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Ugh! I cannot decide! Please help, 2.4 or 2.5?

Bootsie

Bootsie

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Jan 23, 2008
628
36
Utah
I am planning on buying a new MBP, and making the switch from windows, I am very excited.

But I cannot decide if I should go for the 2.4 or 2.5, money is not a huge issues, I just want to get the most for the money that I do spend. I will be getting the free iPod and printer, and selling my old windows machine to help a little.

These are the things I will be using it for...

Lots of internt browsing
Email
Lots of streaming video (I don't have Tivo, so I watch a lot of TV online)
Photo processing (a few hundred shots per week, usually shot in RAW)
Some video editing.
Some sound editing.
A few games, nothing very GPU intensive though. (maybe Guitar Hero)
Using iTunes (syncing iPod and iPhone ect.)
Sometimes I have 4 or 5 of these things going on at once.

I would definitely buy the 2.5, if I knew that it would make a significant difference in the things that I will be using it for, but I just can't figure out if it is going to.

I am also trying to determine if I should just buy it now, or wait for a few more weeks to see if there is an update, I am so sick of trying to decide, I just want to make the decision, and enjoy my MBP, but unfortunatly my mind doesn't work that way, I have to think through things way to much ha ha.
Please help!
 
Just get the 2.5ghz otherwise you'll regret it later down the road when you have the 2.4ghz. It's true that the difference is small but it's knowing that you could have had an extra 100mhz, double the L2 cache (6mb vs 3mb on the 2.4) and double the video ram (512mb vs 256mb on the 2.4ghz).
 
Tallest Skil said:
You won't notice it. You'll notice RAM more.
Click to expand...

I agree. Buy the 2.4 and use the money saved to buy 4 GB of ram from Newegg. The difference between 2.4 and 2.5 is virtually unnoticeable. However having an additional 2GB of RAM when it comes to photo processing and running multiple programs will make a noticeable difference.
 
there's a little bit of apples to oranges in this link:
http://barefeats.com/mbpp01.html

but it does show you the (minor) difference between the 2.4 and the 2.6.

(btw I'm in the same boat re: choice - and i cant decide either...that's a heckuva premium for a few seconds less in rendering or a few more fps in a game).

i think I've settled on the 2.4, and sell my ipod touch to pay for applecare.
 
Bootsie said:
I am planning on buying a new MBP, and making the switch from windows, I am very excited.

But I cannot decide if I should go for the 2.4 or 2.5, money is not a huge issues, I just want to get the most for the money that I do spend. I will be getting the free iPod and printer, and selling my old windows machine to help a little.
Click to expand...

If money is not a problem: 2.5 MacBook Pro
If money is a problem: Black MacBook
 
Jurwin said:
Just get the 2.5ghz otherwise you'll regret it later down the road when you have the 2.4ghz. It's true that the difference is small but it's knowing that you could have had an extra 100mhz, double the L2 cache (6mb vs 3mb on the 2.5) and double the video ram (512mb vs 256 on the 2.4ghz).
Click to expand...

He's right. You say money isn't really an issue, then go with the 2.5. The 512 mb vram is worth it if you have the money.
 
Get the faster one! It's not a fortune. You can't upgrade the cpu at a later date so get the best you can now.
 
Tallest Skil said:
You won't notice it. You'll notice RAM more.
Click to expand...
What are you smoking???

He wants to do photo editing, some video editing, and some sound editing - going from the 2.4 to the 2.5 means the L2 cache is doubled from 3MB to 6MB - that's going to make a *big* difference for these types of tasks.

For only $500 more you get twice the video memory (512 MB vs. 256 MB), twice the CPU cache (6 MB vs. 3 MB), larger hard drive, and small jump in CPU clock (2.5 vs. 2.4). IMO it's silly not to get the 2.5.

DDR2 ram is so cheap these days why would it even be a consideration?? :confused:
 
the barefeats tests dont show a huge difference based on cache size...(although it does make a small difference, as evidenced by the SR 2.4 being faster than the Penryn 2.4 in a few of the tasks.

I'd like to see some tests that show why this is such a big deal...and for some of y'all - there is a middle ground between money is no object, and trying to buy the best computer for the money...esp if dedicated graphics are a must...
 
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