New 13" or old 13"

[Gidgidonihah]

I was planning on buying the new 13" MBP when it came out today, but now it has integrated graphics.

I'm a gamer, but I have my gaming PC for that. I would however want to occasionally use it to take to a lan party or something. Mostly it will be a typical office/home use laptop. I'm also a webdev and will multitask while hooked up to an external 24".

I have the option of buying the new 13" and dealing with the lower graphics card, or I can buy (for the same $1200) my coworkers 3 week old 13" MBP (that has the 320m GPU) that has an internal SSD for the OS + a regular HDD and applecare.

I'm not sure which I should go with. As I understand it, if I really wanted good quality games, I'd need to move up to the high-end 15" which is just too much money. Plus I want the smaller form factor.

Thoughts/suggestions?

 

[DarkVinda]

I've got the 2010 13" c2d 2.4 4gb 320m macbook pro and it does everything i want...

i can play wow on fair and it doesnt bother me at all...it plays cod in bootcamp fair enough.

i havent tried starcraft 2 yet - but will be doing just to see...

i use mine mainly for wow and for logic and dont have any issues at all with mine - im glad i didnt wait for the new 13" i5 or not...

i went from a late 2008 15" to 13" and dont regret it - the portability on this is awesome.

I was planning on buying the new 13" MBP when it came out today, but now it has integrated graphics.

I'm a gamer, but I have my gaming PC for that. I would however want to occasionally use it to take to a lan party or something. Mostly it will be a typical office/home use laptop. I'm also a webdev and will multitask while hooked up to an external 24".

I have the option of buying the new 13" and dealing with the lower graphics card, or I can buy (for the same $1200) my coworkers 3 week old 13" MBP (that has the 320m GPU) that has an internal SSD for the OS + a regular HDD and applecare.

I'm not sure which I should go with. As I understand it, if I really wanted good quality games, I'd need to move up to the high-end 15" which is just too much money. Plus I want the smaller form factor.

Thoughts/suggestions?

 

[RKilbane20]

I have a 2010 13inch Macbook Pro. I can play any valve game on max graphics, runs perfectly fine. I dual-boot Windows 7 to play StarCraft 2 because I can run it at a almost max settings. On OSX you can run on medium during campaign and high online idk why its so different. All other programs work fine on OSX. and the 2010 model has a 3-5 hour better battery.

 

[melterx12]

I have a 2010 13inch Macbook Pro. I can play any valve game on max graphics, runs perfectly fine. I dual-boot Windows 7 to play StarCraft 2 because I can run it at a almost max settings. On OSX you can run on medium during campaign and high online idk why its so different. All other programs work fine on OSX. and the 2010 model has a 3-5 hour better battery.

while I believe you are exaggerating when you claim the 2010 MBP can run any valve game on max graphics perfectly fine, I do agree that the 2010 MBP will run most games better than the 2011's intel graphics.

Also the battery life of the 2010 is probably only ~1.5-2 hours better than the 2011.

 

[RKilbane20]

while I believe you are exaggerating when you claim the 2010 MBP can run any valve game on max graphics perfectly fine, I do agree that the 2010 MBP will run most games better than the 2011's intel graphics.

Also the battery life of the 2010 is probably only ~1.5-2 hours better than the 2011.

I have CS:S, Half Life 2, ep 1, ep 2, portal, and team fortress all at max and they run completely fine, but you're, I must be lying, and for what reason? And for the battery, it was said to have a 10-12 hr battery life where the new one says 7 hr. Not like you would actually get 10-12 unless you have the brightness down and no wireless and doing nothing.

 

[DarkVinda]

in all fairness i've not tried many steam games at all only bootcamp for cod4 cos my mate bought it me when it was on offer!!!

i love mine - does what i want when i want.

what type of games you after playing???

i've currently got wow itunes safari open and still hitting 75+ FPS on fair settings on wow!

also what else you gonna be running...????

 

[Gidgidonihah]

Like I said, the main use for this machine isn't gaming, it's an all around the house, random job computer. I will do coding on it, wife does who knows what (itunes, web, IM and a ton other programs since she never closes anything).
I would just like the option to play some games if i happen to take it to a lan (we're talking maybe once or twice a year here).

Anyone think the new processor is worth upgrading for?

Oh, I forgot to mention, the main game I play is L4D2. I installed and ran it on the 2010 MBP and raised all the settings. It ran at about 12-20 fps. Lower settings, obviously would do better.

 

[mashsensor]

Like I said, the main use for this machine isn't gaming, it's an all around the house, random job computer. I will do coding on it, wife does who knows what (itunes, web, IM and a ton other programs since she never closes anything).
I would just like the option to play some games if i happen to take it to a lan (we're talking maybe once or twice a year here).

Anyone think the new processor is worth upgrading for?

Oh, I forgot to mention, the main game I play is L4D2. I installed and ran it on the 2010 MBP and raised all the settings. It ran at about 12-20 fps. Lower settings, obviously would do better.

I am a gamer also, got the 13 incher today, i am sure it can handle some light gaming fine, but i didnt get it for games. Not to mention I rather play games on my ps3 anyways. I have a AMD 6 core desktop with 6850 card that can handle anything I throw at it The cpu in the new 13 inch is ages better than the c2d.

 

[ender land]

Like I said, the main use for this machine isn't gaming, it's an all around the house, random job computer. I will do coding on it, wife does who knows what (itunes, web, IM and a ton other programs since she never closes anything).
I would just like the option to play some games if i happen to take it to a lan (we're talking maybe once or twice a year here).

Anyone think the new processor is worth upgrading for?

Your coworker computer will be much better for you. Maybe upgrade RAM to help your wife out But the SSD and applecare are worth several hundred easily.

Computers from 3 years ago could probably do what you are looking for too, perhaps excluding gaming.

 

[Gidgidonihah]

Your coworker computer will be much better for you. Maybe upgrade RAM to help your wife out But the SSD and applecare are worth several hundred easily.

Computers from 3 years ago could probably do what you are looking for too, perhaps excluding gaming.

I have a mid 2007 white macbook that is getting slow. Trying to get work on it is slightly frustrating as switching apps is time consuming. Upgraded to the most ram it could handle a year or 2 ago. I was also thinking of spending the ~$200 and swapping out the optical drive for a small SSD to run the OS. Then I could hold off on buying a new laptop for another year and spend my money on an ipad come april.

 

[MagicBoy]

Also the battery life of the 2010 is probably only ~1.5-2 hours better than the 2011.

Apple have changed the way they measure battery life. The stated results for the 2011 will now be lower and more representative. I wouldn't expect much difference from the 2010 in real world use.