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Upgrading to a new MBP

chrislaw

chrislaw

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Apr 11, 2009
649
1
central ohio
I have some questions that I guess maybe I'm not searching properly to find the answers to. I have a mid 2009 MBP (I believe this was the time period, it was the first unibody pro) that is still performing wonderfully. My wife was very anti-Mac when i bought it. Now she loves and uses it more than I do these days as I can't pry it from her. It was originally a 2gb 250gb model, that I (not the most computer savvy) upgraded to 4gb and a 500gb HD myself.

My questions are: If i were to buy a new 13" model for myself today, how is the quality (known issues and whatnot) compared to my 2009 model? What are the main differences (I noticed that the base of the new ones are the same stats as my current) between the two? Are the new ones as easy to update the hardware (10 screws was pretty much the jist of it) as mine?

I'm not really sure if I'm missing anything. I would like to buy the base model and upgrade the ram to 8gb and maybe a larger HD through Newegg.

Any other information would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

EDIT: also, if i were to select the higher of the 2 13" options, how much difference would i notice between the i5 and i7?
 
Last edited:
chrislaw said:
I have some questions that I guess maybe I'm not searching properly to find the answers to. I have a mid 2009 MBP (I believe this was the time period, it was the first unibody pro) that is still performing wonderfully. My wife was very anti-Mac when i bought it. Now she loves and uses it more than I do these days as I can't pry it from her. It was originally a 2gb 250gb model, that I (not the most computer savvy) upgraded to 4gb and a 500gb HD myself.

My questions are: If i were to buy a new 13" model for myself today, how is the quality (known issues and whatnot) compared to my 2009 model? What are the main differences (I noticed that the base of the new ones are the same stats as my current) between the two? Are the new ones as easy to update the hardware (10 screws was pretty much the jist of it) as mine?

I'm not really sure if I'm missing anything. I would like to buy the base model and upgrade the ram to 8gb and maybe a larger HD through Newegg.

Any other information would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

EDIT: also, if i were to select the higher of the 2 13" options, how much difference would i notice between the i5 and i7?
Click to expand...

Same great computer - better performance now - sounds like your not needing one right away - expect refresh within 5 months.
 
Thanks for the info. I didn't mention that my wife and I are both in school. She just started going back this quarter and she was going to look for a laptop at Best Buy (the one by us doesn't sell Mac), but I think we have decided to go this route. I use it for work as well so I'm looking at swiping the new one :cool:

In any event, we will be buying something in the next few weeks. So I imagine I'm going to just buy the i5 and upgrade myself.
 
Ok, so I'm going to be buying the low end 13" I've decided. I'm just going to buy the 750 gb HD from Apple as with student discount its only $90 bringing my total to $10 less than the normal price without the upgrade. I will be buying RAM from Newegg though and was about to buy some just now when I noticed the 1066 vs 1333. After searching around the forum I think I've figured that the pre '11 models use the the 1066 and the '11 models use the 1333, correct?
 
chrislaw said:
Ok, so I'm going to be buying the low end 13" I've decided. I'm just going to buy the 750 gb HD from Apple as with student discount its only $90 bringing my total to $10 less than the normal price without the upgrade. I will be buying RAM from Newegg though and was about to buy some just now when I noticed the 1066 vs 1333. After searching around the forum I think I've figured that the pre '11 models use the the 1066 and the '11 models use the 1333, correct?
Click to expand...

All 2011 MBP use 1333
 
Thought so, thanks.


So some more thoughts, I haven't ordered yet but as i mentioned with student discount i will be able to upgrade to a 750gb for $90. That's probably a good enough deal isnt it?

Also, since I'm thinking of upgrading the HD from Apple I can't walk in the store and just grab it so I'm going to have to preorder. Do you guys think that ship to store is any quicker than shipping to my house?
 
chrislaw said:
Thought so, thanks.


So some more thoughts, I haven't ordered yet but as i mentioned with student discount i will be able to upgrade to a 750gb for $90. That's probably a good enough deal isnt it?

Also, since I'm thinking of upgrading the HD from Apple I can't walk in the store and just grab it so I'm going to have to preorder. Do you guys think that ship to store is any quicker than shipping to my house?
Click to expand...

Im cheap so I would pay for the stock HD - and buy a 750gb from newegg/amazon for about $100 - Then I could convert the 500 into an external hard drive. Personally - But I look for anyway to save money.

I done think it really matters where it is shipped. No experience
 
Spink10 said:
All 2011 MBP use 1333
Click to expand...

Actually, my 13" MBP (Early 2011) came with 1066MHz DDR3. This new 15" Late 2011 did ship with the 1333MHz DDR3 though. I picked up the base model 13" and upgraded to a 500GB hybrid HDD in addition to the RAM, which improved the overall performance noticeably.

For the OP it's too bad the Best Buy near you doesn't sell Macs, as they have all of the Mac computers on special right now - I got this MBP for $2059 instead of the $2199 normal price.
 
Thanks for the external idea Spink...

Now I'm confused however lol

I've already ordered 1333 so please tell me that the current 13" uses this :)
 
Its been very tempting, however I just don't need it. My laptop use is very basic (office, internet, portability is a must) as I use my iMac for the big stuff.
 
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