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Picked up new MacBook Pro 17 - £1699

J

joe2uk

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Oct 21, 2009
26
0
Hi all,

Just thought I would share this - I was able to pick up Macbook Pro 17 (2.4, 4GB, 750GB late 2011) model for £1699 at John Lewis.

Seemed like a very good deal (quoted saving of £500), plan to keep as main computer as my Mac Pro started to die at weekend and get RMBP in a few months.

I know a few people have mentioned the 17" as I read workhorse hoping that's true.

Have a got a good deal? ;)
 
Last edited:
joe2uk said:
Hi all,

Just thought I would share this - I was unable to pick up Macbook Pro 17 (2.4, 4GB, 750GB late 2011) model for £1699 at John Lewis.

Seemed like a very good deal (quoted saving of £500), plan to keep as main computer as my Mac Pro started to die at weekend and get RMBP in a few months.

I know a few people have mentioned the 17" as I read workhorse hoping that's true.

Have a got a good deal? ;)
Click to expand...

Unable to pick up Macbook Pro 17?? ;)
 
That is not bad, would have cost you a little more from apple
http://store.apple.com/uk/product/G0NG0B/A

Though do you really want a 17" + a MBP Retina?

I would have recommended you buy a 27" iMac for around the same price, that way you could also use it as a monitor for you Retina, and its got more grunt and storage then a 17"

The 17" is awesome, I love mine, though I would only have a 17" or a 15", Though i have a 17", I use my iMac 27 far more, the massive screen is awesome to work on when I am at home.

----------
daleski75 said:
Unable to pick up Macbook Pro 17?? ;)
Click to expand...

given the title of the thread, a spelling mistake I believe ;)
 
Thanks daleski75 / MH01 corrected.

I'm limited on desktop Mac MH01. Moving to Tokyo in few months so desktop is out of the question.

Most likely sell 17" once I get my RMBP unless I fall in love! ;) glad to hear you are happy with yours.
 
joe2uk said:
Thanks daleski75 / MH01 corrected.

I'm limited on desktop Mac MH01. Moving to Tokyo in few months so desktop is out of the question.

Most likely sell 17" once I get my RMBP unless I fall in love! ;) glad to hear you are happy with yours.
Click to expand...

Good price for your 17" and would it be cheaper to get a RMBP over there if the exchange rate is any good?
 
joe2uk said:
Thanks daleski75 / MH01 corrected.

I'm limited on desktop Mac MH01. Moving to Tokyo in few months so desktop is out of the question.

Most likely sell 17" once I get my RMBP unless I fall in love! ;) glad to hear you are happy with yours.
Click to expand...

On a plus side, you got the last of the Apple 17" laptops ;) The flagship of the Apple range for so many decades. In some ways I still prefer it to the Retina, sure the new retina has a lovely screen, though nothing makes up for the actual physical real estate :). You can also seriously pimp it up, by replacing the optical drive and running 2x SSD :), also the Ram upgrade is damn cheap.

120 pounds gets you 16GB ram
http://www.crucial.com/uk/store/lis...Quad-Core i7 (17-inch DDR3) Late-2011&Cat=RAM.

Its a damn good laptop!
 
If exchange rate gets back to normal it will help the max saving is from sales tax (VAT) in Japan it's 5% which is huge saving over UK :p

MH01 - RAM is on my list for this weekend, what SSD have you got I was planning for 256GB model going to wait little hoping prices come down again.
 
joe2uk said:
If exchange rate gets back to normal it will help the max saving is from sales tax (VAT) in Japan it's 5% which is huge saving over UK :p

MH01 - RAM is on my list for this weekend, what SSD have you got I was planning for 256GB model going to wait little hoping prices come down again.
Click to expand...

You cannot go wrong with the Samsung 830s. Its what apple uses as thier SSDs, very reliable.

And the prices have dropped recently. Few months back they were around 220mark, now 145 :), which is good for 256GB.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Samsung-2-5...6VLS/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1340011414&sr=8-1
 
As an Amazon Associate, MacRumors earns a commission from qualifying purchases made through links in this post.
You can get the 2.5 from Apple refurb right now for only a little more, it's brand new stock too. I just got a 2.5 to replace my 2009 17".

The SSD I have is Crucial M4 512GB which I moved over from the old MBP. It's even faster in the new MBP because of SATA3. It's doing 256 MB/sec write and 512 MB/sec read according to this benchmark.

I know they say once you have an SSD you can never go back. Well it's true. I used my new 17" on the normal 7200RPM disk it came with for a couple of days, and it was not great. I'd forgotten how slow, noisy and hot the old disks were.
 
Thanks Steve good to know.

Ordered Samsung SSD and 16GB RAM to install this weekend, sounds like it will fly!
 
steve-p said:
You can get the 2.5 from Apple refurb right now for only a little more, it's brand new stock too. I just got a 2.5 to replace my 2009 17".

The SSD I have is Crucial M4 512GB which I moved over from the old MBP. It's even faster in the new MBP because of SATA3. It's doing 256 MB/sec write and 512 MB/sec read according to this benchmark.

I know they say once you have an SSD you can never go back. Well it's true. I used my new 17" on the normal 7200RPM disk it came with for a couple of days, and it was not great. I'd forgotten how slow, noisy and hot the old disks were.
Click to expand...

I was wondering if you could run geekbench? wondered what the 2.5 gets with a SSD.
 
MH01 said:
I was wondering if you could run geekbench? wondered what the 2.5 gets with a SSD.
Click to expand...

Geekbench doesn't test the disk at all. So its still just under 11,000 with the 32 bit tryout. It might be faster with 64 bit paid version or it might not make any difference, I'm not sure.
 
steve-p said:
Geekbench doesn't test the disk at all. So its still just under 11,000 with the 32 bit tryout. It might be faster with 64 bit paid version or it might not make any difference, I'm not sure.
Click to expand...

Thanks Steve. 11K for the 17" v about 12K for new retina's, the 17" at refurb prices looks like a good deal.
 
One thing I will say about it is that when maxing out the CPU for a few minutes at a time, it does get quite hot, particularly on the bottom towards the back. When this happens the fans sound like a 747 taking off, too. According to iStat the fans seem to have a higher top speed than the old one. So it is quite a lot noisier and hotter than the 2009 under sustained load. It's super fast though. On the plus side the CPU spends most of the time at 99% idle anyway.
 
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