Where to buy 2014 MacBook Pro?

H

Hoff

macrumors regular
Hi All,

Lifetime Windows PC user looking to switch to Mac.

Does anybody have a good recommendation where to buy a (like new condition) 2014 or 2015 MBP?

I do photo rendering and CAD design, so need the faster processor. 2.8Ghz preferred (2.5Ghz minimum) so can't buy the 2.2Ghz 2015 that has been available new in some Mac stores.

And preferably the GeForce GPU (2014 was the last year MBP had these).
An AMD GPU does nothing for me. Most of my design software simply will not work with it.

I've looked at
Amazon
eBay
Mac of All Trades (didn't have model I wanted)
B&H Photo (didn't have model I wanted)

Can I trust buying one on Amazon or eBay?
Anyone have a good experience with one of these websites, or a store they can recommend?

I live near Chicago / Milwaukee. Happy to drive to either city if there's a good store there. Or buy online if it's reputable.

Ideal specs:
2014 MBP
16GB RAM
2.8Ghz Processor
GT 750M graphics card

Looking for any recommendations or experience please. Thanks!
 
Hoff said:
Hi All,

Lifetime Windows PC user looking to switch to Mac.

Does anybody have a good recommendation where to buy a (like new condition) 2014 or 2015 MBP?

I do photo rendering and CAD design, so need the faster processor. 2.8Ghz preferred (2.5Ghz minimum) so can't buy the 2.2Ghz 2015 that has been available new in some Mac stores.

And preferably the GeForce GPU (2014 was the last year MBP had these).
An AMD GPU does nothing for me. Most of my design software simply will not work with it.

I've looked at
Amazon
eBay
Mac of All Trades (didn't have model I wanted)
B&H Photo (didn't have model I wanted)

Can I trust buying one on Amazon or eBay?
Anyone have a good experience with one of these websites, or a store they can recommend?

I live near Chicago / Milwaukee. Happy to drive to either city if there's a good store there. Or buy online if it's reputable.

Ideal specs:
2014 MBP
16GB RAM
2.8Ghz Processor
GT 750M graphics card

Looking for any recommendations or experience please. Thanks!
Click to expand...

Nonsense all of you software will work with an AMD gpu, you won’t get CUDA acceleration but the better dGPU’s in the latest machines more than make up for the lack of CUDA.
 
Nonsense all of you software will work with an AMD gpu, you won’t get CUDA acceleration but the better dGPU’s in the latest machines more than make up for the lack of CUDA.
Click to expand...

Wish that was the case. But no, my photo rendering software is CUDA only. It does not recognize AMD GPU's.
 
If it’s Mac software I believe you are mistaken. Are you running other operating systems?
Click to expand...

I've only ever used Windows previously. Windows 7 Pro. I'm a product designer / mecahnical engineer. (Not a graphic designer). Software in product design (engineering) field is predominantly Windows based. But I'm tired of Windows OS, especially Win10. So trying to move to Mac.

A number of programs are either 100% CUDA only, or can only sort of work on AMD but not very well.

Really which software????
Click to expand...

Here is the first one I found. There are others in addition to this.
 

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Hoff said:
I've only ever used Windows previously. Windows 7 Pro. I'm a product designer / mecahnical engineer. (Not a graphic designer). Software in product design (engineering) field is predominantly Windows based. But I'm tired of Windows OS, especially Win10. So trying to move to Mac.

A number of programs are either 100% CUDA only, or can only sort of work on AMD but not very well.



Here is the first one I found. There are others in addition to this.
Click to expand...

SOLIDWORKS works fine with amd

“
Here is our current SOLIDWORKS 2017 hardware recommendations. Please browse through this FAQ for more specific information.

  • Processor: Intel Core i7 with high processor speed
  • Operating System: Windows 10 64-bit
  • Memory: 16GB or more (2 x 8GB cards)
  • Hard Drive: Solid State Drive (SSD) for program installation, maintaining at least 20GB free space after the installation
  • Graphics Card:
    • NVIDIA Quadro M2000 (mid-range) or NVIDIA Quadro M4000 (high end)
    • AMD FirePro W5100 (mid-range) or AMD FirePro W7100 (high end)
  • Internet Connection: High speed broadband connection for downloading service packs
  • File Storage: SOLIDWORKS PDM Standard or SOLIDWORKS PDM Professional”
However it seems that it may only support professional level cards according to their website. So no Macbook will be ok for you.

http://www.solidworks.com/sw/support/videocardtesting.html

Are you sure a laptop is up to the job for your use case??
 
If you want the 15" size:
The 2015-design MacBook Pro is still built and sold "as new units" from Apple. To see them, go to store.apple.com, go to the MacBook Pro page, go to the 15" page, and then click the "buy" button and scroll down (they keep them well-hidden for some reason).

The 2015-design MacBook Pro is also sold through the Apple Factory-Refurbished store. You can get more configurations this way (than if you were to "buy new").

If you want the 13" size:
The 2015-design MacBook Pro 13" is sold through the Apple Refurbished pages. Numerous configurations are available.

A VERY FEW Apple resellers -might- still have "new old stock" MBPro 13" models. Someone suggested B&H Photo in NYC. Might be worth trying. I picked up a "closeout" 2015 MBPro 13" from the "electronics valley" store at ebay, but those are probably long-gone by now.

Advice about buying from the Apple Refurbished store:
If you see a configuration you want, you have to BUY IT QUICKLY.
They tend to come in and go out very rapidly.
 
Samuelsan2001 said:
Nonsense all of you software will work with an AMD gpu, you won’t get CUDA acceleration but the better dGPU’s in the latest machines more than make up for the lack of CUDA.
Click to expand...

What? CUDA is an API that programs use to get to parallel computing support using Nvidia chips. There is not a plug in replacement for the using AMD GPUs. So the many programs that use CUDA have to have critical section of their code reimplemented to use anything other than NVIDIA GPUs. This is a non-trivial task. So if you use or write software coded for the CUDA API there is no easy path to the AMD GPUs, unless someone has done the work to recode to use the AMD GPU,
 
Hoff said:
Wish that was the case. But no, my photo rendering software is CUDA only. It does not recognize AMD GPU's.
Click to expand...

I know you didn't ask, so I apologise in advance if my advice is not appropriate, but I would urge you to reconsider your idea of buying a Mac. First of all, you won't get proper hardware acceleration if you are running software in a virtual machine (so you can forget your CUDA acceleration in Solidworks). Second, 2014 is a rather old machine and will be considered vintage before long — so you won't get any (needed!) service. I say needed simply because any laptop you buy now will already be used and close to its reasonably expected lifespan. In the end, it will be an expensive, disappointing mess.

It would make much more sense to get a contemporary laptop with an Nvidia GPU. Or, if you are willing to change your software to something natively supported by macOS, a newer Mac laptop.
 
leman said:
I know you didn't ask, so I apologise in advance if my advice is not appropriate, but I would urge you to reconsider your idea of buying a Mac. First of all, you won't get proper hardware acceleration if you are running software in a virtual machine (so you can forget your CUDA acceleration in Solidworks). Second, 2014 is a rather old machine and will be considered vintage before long — so you won't get any (needed!) service. I say needed simply because any laptop you buy now will already be used and close to its reasonably expected lifespan. In the end, it will be an expensive, disappointing mess.

It would make much more sense to get a contemporary laptop with an Nvidia GPU. Or, if you are willing to change your software to something natively supported by macOS, a newer Mac laptop.
Click to expand...

Hi leman, thanks for your input. Totally appropriate. Really appreciate it.

Honestly I'm a bit stuck, because I have thousands of dollars of software that runs on Windows 7 (and might cost thousands more to update it for Win10). But my 7 year old Win7 laptop is almost dead. So I need new hardware.
I absolutely hate Windows 10. Many, many reasons. I'm not trying to hate it. Would be easier if I could like it. But it just is not great for me.

First, I'm a visual person, and I just hate the way it looks. When I sit down to Win10 I just do not want to be there. Secondly, the fact they force updates on you, and even in the middle of your work day. Sometimes I leave my computer running for hours, or overnight, to render a batch of images. You come back and find out Win10 has shut down your application, rebooted your machine, and installed some "update" which btw has broken your drivers. So now I lost a night's worth of productivity, AND have to spend hours in the day time trouble shooting and fixing drivers. Why? Because Microsoft. To me, this is 100% unacceptable. In Win7 at least I could say "no updates."

All my friends who have switched from Windows to Mac have said "it's so much better." "I should have switched long ago."

Also, last month I had to do 4 separate tasks on my Windows PCs. I spent, literally, two full 8 hour days figuring out how to do them on PC, searching for, and installing 3rd party applications, learning how to use them, finding many that didn't work, starting over, etc... Two full days. Again, massive lost productivity. And in all 4 instances, my research showed that these operations were available natively on the Mac.

So I'm fed up with Windows. To the point where I'm almost willing to change careers and learn different design software on a Mac if I need to.

The only problem is Macs are so expensive! I'm a freelancer and the budget is tight. I can literally get (more than) twice the power for half the price on a Windows PC.

Hence I'm feeling a bit stuck.
 
Hoff said:
So I'm fed up with Windows. To the point where I'm almost willing to change careers and learn different design software on a Mac if I need to.
Click to expand...

I know very well what you mean :) I have to administer some Windows computers as part of my day job and every single time I feel like throwing those damn things agains the wall.


Hoff said:
The only problem is Macs are so expensive! I'm a freelancer and the budget is tight. I can literally get (more than) twice the power for half the price on a Windows PC.
Click to expand...

True, but they are also barely more expensive than a similarly specced Windows machine if you take into account things like display quality, battery life, flexibility etc. Of course, it doesn't help your case. At this point, maybe you could consider getting a cheaper, potentially second-hand gaming laptop as a working tool and a Macbook or something for your private needs, to try things out.
 
jerryk said:
What? CUDA is an API that programs use to get to parallel computing support using Nvidia chips. There is not a plug in replacement for the using AMD GPUs. So the many programs that use CUDA have to have critical section of their code reimplemented to use anything other than NVIDIA GPUs. This is a non-trivial task. So if you use or write software coded for the CUDA API there is no easy path to the AMD GPUs, unless someone has done the work to recode to use the AMD GPU,
Click to expand...

I know what cuda is but in the OP’s case a new mbp with an amd graphics card will run faster than a 4 year old mbp with an Nvidia card supporting cuda.

Taking a look online I have found a number of reviews comparing amd and Nvidia for SOLIDWORKS amd does not seem to suffer.

Shows an amd beating a Quadro that’s 4x as expensive.

All the other info I have found shows cuda has zero effect on SOLIDWORKS and the the best performance is only found with SOLIDWORKS own drivers on a workstation class gpu whether that is NVIDIA Quadro or amd FirePro makes little difference apart from the amd cost far less money. Running on consumer graphics will not take advantage of this anyway.

Unless you are buying a laptop with a 1070 or 1080 card it seems it makes to make no difference.


Her is a list of open cl and cuda support for different apps so you know where it’s more important, however a modern amd card will still be better than a 4year old 750m anyway.


  • Adobe After Effects CC
    • CUDA Support
      • 3D ray tracing
      • Multi GPU support
    • OpenCL Support
      • No specifics stated
  • Adobe Photoshop CC
    • CUDA Support
      • 30 effects in Mercury Graphics Engine
    • OpenCL Support
      • No specifics stated
  • Adobe Premiere Pro CC
    • CUDA Support
      • Mercury Playback Engine for real-time video editing & accelerated rendering
    • OpenCL Support
      • No specifics stated
  • Adobe SpeedGrade CC
    • CUDA Support
      • Real-time grading and finishing
  • Autodesk Maya
    • CUDA Support
      • Increased model complexity
      • Larger scenes
    • OpenCL Support
      • Physics simulations
  • Avid Media Composer
    • CUDA Support
      • Faster video effects
      • Unique stereo 3D capabilities
  • Avid Motion Graphics
    • CUDA Support
      • Real-time rendering
  • Blackmagic DaVinci Resolve
    • CUDA Support
      • Real-time colour correction
      • Real-time de-noising
    • OpenCL Support
      • Real-time colour correction
  • Final Cut Pro X
    • OpenCL Support
      • Real-time FX editing – no need to render the timeline
      • Faster overall playback & timeline performance
      • Faster third-party effect rendering
      • No transcoding of AVCHD or other complex codecs to editable ProRes
  • RED REDCINE-X
    • CUDA Support
      • Accelerated debayering
      • Support for 2 GPUs
    • OpenCL Support
      • No specifics stated
      • Only supports 1 GPU
  • RED Giant Effects Suite
    • CUDA Support
      • Faster effects
  • RED Giant Magic Bullet Looks
    • CUDA Support
      • Faster effects
  • SONY Vegas Pro
    • CUDA Support
      • Faster video effects and encoding
    • OpenCL Support
      • No specifics stated
  • The Foundry HIERO
    • CUDA Support
      • Better interactivity
  • The Foundry NUKE & NUKEX
    • CUDA Support
      • Faster effects
  • The Foundry Mari
    • CUDA Support
      • Increased model complexity at interactive rates
 
Hoff said:
Hi leman, thanks for your input. Totally appropriate. Really appreciate it.

Honestly I'm a bit stuck, because I have thousands of dollars of software that runs on Windows 7 (and might cost thousands more to update it for Win10). But my 7 year old Win7 laptop is almost dead. So I need new hardware.
I absolutely hate Windows 10. Many, many reasons. I'm not trying to hate it. Would be easier if I could like it. But it just is not great for me.

First, I'm a visual person, and I just hate the way it looks. When I sit down to Win10 I just do not want to be there. Secondly, the fact they force updates on you, and even in the middle of your work day. Sometimes I leave my computer running for hours, or overnight, to render a batch of images. You come back and find out Win10 has shut down your application, rebooted your machine, and installed some "update" which btw has broken your drivers. So now I lost a night's worth of productivity, AND have to spend hours in the day time trouble shooting and fixing drivers. Why? Because Microsoft. To me, this is 100% unacceptable. In Win7 at least I could say "no updates."

All my friends who have switched from Windows to Mac have said "it's so much better." "I should have switched long ago."

Also, last month I had to do 4 separate tasks on my Windows PCs. I spent, literally, two full 8 hour days figuring out how to do them on PC, searching for, and installing 3rd party applications, learning how to use them, finding many that didn't work, starting over, etc... Two full days. Again, massive lost productivity. And in all 4 instances, my research showed that these operations were available natively on the Mac.

So I'm fed up with Windows. To the point where I'm almost willing to change careers and learn different design software on a Mac if I need to.

The only problem is Macs are so expensive! I'm a freelancer and the budget is tight. I can literally get (more than) twice the power for half the price on a Windows PC.

Hence I'm feeling a bit stuck.
Click to expand...


For Windows 10 set the network connection to a "Metered Connection" this will stop all but critical updates and vastly reduce the chance of the system auto rebooting, you can then update as appropriate. W10 Pro you can also defer updates, although I now just prefer the former option.

Not an easy solution as you have two significant cost index's between the hardware & software, think you just have to bite the bullet and update to newer hardware and software. A desktop would likely serve better, equally if portability is required a notebook is mandatory. I can only say as your depending on the systems for a living purchase the newest you can and in many respects the software of your trade is going to govern the choice of OS.

Q-6
 
I use SolidWorks professionally in my work as a mechanical engineer. I usually spend 20+ hours a week in the program using my work-issued HP ProBook with an integrated graphics card and a dual-core Skylake processor.

Honestly, most if the time it works perfectly fine. It would be nice with more powerful hardware, but it works pretty decently. Any 15" from 2014 and onwards is going to be a lot more powerful than the laptop I am using, regardless of whether it has a Nvidia or AMD graphics card. My point is - you will be fine no matter the machine you end up with.
 
Queen6 said:
For Windows 10 set the network connection to a "Metered Connection" this will stop all but critical updates and vastly reduce the chance of the system auto rebooting, you can then update as appropriate. W10 Pro you can also defer updates, although I now just prefer the former option.

Not an easy solution as you have two significant cost index's between the hardware & software, think you just have to bite the bullet and update to newer hardware and software. A desktop would likely serve better, equally if portability is required a notebook is mandatory. I can only say as your depending on the systems for a living purchase the newest you can and in many respects the software of your trade is going to govern the choice of OS.

Q-6
Click to expand...


Great tip about the Win 10 updates. If I go that route, I'll definitely try that.
Solid advice all around. Thank you.
[doublepost=1517364445][/doublepost]
chabig said:
Parallels hides the GPU from software, so Solidworks should run, though some are reporting problems.

http://kb.parallels.com/122807
https://forum.parallels.com/threads/unable-to-locate-assembly-components-in-solidworks.342732/
Click to expand...

Heard about that too. From what I read that problem might be solved by using Bootcamp. Although it's nicer to have Windows and Mac side by side in Parallels.
[doublepost=1517364660][/doublepost]
Stygma said:
You can buy a brand new 2015 MacBook Pro, with 2.8GHZ processor at B&H.

https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/prod...0rf_mjlq28_b_h_15_4_macbook_pro_notebook.html
Click to expand...

I always saw it only as the 2.2Ghz model. Didn't realize you could still select your processor. Thanks Stygma! :)
[doublepost=1517365083][/doublepost]
MadDane said:
I use SolidWorks professionally in my work as a mechanical engineer. I usually spend 20+ hours a week in the program using my work-issued HP ProBook with an integrated graphics card and a dual-core Skylake processor.

Honestly, most if the time it works perfectly fine. It would be nice with more powerful hardware, but it works pretty decently. Any 15" from 2014 and onwards is going to be a lot more powerful than the laptop I am using, regardless of whether it has a Nvidia or AMD graphics card. My point is - you will be fine no matter the machine you end up with.
Click to expand...

Well said. Think I've been getting caught up in the the spec wars hype.
And my main gig isn't even going to be SolidWorks anyway. Hopefully more so renders and animations to just push out to the eGPU or the render farm.

Really appreciate your real world example.
 
Samuelsan2001 said:
SOLIDWORKS works fine with amd

However it seems that it may only support professional level cards according to their website. So no Macbook will be ok for you.

http://www.solidworks.com/sw/support/videocardtesting.html

Are you sure a laptop is up to the job for your use case??
Click to expand...

I think so. MadDane's post above would say yes.

Fishrrman said:
The 2015-design MacBook Pro is still built and sold "as new units" from Apple. To see them, go to store.apple.com, go to the MacBook Pro page, go to the 15" page, and then click the "buy" button and scroll down (they keep them well-hidden for some reason).
Click to expand...

HUGE tip. Thank you!

leman said:
At this point, maybe you could consider getting a cheaper, potentially second-hand gaming laptop as a working tool and a Macbook or something for your private needs, to try things out.
Click to expand...

That's pretty much the conclusion I've come to, too
 
Hoff said:
Great tip about the Win 10 updates. If I go that route, I'll definitely try that.
Solid advice all around. Thank you.
Click to expand...

Really works, I picked it up off a YT sub. By switching to a Metered Connection it literally shuts all updates etc. down barring the absolute critical ones. You can still opt to update manually when it suits you. Is system wide so same applies to the MS Store App's and Office etc.

These days as I'm out of corporate, I use gaming notebooks. Half to a third of the cost of a comparably specified portable workstation, most offer tremendous scalability current has 32Gb option to upgrade to 64Gb, 3 physical drive bays (2 x M.2, 1 x 2.5 inch SATA).

I just "gut" the software and set it up for my needs :) These machines are designed for sustained performance and generally deliver in spades, i.e. no throttling. As for the client only ever had positive comment regarding the aesthetics, very much breaking out from the dull grey :) More importantly no one blinks when it's doing what needs to be done, as the output is what's Important not the colour, OS or moniker on the lid :p

I would like to keep a MBP in my professional rotation, however Apple is incapable of serving my and many others needs today, with Apple drifting evermore to form over function. Many don't want ever thinner notebooks we want more powerful portable systems that deliver. Apple could serve both the need of those that value portability and those that value performance and practicality. Everyone I know either holding onto older Mac's, switching to Windows or evaluating the new iMac Pro, equally no solution for those of us on the go with higher needs...

Q-6
 
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