Upgrade that old MBP or sell it and get a PC ?

[Antares23]

Hello guys !

So, I know It's a Mac forum, so the answers might be a bit biased in favor of staying on Mac BUT PLEASE HEAR ME OUT.

I don't really know what to do, so I have a Late 2013 MacBook Pro that's working fine, except the battery that is dying and the SSD that is the base 128GB (which uses the SATA protocol instead of the NVMe one, topping at 540MB/s read and 211MB/s write)
And I've had quite some issues, obviously the battery (which is a 1411 cycles), the mac shutting down when the battery is at 80% but that's to be expected and the small SSD which (I think) is causing slowdown using it (I've kept it on Catalina because Big Sur is unbreably slow) and it's just too slow, I'm a DJ, I use Serato and I have a 150GB sound library that I need on it. (actually it's really 250GB but the tracks/styles I really play the most is 150GB)

I try to keep as much on it as possible (since I don't have a external HDD, and overall I just prefer having everything on the internal storage, because you can forget your drive when you're going on a gig, people can steal in it parties, or it can fall and break, basically all of them already happened to me), which leave me with like 4GB free on it

So, I was thinking about upgrading it.

Here's what I've seen:

For the storage, it would be 96€:

20€ for the M.2 adapter with the screwdriver

76€ for the Crucial P2 1TB NVMe SSD

And 110€ for the iFixit replacement battery with tools


Which is costing 206€ overall for the upgrade.

But, since I've already bought it for 380€ two years ago, I'm wondering if it's really worth it for a almost 10 years old that won't go past Catalina without being sluggish (and even then I don't like newer macOS but that's a matter of preferences)

And even then, I'm not sure the slowdown I experience will end after upgrading to a NVMe SSD (usually when browsing YouTube/Soundcloud and Spotify in the background in dualscreen on my TV when I have friends over)

Oh and one thing I kinda hate is that, I think the scaling option is fantastic on Retina display, I'm using the 1440x900 scaling, but I would really prefer to use the 1680x1050 one to have more screen space to work with, but it's pretty much unusable at that scale) and this is not an issue with the SSD, but just with the old Iris 5100 that can't handle it

Sure, the actual SSD is slow (see screenshot) but is that really why macOS is sluggish ? Maybe the poor entry level i5 is struggling to keep up

Because, for 300€ (the price I would've put on it+ the 100€ I would sell it for)I can get:

A ThinkPad T470s (i7 6600U/8GB RAM/256GB SSD) for 200€

A ThinkPad X280 (i5 7300U/8GB RAM/256GB SSD) for 300€

A Dell XPS 13 9350 (i5 6200U/8GB RAM/256GB SSD) for 250€


Sure I would've liked to stay on a Mac because of the overall package (built quality, Retina screen, and fantastic trackpad)

But I'm doing just fine with iCloud Drive integration on my Windows desktop for swapping files between my MacBook, desktop and iPhone.

And a decent Windows laptop (ThinkPad/XPS, not crappy ones) with more powerful hardware might just serves me as well (especially since I've kinda been swapping OS a lot on my MacBook, alterning from macOS to various Linux distros)

Considering I would sell it as is for 100€ to a friend that hasn't got that much money and really needs a computer to use at home (she only have her phone, that's it, no computer, no tablet or anything) which I think it's a correct price (mind that the price of used Mac really ain't as low here in France than they are in the US)

Sooo yeah. I'm wondering what would y'all do ? Worth spending 200€ on a +9 years old entry level MBP or better off selling it and get a more powerful Windows PC

(And no, I really can't spend more than 300€, times are tough and I would really only have 300€ to spend)

Sorry if that was a lot to read for not much but I wanted to give you all of the informations and explain my reasoning

Thanks everybody.

 

[Burnincoco]

I can tolerate Windows, but I can’t live with it.

I moved from Win 3.0 to Mac OS9 and never looked back.
Do what feels right and you can live with.

 

[Antares23]

I can tolerate Windows, but I can’t live with it.

I moved from Win 3.0 to Mac OS9 and never looked back.
Do what feels right and you can live with.

Well, in a sense that's was pretty much the same, but I've found myself enjoying Windows more on the desktop lately, but macOS still have an overall much better experience on the laptop

 

[Macky-Mac]

regarding your estimate of the costs, you should also consider prices for software that you'll have to get for windows.

 

[FreakinEurekan]

I also don’t use Windows unless ABSOLUTELY necessary. My wife, for example, must use Windows for her job so we got her a Windows laptop. But… €300 isn’t much for a recent Mac, of course.

The risk with upgrading, is either causing some damage in the process -or- just the random luck of some 10-year-old component dying. Spending €206 will buy you some substantial upgrades in usability, but with damage or a failure you could end up with no Mac at all. Do you have a “Plan B” if that happens? If that would be a truly devastating thing - I’d suggest going to Windows at that price.

If you’d just “Rather not” spend more than €300 - but in the event of a failure, you could - then the upgrade makes sense.

 

[MikeG17901]

1) Get new battery on ebay (very easy to change)
2) The SSD is not hard to change, but there are all sorts of issues even with compatible m.2 SSDs, such as sleep issues and boot issues.
3) Instead of the SSD change, research "Opencore Legacy Patcher" and read about it. it allows you to install any newer Mac OS, such as Mac OS Ventura. I have Ventura running on a 2014 iMac, and it nearly runs perfectly and is much faster than the native maximum OS (Catalina).

 

[Antares23]

regarding your estimate of the costs, you should also consider prices for software that you'll have to get for windows.

Wouldn't have to pay anything, Windows is basically free nowadays, and I pay a Serato subscription at 10 bucks a month, I can download it for whatever platform it is available from, the rest is free, or can be

I also don’t use Windows unless ABSOLUTELY necessary. My wife, for example, must use Windows for her job so we got her a Windows laptop. But… €300 isn’t much for a recent Mac, of course.

The risk with upgrading, is either causing some damage in the process -or- just the random luck of some 10-year-old component dying. Spending €206 will buy you some substantial upgrades in usability, but with damage or a failure you could end up with no Mac at all. Do you have a “Plan B” if that happens? If that would be a truly devastating thing - I’d suggest going to Windows at that price.

If you’d just “Rather not” spend more than €300 - but in the event of a failure, you could - then the upgrade makes sense.

I used to do that too, but I guess that's because my hackintosh experience wasn't all that flawless.
Yeah absolutely, that's the thing, If I had more to spent, I would've got a used M1 MacBook Pro, or a 2015 Retina.
Absolutely. Well.. If this should ever happen well.. All my important stuff is saved to iCloud and to my hdd in my desktop. And until I can afford another computer, I would just stick to my desktop and won't go on gigs for a while, or ask to use the laptop of the people who organizes the party, usually I can manage to find somebody using Serato.
But obviously, all of that is not ideal.
It's not that I'd rather not spend more than 300€, it's that I can't

 

[Antares23]

1) Get new battery on ebay (very easy to change)
2) The SSD is not hard to change, but there are all sorts of issues even with compatible m.2 SSDs, such as sleep issues and boot issues.
3) Instead of the SSD change, research "Opencore Legacy Patcher" and read about it. it allows you to install any newer Mac OS, such as Mac OS Ventura. I have Ventura running on a 2014 iMac, and it nearly runs perfectly and is much faster than the native maximum OS (Catalina).

1) The question is can I trust eBay seller on that one ? And will it be substantially cheaper than buying one from iFixit ?
plus it comes with every tools, glue remover, new glew needed ect.

2) I know it's really not hard, that's why I would upgrade the SSD at the same time as I would change the battery
3) I'll give it a try but would it really help ? Catalina is okay-ish but Big Sur is absolutely unusable, and to be honest, I really hate how new macOS looks, I think it's ugly as hell

 

[v0lume4]

I might can offer some food for thought as I recently purchased a new laptop after using my mid-2010 MacBook Pro as my daily for twelve years. My MBP shipped with a spinning HDD and 4GB of RAM.

Off the top, let's address the macOS sluggishness. I don't believe it's going to get any better. Why do I say that? My MacBook became a paperweight after I updated it to either 10.12 or 10.13 (I can't remember what it's running). It was fine before the update. Afterwards, it would routinely freeze to the point that I would have to hard reset the computer with the power button. Quick aside -- when you see me appearing very salty in other threads when macOS and iOS updates are discussed, now you know one of the reasons why. But I digress. As a last resort, I opened it up and upgraded it to 8GB of RAM and a SATA SSD. I also changed out the battery. Lo and behold, the computer was functional again. And it served me well. But it was still sluggish. The problem, I believe, ultimately comes down to the dated CPU, slower RAM, and whatever Apple is doing behind the scenes to intentionally or maybe-not-intentionally sabotage performance on older machines.

You mention upgrading to an NVMe SSD. Unfortunately, I believe you'll still be capped at SATA speeds. If that adapter is nothing more than a SATA to NVMe interface, you'll still going to be capped at the slowest end of the two interfaces -- SATA. [EDIT - Hello! I did some research and didn't realize those MacBook Pros used a proprietary slot (utilizing PCIe) for their SSD's -- the interface is faster than SATA, but they're still not the speeds of modern drives. I still don't think the drive upgrade will solve the inherent sluggishness problem. HOWEVER, having a full drive will certainly slow down your computer, and that is what you said was the case in your OP.]

So where does that leave you? This is the part of the conversation that I will have to separate myself from, because I don't know what your needs are or what your financial situation is. I also see the machines you're looking at and, having not used those, I can't tell you how they will perform. What I can tell you is what I purchased:

After realizing that the current Mac offerings didn't suit me like the Macs of yore did, I purchased this machine. I paid $540 USD for it, open-box from Best Buy. It runs Windows which I happen to be quite fond of (Windows 11 is sorta meh compared to 10, but I digress). Only 8GB of RAM which, while not ideal, I can get by with. I swapped out the 256GB SSD for a 1TB SSD (NVMe) for like $115 (take that, Apple!). The every day office tasks I use this machine for are relatively instant. Night and day difference when compared to my old MacBook. Not to mention, I can actually watch 60FPS YouTube videos (that's correct -- my MacBook was so old that it lacked the hardware acceleration for the newer video codecs). I can also play some older/less demanding games on it, so that's a plus. I'm personally very happy with my purchase and I can't really say that I miss macOS. Then again, I've always appreciated both OS's.

All of that said, I sadly cannot tell you what to do. I don't know if the machines you linked are good machines because I haven't used them. What I can tell you to look for in a new machine is this, because these are big user experience factors that you don't consider until you're using the machine: make sure the screen is good and make sure the trackpad is good (read: uses Windows precision drivers and is a glass trackpad).

If I can answer anything else for you, please let me know. Sorry that I couldn't really give you advice. But I hope my experience offers something to ponder.

 

[one more]

If you are in France, you could also check BackMarket. You can find a reasonably decent second-hand MacBook there from 2015 for about 300€.

 

[Antares23]

I might can offer some food for thought as I recently purchased a new laptop after using my mid-2010 MacBook Pro as my daily for twelve years. My MBP shipped with a spinning HDD and 4GB of RAM.

Off the top, let's address the macOS sluggishness. I don't believe it's going to get any better. Why do I say that? My MacBook became a paperweight after I updated it to either 10.12 or 10.13 (I can't remember what it's running). It was fine before the update. Afterwards, it would routinely freeze to the point that I would have to hard reset the computer with the power button. Quick aside -- when you see me appearing very salty in other threads when macOS and iOS updates are discussed, now you know one of the reasons why. But I digress. As a last resort, I opened it up and upgraded it to 8GB of RAM and a SATA SSD. I also changed out the battery. Lo and behold, the computer was functional again. And it served me well. But it was still sluggish. The problem, I believe, ultimately comes down to the dated CPU, slower RAM, and whatever Apple is doing behind the scenes to intentionally or maybe-not-intentionally sabotage performance on older machines.

You mention upgrading to an NVMe SSD. Unfortunately, I believe you'll still be capped at SATA speeds. If that adapter is nothing more than a SATA to NVMe interface, you'll still going to be capped at the slowest end of the two interfaces -- SATA.

So where does that leave you? This is the part of the conversation that I will have to separate myself from, because I don't know what your needs are or what your financial situation is. I also see the machines you're looking at and, having not used those, I can't tell you how they will perform. What I can tell you is what I purchased:

After realizing that the current Mac offerings didn't suit me like the Macs of yore did, I purchased this machine. I paid $540 USD for it, open-box from Best Buy. It runs Windows which I happen to be quite fond of (Windows 11 is sorta meh compared to 10, but I digress). Only 8GB of RAM which, while not ideal, I can get by with. I swapped out the 256GB SSD for a 1TB SSD (NVMe) for like $115 (take that, Apple!). The every day office tasks I use this machine for are relatively instant. Night and day difference when compared to my old MacBook. Not to mention, I can actually watch 60FPS YouTube videos (that's correct -- my MacBook was so old that it lacked the hardware acceleration for the newer video codecs). I can also play some older/less demanding games on it, so that's a plus. I'm personally very happy with my purchase and I can't really say that I miss macOS. Then again, I've always appreciated both OS's.

All of that said, I sadly cannot tell you what to do. I don't know if the machines you linked are good machines because I haven't used them. What I can tell you to look for in a new machine is this, because these are big user experience factors that you don't consider until you're using the machine: make sure the screen is good and make sure the trackpad is good (read: uses Windows precision drivers and is a glass trackpad).

If I can answer anything else for you, please let me know. Sorry that I couldn't really give you advice. But I hope my experience offers something to ponder.

Thanks for your answer and I'll try to reply kinda point by point.
I've had a Late 2012 13" in the past (well that's what I had before my Retina), I've upgraded it to 12GB of RAM and a SSD. And that thing worked so well on Catalina, It even was way faster than my Retina, even tho It was one generation late in terms of processor.
I agree with you on the update side of things. My Retina is unsuable on Big Sur, but is okay on Catalina, that's why I'm staying on it.

Well, the reasons why I'm talking about a NVMe SSD is because, these MacBook are compatible with PCIe ones, it's just that Apple used a low end model that used the SATA protocol for the 128GB model (see my screenshots, my SSD appears under the SATA categories, and there's nothing on the NVMe one), hence why I thought that maybe a PCIe once would put some punch back to it


Well, what I would usually do is, instead of buying a new laptop for 500/600 bucks, I would buy a used high end/professional one, like MacBooks, ThinkPad, XPS, ect, because these laptops are built with better materials, better screens, and overall made to last (off course, considering they were once like 2000$), and that's been true so far, my mom needed a new laptop for 400 bucks max, instead of getting whatever you could get new for 400 bucks, I've got her a refurbished Dell Latitude E7450. And that was the best solution, i5, 8GB RAM, PCIe 256GB SSD, 14" 1080 matte display and great keyboard, trackpad and battery
Usually she wouldn't asked me, and got whatever Lenovo or HP ****** low end laptop for the same price and that thing was a torture to use, built like a house of cards and died after a year and a half.

For what I need my laptop to do, well it isn't really that much for now, I use it to browse the web, listen to music, do some word processing/paper work, I mix with Serato and will soon compose music using FL Studio, and all of these doesn't need like a i7 or M1 to work.

Well, if they're good, I know they are, as I said, they were High ends business laptop that used to cost 2000 bucks or something
Exactly, hence why I've chosen these, all have 13" IPS 1080p displays, backlit keyboard, great glass trackpads (I know at least that the XPS one is, my moms Latitude trackpad is surprisingly good to use compared to what Windows laptop trackpads used to be like, XPS being higher end it should be even better or at least the same quality)

That was helpful thanks

 

[Antares23]

If you are in France, you could also check BackMarket. You can find a reasonably decent second-hand MacBook there from 2015 for about 300€.

362€ and that's with 128GB SSD, that's what I have in my MacBook and it's really too small, I could get by on a 256GB, 512 would be ideal.
And I really couldn't stretch the budget so far.
If I could spend more money, I would've got a 2015 13" with the i7 16GB of RAM and 512GB and that would be perfect really, but that's out of my price range.

 

[Unregistered 4U]

If selling it and getting a PC is actually an option, I’d say do it. Wider choice of configuration, wider selection of software, as long as there’s no need for macOS, there’s really not a need for a Mac.

 

[Antares23]

If selling it and getting a PC is actually an option, I’d say do it. Wider choice of configuration, wider selection of software, as long as there’s no need for macOS, there’s really not a need for a Mac.

The only reasons I was really staying on MacBooks was the overall package, built quality, trackpad quality, screen quality, backlit keyboard. It always felt better and more intuitive to use MacBook.
But I don't have any macOS specific application.
Sure being in the ecosystem is nice, everything works together nicely, but the only thing Apple thing I really rely on is iCloud Drive. Which is available on Windows.

 

[jongriff]

Tricky choice, all I can give you is my experience with my 2012 i5 iMac which has really struggled the past few years. I’ve upgraded the RAM to 24GB from 8GB and threw an old Intel SSD in it. It’s running a fresh Monterey install using OpenCore and it runs amazingly well (better than High Sierra I have as a dual boot IMO). Easily good enough as a primary computer, no spinning beachballs and multitasks fine.

 

[Unregistered 4U]

The only reasons I was really staying on MacBooks was the overall package, built quality, trackpad quality, screen quality, backlit keyboard. It always felt better and more intuitive using a MacBook.
But I don't have any macOS specific application.
Sure being in the ecosystem is nice, everything works together nicely, but the only thing Apple thing I really rely on is iCloud Drive. Which is available on Windows.

The build quality has increased on non-Macs. Some of them are fairly blatantly copying the MacBook “look”. Can’t say I blame them, it’s popular with a number of people.

Find a place that offers a return policy like Apple’s and give one a try. Heck, if you’ve got the patience, get a few, return them, get a feel for the ‘state of the art’ there and you may find something to like (and also, you’d be figuring out what RAM, GPU, STORAGE configurations FEEL like on Windows).

 

[Kashback]

Hello guys !

So, I know It's a Mac forum, so the answers might be a bit biased in favor of staying on Mac BUT PLEASE HEAR ME OUT.

I don't really know what to do, so I have a Late 2013 MacBook Pro that's working fine, except the battery that is dying and the SSD that is the base 128GB (which uses the SATA protocol instead of the NVMe one, topping at 540MB/s read and 211MB/s write)
And I've had quite some issues, obviously the battery (which is a 1411 cycles), the mac shutting down when the battery is at 80% but that's to be expected and the small SSD which (I think) is causing slowdown using it (I've kept it on Catalina because Big Sur is unbreably slow) and it's just too slow, I'm a DJ, I use Serato and I have a 150GB sound library that I need on it. (actually it's really 250GB but the tracks/styles I really play the most is 150GB)

I try to keep as much on it as possible (since I don't have a external HDD, and overall I just prefer having everything on the internal storage, because you can forget your drive when you're going on a gig, people can steal in it parties, or it can fall and break, basically all of them already happened to me), which leave me with like 4GB free on it

So, I was thinking about upgrading it.

Here's what I've seen:

For the storage, it would be 96€:

20€ for the M.2 adapter with the screwdriver

76€ for the Crucial P2 1TB NVMe SSD

And 110€ for the iFixit replacement battery with tools


Which is costing 206€ overall for the upgrade.

But, since I've already bought it for 380€ two years ago, I'm wondering if it's really worth it for a almost 10 years old that won't go past Catalina without being sluggish (and even then I don't like newer macOS but that's a matter of preferences)

And even then, I'm not sure the slowdown I experience will end after upgrading to a NVMe SSD (usually when browsing YouTube/Soundcloud and Spotify in the background in dualscreen on my TV when I have friends over)

Oh and one thing I kinda hate is that, I think the scaling option is fantastic on Retina display, I'm using the 1440x900 scaling, but I would really prefer to use the 1680x1050 one to have more screen space to work with, but it's pretty much unusable at that scale) and this is not an issue with the SSD, but just with the old Iris 5100 that can't handle it

Sure, the actual SSD is slow (see screenshot) but is that really why macOS is sluggish ? Maybe the poor entry level i5 is struggling to keep up

Because, for 300€ (the price I would've put on it+ the 100€ I would sell it for)I can get:

A ThinkPad T470s (i7 6600U/8GB RAM/256GB SSD) for 200€

A ThinkPad X280 (i5 7300U/8GB RAM/256GB SSD) for 300€

A Dell XPS 13 9350 (i5 6200U/8GB RAM/256GB SSD) for 250€


Sure I would've liked to stay on a Mac because of the overall package (built quality, Retina screen, and fantastic trackpad)

But I'm doing just fine with iCloud Drive integration on my Windows desktop for swapping files between my MacBook, desktop and iPhone.

And a decent Windows laptop (ThinkPad/XPS, not crappy ones) with more powerful hardware might just serves me as well (especially since I've kinda been swapping OS a lot on my MacBook, alterning from macOS to various Linux distros)

Considering I would sell it as is for 100€ to a friend that hasn't got that much money and really needs a computer to use at home (she only have her phone, that's it, no computer, no tablet or anything) which I think it's a correct price (mind that the price of used Mac really ain't as low here in France than they are in the US)

Sooo yeah. I'm wondering what would y'all do ? Worth spending 200€ on a +9 years old entry level MBP or better off selling it and get a more powerful Windows PC

(And no, I really can't spend more than 300€, times are tough and I would really only have 300€ to spend)

Sorry if that was a lot to read for not much but I wanted to give you all of the informations and explain my reasoning

Thanks everybody.

View attachment 2148712 View attachment 2148711 View attachment 2148710 View attachment 2148713 View attachment 2148714 Was in the same situation. I bought an M1 MacBook Air - only cost me £700. Don’t think you could get anything better than that for the money.

 

[Antares23]

The build quality has increased on non-Macs. Some of them are fairly blatantly copying the MacBook “look”. Can’t say I blame them, it’s popular with a number of people.

Find a place that offers a return policy like Apple’s and give one a try. Heck, if you’ve got the patience, get a few, return them, get a feel for the ‘state of the art’ there and you may find something to like (and also, you’d be figuring out what RAM, GPU, STORAGE configurations FEEL like on Windows).

Yeah it has increased a lot, my mom got a Latitude E7450 from 2015 and that thing is solid, is light, and isn't ugly by any means (sure it hasn't got the aluminium/screen behind full glass front kinda beauty, but IRL it feels like a nice machine)
Yeah I can't blame them either.

Thing is, for 300bucks, the best bang for the buck will be on Leboncoin, which is the french craigslist if you will.
You can add at least 100 to 200 bucks on the kind of sites that would allow me to return them, obviously, they buy these laptops used, refurbishes them and resell them, they have to make a profit on it, compared to directly buying one from somebody.
And that's what I usually prioritize, performance/price bang for the buck. I'll try to get as much performance as my money can buy without sacrificing on built quality. Hence why I end up with 6/7th gen ThinkPad/XPS

 

[Dylan33x]

I haven’t read through all the replies, but I’m currently rocking a 2012 MBP retina (I’m assuming yours is a retina is well) with a OCLP install of Monterey. It’s been overall pretty great, Although I’ve yet to dig into what I truly intend to use it for which is music production. I expect to hit a ceiling with that pretty quickly, but anyways

I attribute it doing well to mostly the RAM being 16GB. It’s also the 256GB model which is too small honestly. The quick and easy answer I would say is that if yours is 8GB of RAM, I would let it go, outside of just browsing the web and note taking. You can revert it to Mojave or even earlier and find more success, but from the reading I’ve done I personally wouldn’t put a Machine with 8GB of RAM on Catalina or later (DDR3 ram not the newer ram used in Apple silicon).

It also depends on your use case. An older iPad Pro with a good Logitech combo touch may fulfill your needs. Otherwise, I would say a cheaper windows laptop or the budget king, the M1 air on a sale for 750-800.

 

[TechnoMonk]

I use a windows workstation, but prefer MacBook Pro for laptop. The lasted think pad I spent 2K for my spouse, lasted like 3 years before it went dead. I like the upgradability in workstation and ability to boot as windows or Linux server as needed. I usually spend most time in Linux.
I see you are not in market for a MacBook Pro but can you look at MacBook Air on Craigslist or your local listing?

 

[gradi]

I can tolerate Windows, but I can’t live with it.

I moved from Win 3.0 to Mac OS9 and never looked back.

For those who may not know, Windows 3.0 was in 1990 -- 33 years ago. Many things have changed a whole lot in 33 years: CPUs, SSDs, cars, covid, music, software, spaceships, and on and on and on. Windows and MacOS have also changed a lot in 33 years and both have not stood still.

 

[Burnincoco]

For those who may not know, Windows 3.0 was in 1990 -- 33 years ago. Many things have changed a whole lot in 33 years: CPUs, SSDs, cars, covid, music, software, spaceships, and on and on and on. Windows and MacOS have also changed a lot in 33 years and both have not stood still.

I’m not old, you’re old!

now, where’s my multivitamins?

 

[iAppleOrchard]

The Apple Silicon Macs are still soooo much better, even in 2023. I switched from a fairly new Windows computer to an M1, and it was 5x faster. The 2013 MacBook Pro would be 15x faster even with an M1.

 

[BlueGhost]

If you really don't need either macOS or Windows based software, have you considered a Chromebook? Less fuss when switching to a new machine, and suspect doing everything on the web is fine for many folks. Rock bottom prices, and operating system updates... are really fast. Suspect a lot of stuff will continue to migrate to the web. Unsure about status of DJ software.

I'm retired (after 34 years in information technology). Still keep a Chromebook for backup to my mac (9 year old MacBook 13" Pro). Would love to go Chromebook only, but still have a mac for non-web applications. Planning to replace unit with a 14" M2Pro MBP. Much of the design of many PCs is influenced by the fact that the architecture was defined by IBM in 1981 (plug in memory and such, just like the mainframes and minicomputers of that period). Remember our HPQ representative telling us not to use WinTel PCs because we'd be locked into an IBM architecture (they were not yet selling WinTel PCs).

If you can work with a desktop, I'd consider a M1 or M2 mini (quite a bit less than a laptop), and use a cell phone or tablet for mobility (or maybe a cold start UPS battery backup unit). I assume much of your DJ equipment requires connection to utility power (mains in the UK, if I remember correctly). In many parts of the world, people use mostly cell phones. Any more, many applications are first released for either iOS or Android (and may not be available for Windows or macOS). I'd assume by now there is tablet based DJ software.

Part of the slowness you are seeing may be due to the SSD having a very small amount of free space. Depending on how much RAM is being used by your DJ (and other) software, there may be attempts to swap memory to disk and/or compress physical memory. Maybe storing some of the audio tracks on a cloud service would speed things up (especially the infrequently used ones). I'd normally want to keep at least 20% of the SSD (or even disk) free, but at least a bit more than the size of RAM on the machine (in event of a program or system crash that attempts to write memory to SSD, or in older machines disk). I'm wondering if some of your SSD storage is occupied by previous disk dumps caused by crashes, and maybe system logs and caches.

You could also investigate using storage on a cell phone, tablet or iPod as a network drive on your current mac. (But I'd look into cloud storage first.)

 

[barkomatic]

Do you absolutely need a laptop? You might get something a little newer if you get a iPad or other tablet with a keyboard. I'd try for something that still gets updates.