15 or 16 inch 2019 MBP?

[dave197]

Hi, limited budget after a intel MBP to last me a few years is there any benefit getting the 16 over the 15 2019 models?

Any advice appreciated

Thanks

 

[GMShadow]

15" has a defective keyboard design and will overheat pretty readily. The 16" is not without issues but it's far less failure prone.

Just note that any Intel Mac is on borrowed time - we don't know when Apple will decide to cut OS support.

 

[dave197]

Thanks, yes I'm well aware of the Intel situation, I think security updates will proceed for a few more years at least

 

[FreakinEurekan]

sort of like asking if you prefer to be shot or stabbed 😉

Between those two, I definitely preferred the 16”. Just don’t pay a lot for it.

 

[Minghold]

15" has a defective keyboard design and will overheat pretty readily. The 16" is not without issues but it's far less failure prone.

The 16" is nice, but requires Catalina minimum. Boo! The 15" will run Mojave in a MacOS Extended *(journaled) partition (and you'll install MacsFanControl, because of course you will). But it does have that darn butterfly nonsense (not that Apple won't find a way to brick them both anyway, e.g., failed soldered SSDs or failed batteries). I've been telling people for years not to buy any Apple laptop made after 2015.

Just note that any Intel Mac is on borrowed time - we don't know when Apple will decide to cut OS support.

*All* Macs are on borrowed time, as Apple artificially obsolesces them in a three-year rollover. (Then someday you'll discover that half-a-dozen Linux distros will run on 15yo machines faster than when they were new and access current-year software. I'm putting Pop! OS on a nice 2011 MB right now.)

 

[SjoukeW]

The 15" has the butterfly keyboard which does break really often. Some people went through 3 keyboards in a year, for others it didn't break. If only 1 key breaks you need a new top cover, new batteries (glued in) and a new keyboard. That costs 'a lot'. there was an extended warranty for those keyboards, but that is the past.
Further more both do totally overheat if you connect an external monitor to it. I had one from work, that slowed down until it throttled the cpu back to 800mhz ... It was utterly slow. When i had to compute something I disconnected the displays, hit the button and then connected the screens again. Saved me 10+ minutes in the summer ... ridiculous design flaw.
I would stay away, far away, from both models and do yourself a favour, buy a new mac. Even a macbook air is faster than those 'pro' models.