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Which MacBook Pro configurations actually have tangible performance differences?
Looking to get another one (13" size) and wondering which features and to what extents actually yield differences in performance for daily work use (some increments look too close to have any). I.e. Differences in processor speeds - is 2.3GHz noticeably faster and worth higher price than 2.5GHz? Or 3.1GHz vs 3.3GHz vs 3.5GHz?
If one can't get the max combo (fastest processor + highest memory + largest storage) then which feature should take higher priority (e.g. fastest processor vs highest memory)? Do certain feature combinations produce better performance? Etcetera.
- pravula 9y agoWhat's your daily work usecase? Do you run multiple VMs? Multiple chrome tabs? IDEs?
- Geekette 9y agoCurrently not much programming related but lots of design/graphics/video intensive applications (photoshop, etc). And expecting to do more of data sci/stats related tasks in near future.
- pravula 9y agoI would focus on discreet video card for your work load. IIRC, none of the 13 inch MacBook Pros have it.
- dabockster 9y agoThis. OP might have to go the Windows/Linux dual boot route to get the most bang for his buck here. Refurbished IT laptops work wonders here.
- seanwilson 9y ago16GB of memory at a minimum is no brainer for coders in my opinion. Some projects can require lots of heavy programs running at the same time.
- applecore 9y agoYou don't need more than 8GB of memory. I doubt anyone could notice a difference in real world performance between 8GB and 16GB. The PCIe-based SSD in the Macbook Pro is so fast that virtual memory is equivalent to RAM for all practical purposes.
- lordCarbonFiber 9y agoRAM is at least 10x faster than SSD memory so Im not 100% sure where you're coming from. If you're doing any kind of VM work (or just want to use more than two or three electron powered desktop applications at a time) 8GB RAM in 2017 is going to be pretty tight on a development machine. [0]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DDR4_SDRAM https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DDR4_SDRAM -- see peak transfer rate
- bebop22 9y agoEverything stated here is false.
- vardump 9y agoWell, talk for yourself. I need typically 32-64 GB RAM (virtual machines, etc.) and 16 GB is painfully little. Different people have different needs. Oh, and I don't think Macbook Pro's RAM bandwidth is just 2 GB/s. Even phones have 30 GB/s RAM bandwidth nowadays. Besides, you don't want to ruin your SSD by constantly swapping.
- nemothekid 9y ago>I doubt anyone could notice a difference in real world performance between 8GB and 16GB. Just having Slack and Chrome open at the same time causes my "Memory Pressure" graph on OSX to turn yellow on my 8GB RAM MBP.
- bfrog 9y agoElectron apps!
- 9y ago
- jtchang 9y agoYou want 16GB ram. You want 512GB storage if you do android or ios dev. Images take up a lot of room.
- kevinherron 9y agoGiven the choice, I'd max out memory first, get 512gb SSD, then use the remaining budget for CPU. The price of a 1TB SSD isn't worth it. If you need extra storage you can buy a Samsung 850 SSD and an enclosure and get full speed transfers over the USB Type-C / TB3 ports.
- Afforess 9y ago> full speed transfers over the USB Type-C / TB3 ports. The NVMe SSDs in the Macbooks are significantly higher throughput than USB-C ports support.
- kevinherron 9y agoShould have clarified, I meant full speed in regards to both the SATA3 interface (6Gbps) and what the 850's are capable of, which is something like ~500-550 MB/s.
- otterley 9y agoThe access latencies are quite different, though, are they not?
- kevinherron 9y agoI don't know. The throughput seems to be there: https://imgur.com/a/hhvZ2 https://imgur.com/a/hhvZ2 For my use case, which is storing and running VMs directly off the external drive, it works better than I had ever hoped. The whole setup feels very fast.
- jwilliams 9y agoLeft-field suggestion: Have you considered an iMac (or equivalent) and then getting something cheaper/lighter for when you're a roadwarrior? Depending on your usage/travel patterns that can work great too.
- Geekette 9y agoNo - I travel a bit with extended stays, so, I'd rather the notebooks.
- brudgers 9y agoThe biggest performance difference in terms of RAW computing power will be a discrete GPU. But only for some (embarrassingly parallel) workloads and not for others. Everything else will make a marginal difference -- with the possible exception of RAM for memory constrained workloads that are swapping virtual memory to 'disk'.
- ohquu 9y agoDiscrete.
- in_hindsight 9y agoIf I was buying MBP tomorrow, I'd get 16GB RAM minimum, 512GB SSD minimum and integrated GPU. I would use eGPU with MBP for intense tasks.
- stephenr 9y agoKeep in mind that i7's get hyper threading, i5s don't. Small MHz increases don't make the same difference as extra (virtual) cores.