What would you do? 2012 13" cMBP i5 to i7 worth it?

[Cassady]

Hi all,

Greetings from down South. I'm hoping I can get some objective advice on my little problem.

I currently have mid-2012 13" cMBP i5 500gb HDD, 8gb ram. Bought it in August 2012. I'm toying with purchasing a 2nd hand i7 of the same model, obviously with a faster processor, and the 750gb HDD, and also running 8gb RAM.

In South African Rand terms, I could sell my MBP for about R10,000 ($966), and could buy the 2nd-hand i7 for about R13,000 ($1256)...

Whereas I would obviously prefer a new Haswell MBP/MBA - I simply could not live with a 128gb model. At the very least, I would want the 512gb, but would only be able to afford the 256gb model - but then would need to settle on a 4gb RAM version, which is not something I would want to do either. Simply put - Retina is stunning, but it is beyond my budget, at the moment.

With this being said - thinking long(er)-term, the cMBP is still pretty useful, in that 16gb RAM and a decent sized SSD will make a huge real-world speed difference - and at least with the 2012 MBP, I can afford to save up and upgrade as needed.

I am currently completing my PHD. I have a massive PDF database, and am primarily working in Devonthink Pro, Scrivener, (Word) and Bookends. I have had to OCR pdf's in bulk - and will probably do so again - the extra RAM helped a bunch. Storage and portability are my main areas of focus. I am already 350gb in to my 500gb HDD.

In light of the above - should I:

A.) Keep the i5, save up for a 500gb SSD, and optibay it along with the HHD - possibly running a fusion-drive?

OR

B.) Flog my current MBP, put in the $300 extra and get the i7 [the 750gb will obviously help - and I can simply start saving afresh to get a SSD later, to optibay it as well, eventually.

Part of me thinks the i7 will be able to hold itself (processing-wise) a bit longer than the i5 - and the extra 250gb space will obviously help things along now already.

But this is contrasted by my wondering whether the difference btw the i5 and i7 is really that big a factor, to justify the purchase - especially since I could pump the extra money into a SSD now already, for use in the i5...

Some wisdom and thoughts would be much appreciated!

 

[TheSlimOne]

You want to see a 2012 MBP come to life. put 16gb of memory in it an SSD in the optibay install OSX and you will have something that seems like you doubled its speed. Trust me. I have the same rig as you and I did this to it.

It is a huge difference. I think the memory is the biggest help though.

Hi all,

Greetings from down South. I'm hoping I can get some objective advice on my little problem.

I currently have mid-2012 13" cMBP i5 500gb HDD, 8gb ram. Bought it in August 2012. I'm toying with purchasing a 2nd hand i7 of the same model, obviously with a faster processor, and the 750gb HDD, and also running 8gb RAM.

In South African Rand terms, I could sell my MBP for about R10,000 ($966), and could buy the 2nd-hand i7 for about R13,000 ($1256)...

Whereas I would obviously prefer a new Haswell MBP/MBA - I simply could not live with a 128gb model. At the very least, I would want the 512gb, but would only be able to afford the 256gb model - but then would need to settle on a 4gb RAM version, which is not something I would want to do either. Simply put - Retina is stunning, but it is beyond my budget, at the moment.

With this being said - thinking long(er)-term, the cMBP is still pretty useful, in that 16gb RAM and a decent sized SSD will make a huge real-world speed difference - and at least with the 2012 MBP, I can afford to save up and upgrade as needed.

I am currently completing my PHD in law. I have a massive PDF database, and am primarily working in Devonthink Pro, Scrivener, (Word) and Bookends. I have had to OCR pdf's in bulk - and will probably do so again - the extra RAM helped a bunch. Storage and portability are my main areas of focus. I am already 350gb in to my 500gb HDD.

In light of the above - should I:

A.) Keep the i5, save up for a 500gb SSD, and optibay it along with the HHD - possibly running a fusion-drive?

OR

B.) Flog my current MBP, put in the $300 extra and get the i7 [the 750gb will obviously help - and I can simply start saving afresh to get a SSD later, to optibay it as well, eventually.

Part of me thinks the i7 will be able to hold itself (processing-wise) a bit longer than the i5 - and the extra 250gb space will obviously help things along now already.

But this is contrasted by my wondering whether the difference btw the i5 and i7 is really that big a factor, to justify the purchase - especially since I could pump the extra money into a SSD now already, for use in the i5...

Some wisdom and thoughts would be much appreciated!

 

[Cassady]

You want to see a 2012 MBP come to life. put 16gb of memory in it an SSD in the optibay install OSX and you will have something that seems like you doubled its speed. Trust me. I have the same rig as you and I did this to it.

It is a huge difference. I think the memory is the biggest help though.

That's the plan! I'm just wondering if I should do that to my i5 - or try and pick up and i7 first!?

Thanks for the reply!!

 

[Cassady]

Browsing through several threads on these forums - pretty much everyone suggested to rather pump the money into upgrading SSD/RAM on the i5, as opposed to spending the extra $$ on the i7 - unless you were doing very CPU intensive tasks...

So I guess the same answer would hold true in the 2nd hand market?...

I guess I simply have to get over my [insert Jeremy Clarkson voice:] MORE POWER infatuation...

 

[KeegM480]

it depends on if you actually use your processor to the max, if you are constantly using CPU intensive apps, its worth it otherwise probably not.

 

[Cassady]

it depends on if you actually use your processor to the max, if you are constantly using CPU intensive apps, its worth it otherwise probably not.

Nothin too serious I would say. Sometimes OCR many pdf's in bulk - but I'm in the academic side of things - so mostly word processing and working with those databases...

So nope - not really CPU intensive. Thanks for the reply. Any future-proof plans should be met nicely by more RAM and SSD installation... And my saving up for a new machine in 2/3 years time.

 

[KeegM480]

Nothin too serious I would say. Sometimes OCR many pdf's in bulk - but I'm in the academic side of things - so mostly word processing and working with those databases...

So nope - not really CPU intensive. Thanks for the reply. Any future-proof plans should be met nicely by more RAM and SSD installation... And my saving up for a new machine in 2/3 years time.

then save your money and grab something nice!