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Suggestions on purchase of Macbook Pro Retina 13

S

sachinwalia

macrumors member
Original poster
Feb 5, 2010
32
1
Bay Area, CA
I am planning to upgrade from 2012 Macbook Air 11" to 2014 Macbook Retina 13".

The models I am contemplating are (future proofing):

1. 2.6 GHz, 8GB Ram, 256 GB SSD - $1399 Adorama
2. 2.6 GHz, 16GB Ram, 128 GB SSD - $1449 Adorama
3. 2.6 GHz, 16GB Ram, 256 GB SSD - $1649 Adorama

My use case is coding in Java, light photo/video processing.

Please help me make a decision.

Also should I purchase apple care. Although my credit card offers one additional year of warranty.

thanks in advance.
 
Option one seems the most practical but if you delve deeper into photo processing you assuredly will want more than 8GB of RAM. To me, option two appeals more so than option one -- but I'd suspect option one to be the popular preference. My reasoning is if you run out of storage there are always external solutions; to the contrary, if you desire more RAM ... you're screwed.
 
For that use case??

Option one all the way for your stated usage.

If you think that is going to change anytime in the next couple of years then 16gb may be a thing worth thinking about, but unless it's lots of VM's or sonme serious video editing i wouldn't even consider it.
 
Even for light photo/video editing, 16gigs of RAM will come in handy. That will somewhat "future-proof" your investment
 
Thanks guys for your suggestions.

Option 3 - 256 GB SSD, 16 GB RAM seems to be best but the difference is $200 for just 128 GB SSD. It's a lot of money for little value in my opinion.

I am leaning towards 128 GB SSD, 16 GB RAM.

My typical upgrade cycle is ~2 years for a laptop.

This is the first time I am buying a retina mac. Can someone please let me know if there is any lag/slowness when used at 1920 x 1200 scaled resolution rather than 1280 x 800. Also does higher RAM help in reducing this lag?
 
sachinwalia said:
Thanks guys for your suggestions.

Option 3 - 256 GB SSD, 16 GB RAM seems to be best but the difference is $200 for just 128 GB SSD. It's a lot of money for little value in my opinion.

I am leaning towards 128 GB SSD, 16 GB RAM.

My typical upgrade cycle is ~2 years for a laptop.

This is the first time I am buying a retina mac. Can someone please let me know if there is any lag/slowness when used at 1920 x 1200 scaled resolution rather than 1280 x 800. Also does higher RAM help in reducing this lag?
Click to expand...

As far as I'm concerned, the maximum scaled resolution is 1680 x 1080. The 15" can do 1920 x 1200. I can't imagine more RAM would be any antidote for lag. Though, I've heard the choppiness which once beleaguered the Retina MacBooks has long been dealt with.
 
Option 1. Check out MacMall, too. I just bought one Sunday from MacMall, $1357 I think, out the door.
 
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