Were there issues with '11 MBA 13" ?

[supercooled]

Hi,

I'm thinking of picking up a 13" from the refurb. store.

http://store.apple.com/ca/product/FC965LL/A

My hesitation is whether or not it's worthy of the extra $300 or so to upgrade to the newer model with better GPU and quieter/cooler Ivy CPU. I've seen reviews of this machine running Premiere and Photoshop with aplomb when they first came out so that doesn't worry me.

So difference are:

- slightly faster/cooler CPU
- faster USB3.0
- Faster GPU of 30%?

Apart from those changes, everything else is pretty much the same, right?

 

[KohPhiPhi]

From what I read, the 2012 SSD and RAM are also faster than the 2011 ones.

 

[deeddawg]

From what I read, the 2012 SSD and RAM are also faster than the 2011 ones.

Still, without a sense of the true real-world effect of these increases, it's difficult to assess whether they provide real value in terms of reducing the time taken in everyday tasks. It's the real world performance effect that matters.

To the OP's question - I've not had any problems with my 2011 model. Works great and I've felt no desire to upgrade to the new one.

If starting from scratch though, it'd be a tough call choosing between the models, but I'd likely lean towards the 2012 due to the USB3 and ability to order it with 8GB memory. Especially so if you qualify for the education discount, thereby reducing the cost difference.

 

[KylePowers]

From what I read, the 2012 SSD and RAM are also faster than the 2011 ones.

Yes. They are SATA III, where as the 2011's were SATA II (IIRC)

Also, HD FaceTime camera. If you're a frequent FaceTimer (I am), that's a big plus!

 

[jojoba]

To the OP's question - I've not had any problems with my 2011 model. Works great and I've felt no desire to upgrade to the new one.

Ditto. For my purposes (email, web browsing, microsoft office, scrivener, playing music, DevonThink, streaming of net based TV), it is more than sufficient.

 

[supercooled]

Thanks for the responses. I don't think going from 4-8GB of memory is going to make that much of a difference; likewise the minute bump in processing power as I've seen reviews of the '11 running quite nicely in Adobe apps.