Replace my late-2008 MBP?

[FetalSage]

So I bought the first-gen Unibody MacBook Pros back in 2008. It's a 15" 2.53Ghz Core 2 Duo with 4gbs of Ram.

I've been thinking of getting a new MacBook Pro, also 15", with a nice Core i7 CPU. I'm unsure of when Apple will give it a nice update, so I'd like to hear your thoughts on whether I should hold on or just go for it?

 

[FetalSage]

Not a fan of bumping, but any advice? I've looked at the Buyer's Guide, but still not sure.

 

[alust2013]

Well, it's about mid-cycle right now, and the next update will likely either be minor or late, or a short lived model. Supposedly it will be redesigned, possibly as an update this fall, but I think more likely when Ivy bridge comes out, which won't be until early next year. I would either buy now or wait until Ivy bridge. If you like the current design and don't have a lot of heavy needs, now would be a good time to buy, or if your current computer does what you want it to and you'd like to see a redesign, then wait.

 

[Young Spade]

So I bought the first-gen Unibody MacBook Pros back in 2008. It's a 15" 2.53Ghz Core 2 Duo with 4gbs of Ram.

I've been thinking of getting a new MacBook Pro, also 15", with a nice Core i7 CPU. I'm unsure of when Apple will give it a nice update, so I'd like to hear your thoughts on whether I should hold on or just go for it?

Do you think you need a new machine? Since you are actually asking the question, I doubt you need to upgrade. My point is that if you needed the extra power, you would already know it.

Keep your machine for another year or two and wait until something a lot better comes out.

 

[Dark Void]

Why though? Your 2008 model still has a lot of life to it, no?

 

[FetalSage]

Why though? Your 2008 model still has a lot of life to it, no?

Honestly, it feels like it's on its last few breaths. It's slow, especially when I need to run a dev environment and photoshop.

It's also slow when it comes to gaming. With SC2 under Mac, it'll run fine for a few minutes then crawls to a few FPS and becomes unplayable.

 

[Dark Void]

How much storage space do you need at this point? How about getting a small SSD for 1/10 the cost of a new Mac? You could always use externals.

It will run you much less and it is a good investment because it is reusable hardware.

 

[greenchiliman]

Honestly, it feels like it's on its last few breaths. It's slow, especially when I need to run a dev environment and photoshop.

It's also slow when it comes to gaming. With SC2 under Mac, it'll run fine for a few minutes then crawls to a few FPS and becomes unplayable.

Looks like you did all the right stuff with the XT and RAM. You might be the 1 in 100 that could benefit from upgrading.

 

[uiop.]

We have the exact same model. Late 2008, 2.53gHz, 4GB RAM. I personally am asking myself what to do next year before I go to college. At this point I'm thinking I'm just going to hold on to it until it really dies. The design is still current, and it really performs well, especially now with Lion. Man what a difference that made..

Is your battery awful, like mine now is? I need to buy a replacement.

 

[DrivenDaily]

First, if your battery is awful go have it tested at an Apple Store if you get a chance. They replaced mine for free just this past May and it had over 300 cycles.

Second, although I feel the urge to go out and get something newer/faster I don't really think I need to at this point. The laptop runs like a champ with an SSD and if I need to do something cpu/gpu intensive I can just run it on my AMD X6 desktop. I'm not sure what sort of applications you run on a daily basis but I find it more than capable to run MATLAB, Pro/E, and Fluent in Win7 Bootcamp (MATLAB runs well in Mac as well). My biggest issues with it are that it doesn't have as stellar battery life as the new machines, the thermal characteristics could be better, and handbrake encoding takes forever (one of the reasons i built a desktop). The lack of an ExpressCard slot is also a bummer on the new 15 models but I guess Thunderbolt will fill that gap once the price of peripherals start to fall.

 

[uiop.]

First, if your battery is awful go have it tested at an Apple Store if you get a chance. They replaced mine for free just this past May and it had over 300 cycles.

One year warranty on the batteries too though, no? Its almost three years old and has 390 cycles. Yuck.

 

[solowmodel]

So I bought the first-gen Unibody MacBook Pros back in 2008. It's a 15" 2.53Ghz Core 2 Duo with 4gbs of Ram.

I've been thinking of getting a new MacBook Pro, also 15", with a nice Core i7 CPU. I'm unsure of when Apple will give it a nice update, so I'd like to hear your thoughts on whether I should hold on or just go for it?

I hace pretty much the exact same laptop as you. 2.53Ghz, 4Gb, 500Gb Momentus XT etc. Installed the new HDD several weeks ago, and it has kicked some life back into this laptop which previously felt as if it were on its last legs. I was thinking of selling this and buying a new computer this fall (iMac or MBP), but probably just going to wait until Ivy Bridge next year as I don't desperately need a new one now.

However, I do agree with an earlier post that Handbrake encoding takes forever One reason I'd love to get an i5/i7 now..