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Will an older Macbook Pro still be perform?

D

dldjr31

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Aug 28, 2015
2
0
Hello,

I am a college student and looking to purchase my first Macbook Pro. I am currently using an old 15' Sony Vaio laptop with an E2 vision AMD. It is pretty old. It cant run anything in HD, battery is dead, left clicker doesn't work, and is laggy even while browsing.

I wanted to know if I could purchase an older 13" MBP, but still be able to perform daily task. I need it for work, school, entertainment. I simply want a laptop that will not lag while browsing and will allow me to watch Netflix/Youtube in HD.

How old of a MBP can I purchase?

Macbook Air is also and options, but I figured I can upgrade the MBP to last longer if I bought an older model

Thank You All :)
 
i'm currently using a Mid 2010 13" MBP 2.4 GHz, upgraded the RAM to 8GB(supports 16GB) with a 256GB SSD running the latest Yosemite 10.10.5 and it runs smoothly with no hiccups...
 
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A co-worker just picked up a 2011 MBP and beyond the worn out battery is runs incredibly smooth with Yosemite.

I was actually pretty impressed.
 
I would go with a Sandy Bridge or newer CPU, so 2011 or newer. Older ones will work great and might be fine for your needs though. It is probably best to avoid 2011 15" and 17" models due to GPU failures.
 
Pay careful attention to what 556fmjoe wrote above.

2011 15" and 17" MacBook Pro models are prone to failures of the graphics board.
 
I would personally lean towards a brand-new entry level Air over a well used Pro. Performance will likely be similar, if not tilted well in the Air's favor, and they are widely available for about $750 or so. Plus you'll get all-day battery life vs. a couple of hours.
 
Well you left the biggest issue here, BUDGET.

Your question implies that you want to spend as little as possible, while staying in the realm of what you want/need.

The easy answer to that, is a 2008 unibody.

Now, throw in a budget and do the best you can with what you have, and I would recommend a mid 2010 2.4ghz macbook pro. You can find them for 4-500 dollars. Then you add a solid state drive for 100 dollars (256). After that, you up the ram to whatever you need it to be. With all of that said, you can have a very capable macbook pro that will play HD video, all for about 5-700 dollars.

This is not to say it doesn't come with it's drawbacks. Display port instead of thunderbolt 1, USB 2.0 as apposed to 3.0, SATA II instead of III, 1066 instead of 1600 RAM... Nothing that's gonna kill you, but for 300 more, you can get the 2014 non retina and the bluetooth and wifi is better as well.

Like I said, it's all about you budget. You may find a 2011 at 2.9ghz for 500 and not needing to change anything. That's be great. My old mac, that I am typing on now, is 2010 with 16gb RAM, 256 SSD, 1TB 700RPM DD in the optical bay, and it's a damn fine machine. I was even able to use it as a backup for music production. It will run two monitors and logic pro X with plugins on all tracks, sayyyyy about 20 of them, with no problem.

Either way, if you find yourself between an older model and newer model and the cos is anywhere from 2-4, personally, I'd get the newer model.

GOOD LUCK!
 
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My 2011 15" MBP is still working great with Yosemite and I haven't even upgraded to an SSD yet.
Even my RAM is still at 4GB and it works just fine.
 
whitieiii said:
Doesn't those computers also come with and utilize Intel integrated graphics? That's what I would use 90% of the time i own one of those
Click to expand...

Doesn't matter. When I had my 2011 and the dGPU was failing (which was constantly, 8 lobos in the first year) it would cause the whole system to lock up, even if I disabled the dGPU with an app.

OP, if your going with a 13" MBP your best bet would be a 2011. These were the first 13" to have i5s/i7s and will serve you well for years to come. Anything older then that will have a Core 2 Duo, which is still good but it most likely won't be supported for as long. The 15" and 17" models from 2011 are notoriously unreliable, but the 2010s will probably still be good another few OS releases, and the 2012 non-Retinas are good machines as well. If you want one of the newer Retina MacBook Pros, get the late-2013 and newer models. The first gens had GPU problems as well and should be avoided IMO.
 
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