which cpu & RAM should i get for rMBP??

[amrabari]

hi all, i am new to MAC, and after long waiting for the new rMBP late 2013 i am finally going to buy my new MAC inshAllah.

however i would like to know which CPU to get?? the 2.6 i5 or 2.8 i7?? and the price difference is more than $200.

also which RAM should i take? the 8GB or 16GB of RAM?? also the price difference is $200.

i can't afford going with both upgrades, i only can afford one of them.

i will be using the normal user things, photo editing, word processing, web serving no video editing, however since i am coming from Windows background i think i will be using a lot of windows in VM box, and Windows always need more RAM.

i would like to keep my new rMBP for at least 3 - 4 years InshAllah without changing it, and now we can't upgrade even the RAM in the new MBP so that's why i was thinking on going to the high configuration from day 1.

hope to get your advice as i would like to order my new rMBP inshAllah this week.

 

[pukifloyd]

Welcome to the mac world! I personally would suggest getting the base MBP since your use seems very limited. You won't need a lot of processing power. You'll just need more RAM for running VM box.

The best way to save money would be buying a refurbished mac mini (same as brand new, sometimes even better because it passes through their quality checkpoint many times) and upgrading the RAM yourself. It's very easy to upgrade and can cost less than half of what apple charges.

Good luck!

 

[KeegM480]

For you I would say base model save some money, you probably will not need 16GB of RAM or a high end i7,

my MacBook Pro (with 16GB and an i7) rarely needs the 16GB of RAM with, Photoshop, Final Cut, After Effects, Lightroom, all open at once. I do use my processor but I also do heavy editing and only have a 2.2GHz.

So go base model