128GB or 256GB SSD?

[ambxlaux]

Yo, what's up guys!
I'm currently in the market for buying my first ever MacBook (taken me a while to catch on lol)
I've decided I'm going for the '2017 Apple MacBook Pro 13", Intel Core i5, 8GB RAM, Intel Iris Plus Graphics 640, Silver'.
However, I can't decide on which SSD would be better? 128GB or 256GB? The purpose of the MacBook would mostly be for completing Uni work but also for listening to music on Spotify (not a fan of Apple Music tbf), catching up on the odd Netflix show and a little bit of Social Media browsing!

As I said, this is my first MacBook so I'm really hoping some of you guys can help a girl out and tell me which is better and why?!

Thanks
A xo

 

[netmaskit]

Yo, what's up guys!
I'm currently in the market for buying my first ever MacBook (taken me a while to catch on lol)
I've decided I'm going for the '2017 Apple MacBook Pro 13", Intel Core i5, 8GB RAM, Intel Iris Plus Graphics 640, Silver'.
However, I can't decide on which SSD would be better? 128GB or 256GB? The purpose of the MacBook would mostly be for completing Uni work but also for listening to music on Spotify (not a fan of Apple Music tbf), catching up on the odd Netflix show and a little bit of Social Media browsing!

As I said, this is my first MacBook so I'm really hoping some of you guys can help a girl out and tell me which is better and why?!

Thanks
A xo

Hello, welcome to the forum, and good luck with your purchase.

First, let me edit your question:
Don’t ever ask questions like “what is better - 128GB or 256GB”, because the obvious answer will always be that 256GB is better;
The right question should be:
“Is the difference between 256 and 128 worth the higher price?”

Now to the answer:

The entry level models of Apple, not only in MacBooks but also in iPhones and other products, are based on very minimalistic specs that are almost impossible to use.
Why do they do that?
In order to enjoy a low price tag in the “Starting from...” sentence.
In the case of 128GB MBP, it means that most of the 128GB will be taken by the operating system and other basic apps even before you did your first useful usage of the computer.
In other words:
256 may be higher by 100% than 128, but your AVAILABLE disk space will be higher by 200%-300%, which worth the higher price (contrary for the difference between, let’s say, 1024 and 512, which is nearer to 100%).
Some people coming from PC may say:
“Buy the minimalistic disk and use external disks when needed.”
But external disks are far from compensating you for the shortage of internal disk space:
MBPs enjoy the fastest disk I/O, much much more than any other laptop, and your disk I/O performance will drop drastically when using external disks.

 

[Juicy Box]

If you can afford the higher storage, I would go for it.

Never in my life have I ever purchased an Apple device and had too much storage, but there have been many cases in which I had not enough.

You could probably get by with the 128GB, and I know that an extra $200 for the increase storage might be too much, but depending on what you do, you could fill up that space quickly.

If it was a desktop, maybe an external hard drive might be okay, but being something mobile, having external could become a pain.

If you plan on keeping this device for a while, just spend the extra money now. If not, then maybe you can get away with the small storage.

Another tip, see if you can get a student discount, and check out Apple's refurbished store for decent deals on MBPs.

Here is the MBP that you are looking for with a decent discount.

https://www.apple.com/shop/product/...core-Intel-Core-i5-with-Retina-display-Silver
[doublepost=1537885505][/doublepost]

Here is the MBP that you are looking for with a decent discount.

And it has the 256GB storage, but cheaper that the new base model with 128GB storage.