I am going to College this fall and I want to buy a MBP 13 inch. I don't know whether to get the 2.26 or the 2.53 version. If I do buy the 2.26 I will purchase upgrade the memory to 4GB and the hard drive to 250GB. The 2.26GHZ will cost me $1466 while the 2.53GHZ will cost me $163 more at $1629. I will likely have to run windows on it for some programs, no gaming at all, but lots of music and movies, and general college stuff. So which one should I go for?
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Which MBP for College?
- Thread starter Flyers18
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
2.53 in my opinion you will need the extra power especially if you use parallels to run windows. However you will also need the memory.
You can definitely save some dough by ugrading the ram and HD yourself to the same spec as the 2.53; you are probably not going to notice a 270mhz difference, and I'd personally say it's not worth almost $200.
Money is not really a problem, if I can save it that's good, if I have to spend the extra, doesn't really matter. In the end I just don't want to regret my decision. I'm not really a big computer nerd and I don't know how to upgrade the ram by myself, so however I buy it, that's the way it stays.
Then no brainer go with 2.53 and 4GB of RAM...but if money really is no option then maybe you want to go to a 15inch MBP
If you have the money to spend I might seriously consider 15inch...you will really enjoy the extra screen size.
I would go for the 2.26 GHz. Like others have said, there isn't any noticeable difference. Save the money and spend it on a larger hard drive and/or more ram, if you need it. I have a stock 2.26 GHz MBP and it runs very smoothly.
Make sure you get the education discount.
Should be: $1,582.00
2.53 GHz 13" Macbook Pro
4GB DDR3
250GB hard drive
3-year applcare.
It takes all of about twenty minutes. You don't need to be a computer nerd to do it.