

[Tony01]

Yeah, the 2019 seems very solid overall. It's just that $700 if the keyboard fails after the four years that's the killer for me.

Plenty of folks happy with their 2019s and the 13" in particular is far better value now than it has been for a while, with quad core even on the lower end model. From a performance perspective the 2020 13" refresh can't bring too much to the table in terms of raw CPU upgrade I don't think, not like the jump from the dual core nTB 13" to the quad core 1.4Ghz TB model, that was a significant horsepower upgrade.

Maybe small bezel in the 2020 will be great to have but... who knows...

If the keyboard fails in 4 years from now, the repair cost will probably be less than 700$. Or, if it breaks down during the 4 year, they will replace it with the new keyboard version....

Thx for clearing up my mind

 

[MrMister111]

Maybe small bezel in the 2020 will be great to have but... who knows...

If the keyboard fails in 4 years from now, the repair cost will probably be less than 700$. Or, if it breaks down during the 4 year, they will replace it with the new keyboard version....

Thx for clearing up my mind

Not sure about the world but think in UK, you get a 7 year EU warranty if something good wrong. Now normally I’d imagine this would be really hard to proof. But surely with Apple giving a brand new device that you buy a keyboard warranty of 4 years extra over normally 1 year, surely there is scope for more than the 4 years if it broke?

Think I’d be inclined to argue if it did....

In the point, there’s never a good time to buy, always something new “just around corner” but when/how long?

Also as said, there’s other problems that can come with a new device. All the devices Apple have made (and everyone), there isn’t a perfect product even with all the info, problems, engineering that they have. New CPUs, screens etc.

Just buy what happy with, in general I think with the hardware/software combo Apple seem to last longer anyway in hardware and MacOS updates supported.

 

[Lakersfan74]

I’m waiting until the end of the month for any refresh info before I bite. I only need the base 1.4 128gb.
I wonder when models with Catalina installed will become available?

 

[leman]

Wait at least until the end of the month (until Mac Pro is officially out). New-gen CPUs suitable for the 13" are already out — it wouldn't surprise me at all if we see an Ice Lake refresh on 13" within the next few weeks.

 

[KPOM]

Yeah, the 2019 seems very solid overall. It's just that $700 if the keyboard fails after the four years that's the killer for me.

Plenty of folks happy with their 2019s and the 13" in particular is far better value now than it has been for a while, with quad core even on the lower end model. From a performance perspective the 2020 13" refresh can't bring too much to the table in terms of raw CPU upgrade I don't think, not like the jump from the dual core nTB 13" to the quad core 1.4Ghz TB model, that was a significant horsepower upgrade.

Exactly. If anything, 2020 could bring a similarly significant performance upgrade to the MacBook Air (there is a 9W quad core Ice Lake chip coming), but the main update to the 13” Pro would likely be the keyboard. I don’t see them making the Pro much lighter (it would overlap with the Air).

The quad-Core is a noticeable improvement. I’ve used the 12” MacBook since 2015 (and still have a 2017 model that I travel with), so the keyboard doesn’t bother me. Now that the 12” MacBook is discontinued, I recommend the base Pro for most users. Even if the Air is “enough,” the Pro is more future proof, and the Air isn’t lighter enough IMO to justify the lower power (it is basically running the same chip as the 12” i7 MacBook, just with a fan and slightly higher base speed, but same turbo boost speed).

 

[Zerosopher]

I am waiting to buy a MacBook Pro as well. I think I should wait until the end of this month to see if they have new stuff to talk (or until Mac Pro is officially out).

 

[MrMister111]

Do we think the July 2019 13” MacBook Pro is going to get an update soon? Do they normally don updated this quick?

 

[leman]

Do we think the July 2019 13” MacBook Pro is going to get an update soon? Do they normally don updated this quick?

It's a possibility. New Intel CPUs are here and they offer clear benefits. But it also depends on whether Intel can ship sufficient quantities to satisfy Apple's volume (they probably can't). There are many variables and we don't even know half of the story.

 

[MrMister111]

It's a possibility. New Intel CPUs are here and they offer clear benefits. But it also depends on whether Intel can ship sufficient quantities to satisfy Apple's volume (they probably can't). There are many variables and we don't even know half of the story.

What are the benefits? Haven’t looked into this but looking at MBP 13”.

Massive updates? Faster, presume, better battery life? Are they big updates over what is in MBP 13” now 8th Gen?

thanks

 

[leman]

What are the benefits? Haven’t looked into this but looking at MBP 13”.

Well, its a bit complex... to summarise, there is a healthy improvement in operations-per-clock, but I am not sure you will see it that much in a day-to-day operation. If however your software supports AXV-512, those 15W quad-core Ice Lake CPUs murder everything else. The GPU is also much faster and actually compares favourably to low-end dedicated GPUs.

The point is, if you can get a Ice Lake at a similar price point, there is absolutely no reason not to go for it. Its one of those things that will get much more performant as software starts supporting AVX-512. Especially of interest to creators and people who work with a lot of data crunching. And a 2x faster GPU does not hurt also.

 

[MrMister111]

Well, its a bit complex... to summarise, there is a healthy improvement in operations-per-clock, but I am not sure you will see it that much in a day-to-day operation. If however your software supports AXV-512, those 15W quad-core Ice Lake CPUs murder everything else. The GPU is also much faster and actually compares favourably to low-end dedicated GPUs.

The point is, if you can get a Ice Lake at a similar price point, there is absolutely no reason not to go for it. Its one of those things that will get much more performant as software starts supporting AVX-512. Especially of interest to creators and people who work with a lot of data crunching. And a 2x faster GPU does not hurt also.

Thanks for that. Are the 8th Gen “bad” at moment? What about the Iris 645 graphics? I’m a little worried on what they can do? Don’t game apart from older ones rarely, but photo and hope to start video editing sometime, just iMovie, nothing serious.

Coming from an old iMac quad core 2.9GHz i5 turbo 3.6GHz with GeForce GT 650M, 1Tb fusion, I’m wondering if there is a step up with a 2019 MBP 13”.

I know there is generations between, but wonder how they would stack up. SSD, faster memory, newer generation CPU I’d imagine would help a lot? Just want to future proof as well as much as can....

 

[RyawesomeU13]

Ultimately the hard thing to know is what apple's roadmap looks like. Does ice-lake come to the current chassis or a whole new design? I'm thinking apple goes to arm chips in the next year or two on the smaller MacBooks so I'm kind of thinking that they MAY get ice lake then transition to arm after that. I'm really happy with my mbp13 1.4. Icelake would be a little better for graphics (doesn't affect what I do), but ultimately I think the next big leap will be arm in the next couple years. Hard to future-proof when the next few years may seem some pretty huge shifts.

 

[Howard2k]

What are the benefits? Haven’t looked into this but looking at MBP 13”.

Massive updates? Faster, presume, better battery life? Are they big updates over what is in MBP 13” now 8th Gen?

thanks

Intel reveals final details on Ice Lake mobile CPUs

Ice Lake boasts significant power savings and much-improved integrated devices.

arstechnica.com

The article seems to hint that there won't be huge CPU performance improvements. Although there are efficiencies with the newer architecture, the clock speeds are reduced.

Graphics should be a fairly decent improvement.

It will include Wifi6, which sounds good on paper, but whether it's an improvement will depend on the specific implementation. Apple set the bar pretty high with the initial 802.11ac (Wifi5) deployments but then dialled it back on some models and offered a slower implementation.

DDR4 too.