rMBP or Refurb Air+ Refurb iMac?

[Klae17]

Hello! Should I get the Retina MacBook Pro

or

a Macbook Air (256 Drive, 1.8, Intel 3000) and an iMac 500 gb, 4 gb ram, 512 graphics.

Basically, I love the light weight of the Air and it would be nice to have a computer at home for the Apple TV streaming and doing Photoshop, Logic Pro, and Final Cut because of the big screen. I can also wait for the refresh of the iMac.

The Retina MBP will be less expensive, and probably light enough to lug around.

Advantages and disadvantages of the choices?

 

[hafr]

Hello! Should I get the Retina MacBook Pro

or

a Macbook Air (256 Drive, 1.8, Intel 3000) and an iMac 500 gb, 4 gb ram, 512 graphics.

Basically, I love the light weight of the Air and it would be nice to have a computer at home for the Apple TV streaming and doing Photoshop, Logic Pro, and Final Cut because of the big screen. I can also wait for the refresh of the iMac.

The Retina MBP will be less expensive, and probably light enough to lug around.

Advantages and disadvantages of the choices?

Based on what you're saying, I would go for the MBA + iMac if I could afford it. I have only a laptop, and I think it's annoying having to take it out when I get home, plug it in, have a small screen when sitting by the desk, and before i jailbroke the ATV2 I had to make sure it was always plugged in and no one could use the ATV2 when I was away.

I would absolutely love being able to trade my MBP for an MBA and an iMac, it'd make my day to day dealings with the computer and ATV2 so much smoother. I can't even count the number of times I've gone to bed just to realise that the computer is in the bag and I have to get up, get it out and plug it in to watch a movie...

 

[RedCroissant]

Hello! Should I get the Retina MacBook Pro

or

a Macbook Air (256 Drive, 1.8, Intel 3000) and an iMac 500 gb, 4 gb ram, 512 graphics.

Basically, I love the light weight of the Air and it would be nice to have a computer at home for the Apple TV streaming and doing Photoshop, Logic Pro, and Final Cut because of the big screen. I can also wait for the refresh of the iMac.

The Retina MBP will be less expensive, and probably light enough to lug around.

Advantages and disadvantages of the choices?

I agree with Hafr. I have an iMac that was my primary media hub(before I sold my iPad2 and AppleTV2) and is now both my computer and my TV. I would definitely go with the dual computer setup.

 

[Klae17]

I agree with Hafr. I have an iMac that was my primary media hub(before I sold my iPad2 and AppleTV2) and is now both my computer and my TV. I would definitely go with the dual computer setup.

Should I get the refurbs now for the iMac, or wait for the new ones to be released? I'm thinking the new ones will lack CD Drive, have USB 3, and not much more (maybe retina?). The other reason is the older model might drop down in price as well (How much of a drop though?)

Other question, If I connect a firewire 2 TB drive to the iMac and have it running all the time for movies and etc (I have more than 500 gb worth of media), would that damage the drive faster? I just don't want to be plugging in and out just to scan for a movie.

Is there a better place to get Refurbs than the Apple Store?

BTW thanks for all the advice.

 

[RedCroissant]

Should I get the refurbs now for the iMac, or wait for the new ones to be released? I'm thinking the new ones will lack CD Drive, have USB 3, and not much more (maybe retina?). The other reason is the older model might drop down in price as well (How much of a drop though?)

Other question, If I connect a firewire 2 TB drive to the iMac and have it running all the time for movies and etc (I have more than 500 gb worth of media), would that damage the drive faster? I just don't want to be plugging in and out just to scan for a movie.

Is there a better place to get Refurbs than the Apple Store?

BTW thanks for all the advice.

I would get the refurbs now as opposed to later. There's a 21.5 iMac quad-core i5 for 999 that should be more than adequate for your needs. I had my 1TB WD MyBook edition plugged in continuously for over 2 years with no ill effects on the drive. If I were you though, I would consider upgrading the HDD at some point. I put a 3TB seagate barracuda in mine and now I don't need externals. I even have it in sleep mode a lot and set it to wake for network access. It's nice.

I honestly don't think they'll be getting rid of the ODD yet for their desktops(especially since they seem to moving toward a merging of the MacPro and iMac lines).

 

[Spink10]

Be a little while until the 2012 refurb iMac comes out - couple months at the minimum after the release - which is happening...hmm...i dont know.