should I get MacBook Pro? Please help me with this decision

[vikky2426]

I'm looking to upgrade from early 2013 MacBook Pro which is almost not usable. and the OS is not upgradable.

I'm mainly looking to buy Macbook Pro for Software development and delovoping YouTube tutorials or maybe in fututre develop a proper couse for Udemey etc. My confusion is that do I really need to spend almost £3,000 or is this an overkill.

I'm thinking of going with M1 Pro 16 Inch with 512 GB disk and 32 GB RAM
I'm not going with 1 TB as I think I'll be better off using an external storage as it will be cheaper.

What do you guys think? Do you think it will be an overkill for me and should I save some money and instead go with M1 MacBook Pro 2020

Anyone else here uses M! for Software Development? Any issues you face around this.

I would highly appreciate any input you guys can give me on this.

 

[mr_manny]

Linux runs awesome on older MBPs.
Through in an SSD and increase the RAM to 8GB or more...shouldn't need to upgrade to an M1.
Your existing SATA drive could be installed in-place of your superdrive (with a sata drive adapter), for increased internal storage.

Unless your looking for an excuse to upgrade to an M1

 

[Bodhitree]

For software development it’s usually important to have an up-to-date OS.

 

[vikky2426]

Linux runs awesome on older MBPs.
Through in an SSD and increase the RAM to 8GB or more...shouldn't need to upgrade to an M1.
Your existing SATA drive could be installed in-place of your superdrive (with a sata drive adapter), for increased internal storage.

Unless your looking for an excuse to upgrade to an M1

I want to stick to one OS which is MacOS. I use it at work and want to use it personally too.

It's also an excuse too - lit's been over 9 years since I bought a new macBook

 

[MBAir2010]

If you have the funds and will earn more with a M1 MacBook, you should purchase one.

I'm using pre 2013 MacBook Air and mini to compose graphics, edit photos and everything else.
yes, you might lose on downloading the latest OS, but the recent OS ones still work and are safe.

 

[JPack]

You obviously don’t need it as you were able to use your 2013 MacBook Pro until Apple stopped providing software updates.

The 32GB memory is overkill. Many developers are using the M1 Mac mini which is limited to 16GB.

 

[vikky2426]

You obviously don’t need it as you were able to use your 2013 MacBook Pro until Apple stopped providing software updates.

The 32GB memory is overkill. Many developers are using the M1 Mac mini which is limited to 16GB.

Yep 32 GB is an overkill but I was just thinking of future proofing. I don’t expect to change this laptop for another at least 5 to 7 years

 

[vikky2426]

If you have the funds and will earn more with a M1 MacBook, you should purchase one.

I'm using pre 2013 MacBook Air and mini to compose graphics, edit photos and everything else.
yes, you might lose on downloading the latest OS, but the recent OS ones still work and are safe.

Not sure if I’ll be able to earn back this much money but I can only try. Not sure if there is an audience for the type of tutorials I’m thinking of developing.
Do you use MacMini M1 along with your pre 2013 MacBook?

 

[MBAir2010]

Do you use MacMini M1 along with your pre 2013 MacBook?

i have the 2012 mini version which does everything and fast!

the good aspect of the these M1 macbooks are they seem very reliable, which the 2015-2020 were not.

 

[Danfango]

I'm looking to upgrade from early 2013 MacBook Pro which is almost not usable. and the OS is not upgradable.

I'm mainly looking to buy Macbook Pro for Software development and delovoping YouTube tutorials or maybe in fututre develop a proper couse for Udemey etc. My confusion is that do I really need to spend almost £3,000 or is this an overkill.

I'm thinking of going with M1 Pro 16 Inch with 512 GB disk and 32 GB RAM
I'm not going with 1 TB as I think I'll be better off using an external storage as it will be cheaper.

What do you guys think? Do you think it will be an overkill for me and should I save some money and instead go with M1 MacBook Pro 2020

Anyone else here uses M! for Software Development? Any issues you face around this.

I would highly appreciate any input you guys can give me on this.

Ok lets look at this realistically. It depends on what your requirements are which are not really well defined. It seems exploratory.

I have an absolute bottom end 8Gb RAM 256Gb MacBook Air as my primary "non work" computer and I do a lot of hefty software development through it. Note the through it, which is really important. It's currently selling on Amazon here in the UK for £889. Throw apple care on it and it's cheap. Really cheap. I've got 129Gb of SSD space left and it contains everything I have ever done (I'm in my 40s so that's a fair bit) and all the software I use because I'm not a hoarder and spend time pruning things carefully.

The thing you've really got to trade off is where you intend to spend your money and when you want to spend it. Where is on things you really need. When is ONLY WHEN YOU NEED TO. Don't buy a Ferrari to take to the race track once a year when you can rent one for the day instead.

My workflow is considerably different to most which is where I made the compromise. I don't actually do the legwork on the Mac. It's a terminal. It runs VS Code, a few terminal windows and the usual desktop apps and NOTHING ELSE. All the development work is done remotely on rented Linux VPS machines which are scaled up to the requirements at the time via VS code and terminals.

Rather than throw £2200 extra on a top end MacBook Pro, that'll rent you a basic VPS box for 12 years of 24/7 service. If you need more power you can throw one up and pay just for the time you need to use it for. I can throw up a box with 128Gb of RAM, 50 cores and 2.5TB of SSD for $1.44 an hour. I use one of those to do test runs on for a couple of hours a month when I need it.

The only compromise is that if you're doing desktop development or Apple specific dev, go for a MacBook Pro but honestly 90% of the dev out there now is best pushed somewhere else on demand.

Also to note, don't get the 2020 MacBook Pro. The thing has the Touch Bar. it's horrid.

It’s who you are and how you choose to solve the problems that define success not the absolute numbers.

 

[Yebubbleman]

I'm looking to upgrade from early 2013 MacBook Pro which is almost not usable. and the OS is not upgradable.

I'm mainly looking to buy Macbook Pro for Software development and delovoping YouTube tutorials or maybe in fututre develop a proper couse for Udemey etc. My confusion is that do I really need to spend almost £3,000 or is this an overkill.

I'm thinking of going with M1 Pro 16 Inch with 512 GB disk and 32 GB RAM
I'm not going with 1 TB as I think I'll be better off using an external storage as it will be cheaper.

What do you guys think? Do you think it will be an overkill for me and should I save some money and instead go with M1 MacBook Pro 2020

Anyone else here uses M! for Software Development? Any issues you face around this.

I would highly appreciate any input you guys can give me on this.

You're probably fine with the M1 13-inch MacBook Pro, unless you really need 32GB of RAM and the extra performance cores. The 14-inch MacBook Pro and the 16-inch MacBook Pro are identical in terms of how powerful you can configure them to be. The only exception is with the M1 Max and high power mode. That said, I'd just get a 14-inch model unless you have to have a bigger internal display on your laptop and can't use external displays. Otherwise, you're adding more money for only two inches of real estate when you could use that on an external display that gives you way more room anyway.

 

[vikky2426]

Ok lets look at this realistically. It depends on what your requirements are which are not really well defined. It seems exploratory.

I have an absolute bottom end 8Gb RAM 256Gb MacBook Air as my primary "non work" computer and I do a lot of hefty software development through it. Note the through it, which is really important. It's currently selling on Amazon here in the UK for £889. Throw apple care on it and it's cheap. Really cheap. I've got 129Gb of SSD space left and it contains everything I have ever done (I'm in my 40s so that's a fair bit) and all the software I use because I'm not a hoarder and spend time pruning things carefully.

The thing you've really got to trade off is where you intend to spend your money and when you want to spend it. Where is on things you really need. When is ONLY WHEN YOU NEED TO. Don't buy a Ferrari to take to the race track once a year when you can rent one for the day instead.

My workflow is considerably different to most which is where I made the compromise. I don't actually do the legwork on the Mac. It's a terminal. It runs VS Code, a few terminal windows and the usual desktop apps and NOTHING ELSE. All the development work is done remotely on rented Linux VPS machines which are scaled up to the requirements at the time via VS code and terminals.

Rather than throw £2200 extra on a top end MacBook Pro, that'll rent you a basic VPS box for 12 years of 24/7 service. If you need more power you can throw one up and pay just for the time you need to use it for. I can throw up a box with 128Gb of RAM, 50 cores and 2.5TB of SSD for $1.44 an hour. I use one of those to do test runs on for a couple of hours a month when I need it.

The only compromise is that if you're doing desktop development or Apple specific dev, go for a MacBook Pro but honestly 90% of the dev out there now is best pushed somewhere else on demand.

Also to note, don't get the 2020 MacBook Pro. The thing has the Touch Bar. it's horrid.

It’s who you are and how you choose to solve the problems that define success not the absolute numbers.

100% agree with you on every point you made. The MacBook Pro 2020 is perfect for me and will do 99% of the job - the only problem is it's a bit outdated now that M1 pro is out and I absolutely hate the touch bar.

Also for my development work I'll mostly be using various cloud service providers to run my tests and test new technologies but the only reason I'm inclined toward M1 Pro 2021 is because I will be doing some video editing and I think M1 Pro will be much better, smoother and quicker.

I was also considering Mac Mini but I've heard that Apple will be refreshing it very soon so I think it's not a good idea to go for that now and also I'll lose portability with that.

 

[Miltz]

I'm looking to upgrade from early 2013 MacBook Pro which is almost not usable. and the OS is not upgradable.

I'm mainly looking to buy Macbook Pro for Software development and delovoping YouTube tutorials or maybe in fututre develop a proper couse for Udemey etc. My confusion is that do I really need to spend almost £3,000 or is this an overkill.

I'm thinking of going with M1 Pro 16 Inch with 512 GB disk and 32 GB RAM
I'm not going with 1 TB as I think I'll be better off using an external storage as it will be cheaper.

What do you guys think? Do you think it will be an overkill for me and should I save some money and instead go with M1 MacBook Pro 2020

Anyone else here uses M! for Software Development? Any issues you face around this.

I would highly appreciate any input you guys can give me on this.

I would got with 1TB. External storage isn't cheaper if you care about performance. How many external drives hit 7,000MB per sec?

 

[clevins]

First off, it's financially a bad decision to buy far more than you need now to stretch the life of a Mac to 7 years. As I said elsewhere here:

If you're looking at cost as $/day (vs the lump cost of the machine) then the formula would factor in initial purchase price, resale price at various intervals (1 year, 3 years etc) and account for the performance bump moving from the current machine to the new one.

Simple example - buy a machine for $2000. If you can sell it for $1000 at 3 years, then it's cost you about $0.91 per day. You can keep it for longer, say 5 years, but if it sells for $500 at 5 years old, that only decreases your cost to $0.82 per day. So, in this made up example, you're likely better off selling it at 3 years old, assuming each new update in the machine brings real performance or feature gains.

If you want to be obsessive about it, you could monitor resale and calculate this more closely but I think the key point here is that it DOES make sense to buy a machine that fits your needs but isn't massively overpowered and then to sell that about every 3 years and rebuy the equivalent machine. Whether that's the base model or another one will usually depend on someone's specific requirements.

Don't get hung up on the numbers above - the logic is valid even for an Air that costs $1300... basically you want to upgrade every 3 years or so otherwise you're dealing with an increasingly behind the times machine for no real savings on a $/day basis.


That said, you could easily do what you want on an M1 Air with 16/512. It will run rings around your current machine and has plenty of power for what you need.

 

[Lioness~]

Buy the best you can afford when buying a new Mac, anyone, if you plan to have it awhile.
Simple as that.
Sure, it's never cheap to buy new Mac's. But you get what you pay for.
It also matters if it is your only Mac or if you plan to have another one.
Maybe a smaller internal display, and get a larger external if you work on a desk?

I rather have less storage on the Mac, external is cheap, then less memory.
Max the RAM as much you can afford. Good to future proof that I think, too.
As a second mac, my MBA 16GB ram with 250GB storage, never runs full. But I have a NAS that I access files from on both the portable and an old iMac.

 

[MajorFubar]

Never over-specify your purchase now, based on what you think your future requirements will be. The reason is that there will come a time sooner than you think where you are changing it because it is obsoleted in ways you can't yet envisage, even though it is still otherwise higher specified than you need.

Exhibit A: In 2011 I bought what was then a TOTL i7 3.4GHz quad core 27" iMac which was hugely over-specified for my needs. Eleven years later I still own it, it still is over-specified for my needs in some ways (other than the glacial HDD) but it is obsoleted in so many other ways (not least being that the OS is pegged at High Sierra) that I may as well have bought the cheaper version, because the cheaper version would have been obsoleted just as quickly, and buying it would have saved me money while still meeting my requirements.

 

[fa8362]

Buy an Air.

 

[iHorseHead]

I'm looking to upgrade from early 2013 MacBook Pro which is almost not usable. and the OS is not upgradable.

I'm mainly looking to buy Macbook Pro for Software development and delovoping YouTube tutorials or maybe in fututre develop a proper couse for Udemey etc. My confusion is that do I really need to spend almost £3,000 or is this an overkill.

I'm thinking of going with M1 Pro 16 Inch with 512 GB disk and 32 GB RAM
I'm not going with 1 TB as I think I'll be better off using an external storage as it will be cheaper.

What do you guys think? Do you think it will be an overkill for me and should I save some money and instead go with M1 MacBook Pro 2020

Anyone else here uses M! for Software Development? Any issues you face around this.

I would highly appreciate any input you guys can give me on this.

I use MacBook Air M1 for Xcode and it works fine.

 

[BigMcGuire]

I need an Intel MBP to run windows via Parallels so I can work with our .net 4.7.x Windows application. I couldn’t get our app to run on Windows Arm and while it ran in visual studio, it was slower than a snail. So I got a refurbished 2020 Intel MBP and use it with an eGPU and I’m pretty happy.

I used an M1 MBP for a personal laptop for about half a year. Great laptop, absolutely amazing. I forgot what cold metal felt like - even during heavy usage periods. Also, experiencing instant Mac OS was nice - felt almost iPad like. For development? I really didn’t do much on it. XCode install seemed to take forever, but I guess it always does. So I’m probably not the one you really want to hear from, lol.

 

[nintendoswitch]

You don’t necessarily need to get the MacBook Pro. You could also get an M1 MacBook Pro (like you said) M1 MacBook Air, M1 Mac mini, or M1 iMac. All the macs obviously do the same, so it doesn’t matter which one you get.

 

[clevins]

Buy the best you can afford when buying a new Mac, anyone, if you plan to have it awhile.
Simple as that.

Nah. See my post above. It's never wise to drastically over-spec a Mac since they hold their resale price for the first 3 years or so. If performance is important to you AND if each generation moves performance ahead noticeably, you're better off speccing a machine to do what you need now and what you think you'll need for the next 3 years or so, then sell it (typically for around 50% of the price paid) and then buy the equivalent of that machine in the new generation.

 

[e1me5]

Buy a 13” M1 and don’t look back.

 

[vikky2426]

You're probably fine with the M1 13-inch MacBook Pro, unless you really need 32GB of RAM and the extra performance cores. The 14-inch MacBook Pro and the 16-inch MacBook Pro are identical in terms of how powerful you can configure them to be. The only exception is with the M1 Max and high power mode. That said, I'd just get a 14-inch model unless you have to have a bigger internal display on your laptop and can't use external displays. Otherwise, you're adding more money for only two inches of real estate when you could use that on an external display that gives you way more room anyway.

Nah. See my post above. It's never wise to drastically over-spec a Mac since they hold their resale price for the first 3 years or so. If performance is important to you AND if each generation moves performance ahead noticeably, you're better off speccing a machine to do what you need now and what you think you'll need for the next 3 years or so, then sell it (typically for around 50% of the price paid) and then buy the equivalent of that machine in the new generation.

I really like your suggestion and it makes sense too.

 

[clevins]

I really like your suggestion and it makes sense too.

The only time to over-spec is when each generation brings very minimal gains. This was the case the last few years of the Intel stuff, but I think we'll see the next several generations of M processors each bring significant speedups, so I'd plan on doing what I noted above.

 

[Lioness~]

Nah. See my post above. It's never wise to drastically over-spec a Mac since they hold their resale price for the first 3 years or so. If performance is important to you AND if each generation moves performance ahead noticeably, you're better off speccing a machine to do what you need now and what you think you'll need for the next 3 years or so, then sell it (typically for around 50% of the price paid) and then buy the equivalent of that machine in the new generation.

I didn’t say anything about drastically over-spec anything. Your own interpretation entirely.
If you buy Macs for speculation, you’re in the totally wrong business ?

The feel to buy a new Mac, or anything else for that matter, that you really want, is what matters.