Hey guys, I'm new to posting here but have lurked the boards on and off for a few years and I'm in search of some advice!
About three years ago, I bought a 15" Macbook Pro 2.4GHz Core 2 Duo. It was one of the last non-unibody Macbook Pros my local store sold and as I've come into a reasonable amount of money I'm considering an upgrade.
The mac is currently out of warranty, but has had the battery, keyboard, top case and logic board all replaced by Apple free of charge, so I still get a good 3.5hrs out of the battery and everything runs just fine and dandy but I'm thinking about getting something a little speedier.
I use the mac for word processing, light work on Photoshop, iPhoto, standard iTunes and web chilling and a decent amount of casual gaming. My computer has no problems running the games I play with the exception of hosting Minecraft games for my friends and I when it occasionally stutters a little during high-intensity moments such as lots of TNT exploding simultaneously, and on WoW when I'm playing my mage and a lot of AoE spells are being exploded all over the place.
I'm looking at getting the current i7 15" model with the 1680x1050 glossy screen as I'm not looking for enhanced portability but I'm wondering would it be a more sensible option to simply upgrade the RAM on this beast to 6GB from its current 2GB and perhaps swap my HDD for an SSD? Obviously the RAM and Drive upgrade will be far cheaper than a new laptop, but I am eligible for student discount including massive reductions on Applecare so the laptop will cost me somewhere in the region of £1400 which is affordable. I am only slightly hesitant as I got 5 years out of the powerbook I had before this and think it would be better to hold off upgrading for another year and buy the equivalent of what I want now. What do you think?
Thanks in advance!
TLDR: Thinking of upgrading from 2.4ghz mbp bought just before unibody came out, sometime stutters a little during heavy gaming and would like a new one but wondering if it's more sensible to upgrade the RAM instead and perhaps swap an SSD into it.
About three years ago, I bought a 15" Macbook Pro 2.4GHz Core 2 Duo. It was one of the last non-unibody Macbook Pros my local store sold and as I've come into a reasonable amount of money I'm considering an upgrade.
The mac is currently out of warranty, but has had the battery, keyboard, top case and logic board all replaced by Apple free of charge, so I still get a good 3.5hrs out of the battery and everything runs just fine and dandy but I'm thinking about getting something a little speedier.
I use the mac for word processing, light work on Photoshop, iPhoto, standard iTunes and web chilling and a decent amount of casual gaming. My computer has no problems running the games I play with the exception of hosting Minecraft games for my friends and I when it occasionally stutters a little during high-intensity moments such as lots of TNT exploding simultaneously, and on WoW when I'm playing my mage and a lot of AoE spells are being exploded all over the place.
I'm looking at getting the current i7 15" model with the 1680x1050 glossy screen as I'm not looking for enhanced portability but I'm wondering would it be a more sensible option to simply upgrade the RAM on this beast to 6GB from its current 2GB and perhaps swap my HDD for an SSD? Obviously the RAM and Drive upgrade will be far cheaper than a new laptop, but I am eligible for student discount including massive reductions on Applecare so the laptop will cost me somewhere in the region of £1400 which is affordable. I am only slightly hesitant as I got 5 years out of the powerbook I had before this and think it would be better to hold off upgrading for another year and buy the equivalent of what I want now. What do you think?
Thanks in advance!

TLDR: Thinking of upgrading from 2.4ghz mbp bought just before unibody came out, sometime stutters a little during heavy gaming and would like a new one but wondering if it's more sensible to upgrade the RAM instead and perhaps swap an SSD into it.