Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

What do you think is better?

B

Boilerhead

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Mar 14, 2012
18
0
Pennsylvania
I have been a windows user my entire life, but have decided to switch to Apple.

I have been looking into mac products now for the last couple of months. I was going to go with a 13" MBP if is had a bump in resolution and was still able to be upgraded by a third party. I was also waiting for the ivy bridge chips.

After WWDC today, I saw that the 13" was still unchanged as far as the display, and I don't think the current resolution is going to do it for me. So, I looked at the Macbook Air. Everything looks great, except the hardware is not able to be upgraded (RAM & SSD).

Also, I heard that a retina 13" will be coming out this August, which is very tempting, but I also don't want to pay $400 extra for a nicer display.

I am a college student that will be doing word processing, a little programming, email, and some cad.

Any thoughts on witch I should go with?
 
The Airs have user replaceable SSDs, OWC sells replacements:

http://eshop.macsales.com/shop/SSD/OWC/Aura_Pro_Express

I think that either a 13" Air or 15" Retina MBP would be best. The 15" is probably overkill for what you're going to be using it for.

The 13" Air is lighter than the equivalent MBP and has a higher resolution display.

I think a base model 13" Air with the 8GB of RAM upgrade (since you can't upgrade it later) is a great machine for the price.
 
I guess you can upgrade the SSD afterall... I do like the standard 2.5" drives however, as they are cheaper and I think they are faster as well.

Do you think the 13" pro with retina display will use the 2.5" drives?

I also like the black bezel on the Pro vs the MBA, but that's not that big of a deal. It just seems like a slight compromise with exactly what I want wichever way I go.

I guess I should have mentioned as well that my budget is around $1300. I would like to have 256 GB of space.
 
Boilerhead said:
Does the new 15" Pro use the 2.5" drives? Or does it use the drives found in the MBA?
Click to expand...

The new MPB retina does not use 2.5" SSD but uses what looks like the blade style mSATA SSD in the Air. No one knows yet if it is compatible with the Air SSDs, follows other mSATA, or if it is completely proprietary.
 
Can't wait to see the tear down of the new retina model. Samsung makes their drives as thin as 7mm so hopefully there is one in there. Upgrading/expandability is fairly important to me.
 
Boilerhead said:
Can't wait to see the tear down of the new retina model. Samsung makes their drives as thin as 7mm so hopefully there is one in there. Upgrading/expandability is fairly important to me.
Click to expand...

No need to wait, this is from the Apple site:

performance.jpg


The SSD is the card visible just below the left fan.
 
Well, I was thinking about my options today and decided to wait a little longer for the 13" retina model. Is there a pretty strong possibility that this will come out? If so how soon do you think?
 
Boilerhead said:
Well, I was thinking about my options today and decided to wait a little longer for the 13" retina model. Is there a pretty strong possibility that this will come out? If so how soon do you think?
Click to expand...

Ming-chi Kuo (the analyst who correctly predicted the introduction of a separate model line of new Retina MacBooks) said that Apple would first come out with the 15" Retina then eventually make a 13" in August. Take of that what you will.

Boilerhead said:
What do you think of the thinner 13" pro having a dedicated GPU?
Click to expand...

I can see them having the full blown quad core processor but no dedicated graphics- the HD4000 is plenty powerful for most tasks now. Just my 2c.
 
Boilerhead said:
Well, I was thinking about my options today and decided to wait a little longer for the 13" retina model. Is there a pretty strong possibility that this will come out? If so how soon do you think?
Click to expand...

I can't see them doing it in August. I think the 13" retina would come when the do the slight spec bump to the 15" in the fall.
 
Have you personally seen the 13" MBP display? You may find it to be better than you think...

I have an early 2011 base model 13" MBP and the screen resolution doesn't bother me one bit. Having considered the 11" and 13" MBA I didn't see much advantage over the 13" MBP. In fact, the 11" MBA gave me a headache after just fifteen minutes and severe eyestrain that last 8+ hours.

I took the money that I saved getting the MBP for around $900 on sale and invested in a high-quality 24" NEC display. That's the display I use when I need more screen real estate.

Be sure to check the bookstore at the college you will be attending. Some college bookstores purchase previous-generation Macs and pass significant savings on to students. I have saved up to 50% going that route. If you don't need the latest and greatest Mac you can save some serious $$$.
 
I went to Best Buy the other day and played around with the different models. The pro screen really isn't that bad, but I do like how thin the air is, and the slight resolution bump.

If the 13" retina doesn't come out by the end of the summer, I think I'll go with the Air. My current Dell is falling apart and I don't know how much longer It will last.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back