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The 13" MBP isn't really "pro?"

axu539 said:
I would disagree that you need more than 256 GB for all professional work. In fact, I would highly recommend against sticking a 1 TB spinning disk drive in notebooks, since it's just dangerous to be carrying that much data around in a mobile machine (my 1 TB drive failed after 3 months, just taking the machine to class and using it normally, no physical drops or anything). It's too easily damaged or lost. I'd see having a large Thunderbolt RAID drive at a workstation, and a good 512 GB as the storage in the computer. After all, you really only need your working files with you at any point. I will wholeheartedly agree that pretty much any professional computer use definitely will need as much RAM as possible, and dGPU is overrated unless you are specifically a graphics professional.
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Its quite easy to need way more than 256gb in a portable machine, of short term scratch disk.

If you work with VMs a lot, or work with video (hell, even photos) you need lots of storage.

No, leaving it on your laptop un-backed up is not a good idea.

But SSDs simply are not big enough for the money just yet. I'm not saying you'll need the full 1tb of storage to actually use. But it will give you plenty of room for snapshots, and bigger drives are faster than smaller ones due to the potential to short stroke them.
 
throAU said:
Its quite easy to need way more than 256gb in a portable machine, of short term scratch disk.

If you work with VMs a lot, or work with video (hell, even photos) you need lots of storage.

No, leaving it on your laptop un-backed up is not a good idea.

But SSDs simply are not big enough for the money just yet. I'm not saying you'll need the full 1tb of storage to actually use. But it will give you plenty of room for snapshots, and bigger drives are faster than smaller ones due to the potential to short stroke them.
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Fair enough. The more space, the better, always, but I just think that many people (even professionals) would be perfectly satisfied with 256 GB. Either way, I'm not trying to argue with you. Just saying 256 is often passable, but 512+ is always nice, and sometimes required.
 
I bought the 13" MBP (the 2.9 GHz i7 version) for the following reasons:

1. 15" is just too much heft to carry around... what's the point of a portable computer if you don't want to lug the thing around?

2. I DO use the optical drive... I am in the Navy and that means going to sea. I bring DVDs with me, and watch them in my bunk. Sure I could download tons of movies before I left, but I don't like doing that... downloading is time consuming and the ships / subs usually have a DVD Library that you can borrow movies from. An external optical drive wouldn't be ideal when on battery power in your bunk

3. Contrary to popular belief, you can do graphics on the 13" MBP. I am graphic artist and photographer in my spare time outside my Navy career. I use Adobe CS5 often!

4. Contrary to popular belief LOTS of people DO upgrade their MBP on their own! It's not rocket science! I changed out my hard drive to the Momentus XT and got win/win with loads of storage but also near SSD speeds due to it being a hybrid drive. In my older 13" MBP I also upgraded the RAM on my own. I may upgrade this to 16 Gb in the near future (if I deem that it will make any performance enhancements at all)

5. Colour Gamut... I DO notice the difference between MBA and MBP. And being a graphic artist I want the best colour reproduction. I can do without a few extra pixels worth of resolution that would only serve to squish the text smaller anyway.

6. I just don't like typing on the MBA. Its too thin... I feel like i have to almost invert my wrist to type with a MBA on my lap... MBP has that little bit extra thickness and just feels better for typing (of course I realize this is personal preference) I also don't like the contoured lower body of the MBA further enhancing the weird typing position.
 
I can afford a rmbp, but I don't need it; so I bought a mbp mid 2012 13'; it's enough "pro" for me.
 
Synergie said:
2. I DO use the optical drive... I am in the Navy and that means going to sea. I bring DVDs with me, and watch them in my bunk. Sure I could download tons of movies before I left, but I don't like doing that... downloading is time consuming and the ships / subs usually have a DVD Library that you can borrow movies from. An external optical drive wouldn't be ideal when on battery power in your bunk
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In your shoes, I'd probably rip a bunch of movies from the discs to the harddrive and watch them from there. A lot less power will be required to play them at that point. That's what I do whenever I travel anywhere.

Synergie said:
5. Colour Gamut... I DO notice the difference between MBA and MBP. And being a graphic artist I want the best colour reproduction. I can do without a few extra pixels worth of resolution that would only serve to squish the text smaller anyway.
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I have not had a chance to compare the MBA screen to the 13" MBP screen... but at that point wouldn't you be better off with an rMBP? IPS >> TN for color reproduction, period. Weighs the same as a 13" MBP too. Though I don't even know how much a high end 13" costs, so I'm not sure how much extra you'd have to pay to go w/ the rMBP

Just my $.02
 
terraphantm said:
In your shoes, I'd probably rip a bunch of movies from the discs to the harddrive and watch them from there. A lot less power will be required to play them at that point. That's what I do whenever I travel anywhere.



I have not had a chance to compare the MBA screen to the 13" MBP screen... but at that point wouldn't you be better off with an rMBP? IPS >> TN for color reproduction, period. Weighs the same as a 13" MBP too. Though I don't even know how much a high end 13" costs, so I'm not sure how much extra you'd have to pay to go w/ the rMBP

Just my $.02
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If I had over 2000.00 to drop on a laptop (not every Apple owner is rich)... plus its still too big. I like the weight AND size of the 13"

btw rmbp base model costs 700.00 more before taxes than the high end 13" mbp

Oh and ref ripping... it takes time to rip DVDs... cant be bothered... its too time consuming plus if the boat had one that I didnt have I can watch it with an optical drive (or rip it while plugged in and watch it off my drive then delete it later if I want)
 
axu539 said:
In all fairness, equally specced (with SSD), the Pro isn't that much cheaper.
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And that there is the crux. Some people don't want or need the SSD. Most of us MR users are not a good sample of the population because we are more technologically inclined, while a lot of Mac users are just happy to be using a Mac, and the cheapest one at that.
 
Dangerous Theory said:
And that there is the crux. Some people don't want or need the SSD. Most of us MR users are not a good sample of the population because we are more technologically inclined, while a lot of Mac users are just happy to be using a Mac, and the cheapest one at that.
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Most people probably won't know the diff between normal hdd and flash storage and look at just the raw numbers. I know I initially baulked at the air's 64 gb storage, but later understood that the price was due to their high costs. :p
 
T5BRICK said:
I skimmed through the thread and I don't think this has been said.

The equipment doesn't make the user "pro." The user makes the equipment "pro." A professional photographer doesn't always take his best pictures with a $5000 DSLR, sometimes a camera phone will do the trick. On the other hand, a high end tool is nothing if the user lacks the experience to correctly use it.

Pro is just a bit of marketing, just like "turbo-boost" on the current Intel CPUs(i.e. the chips don't really have turbos.)
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That's like saying that if you are really smart, you shouldn't need to study ever.

You don't hear people say what you say more often because such quotes are utter ********. Skill and equipment are not mutually exclusive; very often, the quality of one's output is the result of an amalgamation between his skill and equipment.

All other things equal, the man with the better tools has the resources to do a better job. Take 2 photographers of equal skill, give one the $5000 DLSR and the other an iphone 4s. Under the same conditions, the former will take better quality photos every time.

The idea behind the "pro" tag is that Apple recognises that such professionals tend to use software that is more demanding, and thus designs hardware specifically to support those software. It shouldn't be an empty marketing term.

Currently, the 15" pros can still do justice to the "pro" tag; I can't really say the same for the 13" version though. :(
 
I'd imagine they know it's not really pro. Didnt they mention that they're in the process of restructuring the Macbook line? The pros will be more pro once they add in the retina and get them slimmed down to the new form factor.
 
Abazigal said:
That's like saying that if you are really smart, you shouldn't need to study ever.
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No, that isn't what I said at all.

You don't hear people say what you say more often because such quotes are utter ********. Skill and equipment are not mutually exclusive; very often, the quality of one's output is the result of an amalgamation between his skill and equipment.
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I've heard plenty of people say what I've said. Ansel Adams, arguably one of the best nature photographers once said: "The single most important component of a camera is the twelve inches behind it." He took some amazing pictures with equipment that is now 60-70 years old, and had no MacBook Pro or Photoshop to touch up his work.

"Pro" doesn't mean anything if you don't know how to use it. In the case of Apple(and a lot of other companies), "Pro" is just a marketing term.
 
There are obviously different types of uses that all pros will put their machines to, but the 13" doesn't cut it for video/motion graphics stuff, which is what I do (still a student, but you get the picture). There's not really enough screen real estate even on my 15 incher--I'm constantly having to resize panels in After Effects and Cinema 4D just to see what I'm doing, plus the lack of a discrete graphics card in the 13" makes it impractical for 3D program use. Yeah, hook it up to an external display, but that only solves one of the issues, and a good quality one is expensive. This is why my next machine will be a 27" iMac.
 
"the 13" MBP isn't really 'Pro' keeps coming up over and over again in Macrumors Forums and we keep responding. Heck, I'm responding. I don't care if the 13" MBP is pro or not. It's just a computer. It has a set of features. Better than some computers, worse than others. It's just a name. Let Apple name it the HAL9000... it won't make it any better or worse than it is now.
 
hellstorm12345 said:
What resolution were you playing at? Of course it's going to be unplayable if you are using 2880x1800.

Check out: http://www.notebookcheck.net/NVIDIA-GeForce-GT-650M.71887.0.html

The 650m can easily play on high on MW3 and Skyrim. It's equivalent to a GTX 560m in some 2011 Asus ROG gaming laptops. If overclocked, it can top even the 6970m in the 27 inch iMac. I would say for the thinness and weight of the Macbook Pro retinas, it is very impressive.
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Actually I hear that Skyrim gets ~25fps on Ultra settings on even 2880x1800...Unplayable on low seems veru unreasonable for a machine with specs like these.
 
rockoar said:
the 13'' mbp is considerably cheaper than the 13'' mba. What i don't like of the mba is its planned obsolescence smell, you're stuck with what you get at time of purchase and there's anything you can upgrade later on if you feel you need to. Plus, you have to spend a lot of money buying accessories for it. I will admit that its form factor and weight are very attractive but the 13'' mbp isn't ugly at all.
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+1
 
appletechpro said:
The definition of "pro" is relative. This thread is nonsense.
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Ha-ha, true :) What does pro in your user name means by the way? :)

I consider myself a pro because I use computer for my professional full time activities.

I do:
1. Some iOS (iPhone) development (natively on mac). Relatively easy task for the hardware.
2. Java Web development (natively on mac) - very memory and CPU intensive. Using memory swap is not an option.
3. Windows OS development (Virtual Box VM + MS Windows OS + MS Visual Studio) - relatively easy task as long as enough RAM is provided. Using memory swap is not an option.

I deal with video encoding, but that's home movies on occasion once or twice a year.

#1 is the reason why I need mac. Otherwise I could save lots of money and buy PC hardware with much more power. I'm also a little tired of Windows and want something different. Linux is not refined enough for me. I like Macbook design.

* Memory:
For my current tasks 4GB is just enough at the lower edge. I can do either #2 or #3, but not at the same time, as either of these tasks uses all memory. I did not buy more memory from Apple as it is cheaper to upgrade elsewhere. I will upgrade later, when 4GB will not be enough and I will know how much extra I need. I'm pretty sure at some point 8GB will not be enough. If I decide to work on #2 and #3 at the same time 8GB will be at the limit even today. And #2 and #3 grow in memory the more time you use them. (Air is a no go).

* CPU:
i5 has reasonable power. #2 builds around 2 times faster than my Macbook white Core 2 Duo 4GB does (which I still use as secondary dev. box). #3 builds slightly faster than HP Core 2 Duo laptop with Windows OS that I also have but would like to decommission and use single hardware. i7 would do better, but not enough to justify extra spending. And any CPU will get outdated soon, so no reason to pay big bucks for the top one. Also, Apple doesn't give us the best of i5 i7 anyways. (Air or Pro - are even here)

* Hard Disk:
#1-#3 does intensive and extensive disk input/output all the time, and I'm concerned regarding SSD longevity with its limited write cycles. Also, #3 takes a lot of disk space. (Pro wins over Air here). I do appreciate SSD's speed, but more importantly - mobility as there's no risk of loosing the information while using the laptop in the motion. I can install SSD if this becomes important (Pro wins again).

* Battery:
I do use the battery a lot, and ability to replace it makes lots of sense. (Air loses).

* Screen resolution:
Doesn't matter much as long as it's reasonable. Screen size plays bigger role. (Pro and Air are equivalent for me on this one)

For anything other than #1-#3, like web browsing, photo editing, document\spreadsheets and even video editing my MacBook white with Core 2 Duo does perfect job and I feel over-powered.
 
Honestly, if you're worrying about whether the machine is "pro enough" for you to deserve the label then please just buy the highest end Retina and be done with it. Anyone with half a brain and enough patience and information can figure out for themselves whether the 13" Pro is enough machine for themselves or not. I actually think assuming people who aren't computer experts are too stupid to do so is very insulting and contributes to the stereotype that computer geeks are arrogant jerks.

I just helped my wife through the process of deciding between a 13" Air and a 13" Pro. She is very representative of your average consumer, who generally knows how to use a computer but gets lost in the soup of specifications that get thrown around. Not once during her decision process did she even consider that the Pro would be too much or the Air not enough based on the "Pro" label. Her final decision was to go with the 13" Pro because she wants it to last at least 3 years, which is more likely since I can upgrade it for her down the road.
 
vladster said:
Ha-ha, true :) What does pro in your user name means by the way? :)
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It means a professional in the general sense of the word. :) I used to be ACMT certified, am proficient with Linux/Bash and tend to run multiple virtual machines and develop in PHP/Bash/Perl.

I believe the 13" Macbook Pro is "pro" in the sense that relative to the Macbook Air, it has more CPU power and upgradeability. I'm assuming that is the basis for Apple's "pro" label.
 
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