> None of that matters. My computer is very rarely running flat out, and I'd venture the same is true 99% of the time for 99% of the people who own them. > It'

> None of that matters. My computer is very rarely running flat out, and I'd venture the same is true 99% of the time for 99% of the people who own them. > It's very much on par, given the way 99% of people use their laptops. > But is the difference, in real life, between Max Memory Bandwidth of 25.6 GB/s vs 34.1 GB/s anything to be concerned about? Not for most people. Emphasis mine. Can you cite a source for the above? I linked the CPU specs because it shows the difference between what you're buying. The author stated "i7" like all i7s are the same. They're not. The GPU is important outside of games because the display on new Macbook Pros are retina displays. What the advances in the integrated GPUs and lower power consumption leads to is the latest generation MBPrs can power a screen much higher resolution than the 2012 MBP, but still have the same performance profile (battery life, responsiveness). To use your argument: The current generation MBPrs come with good enough specs for storage and RAM for 99% of users. No one needs to upgrade pass 16GB of RAM since it's good enough for most people or a 512GB SSD, especially when storage is being pushed to the cloud. You get a better display, better battery life, in a smaller form factor that weights less. For most people the trade off between that and the ability to open up your laptop to stick in new hardware is worthwhile.