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What is the best Macbook Pro?

S

sector457

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Apr 7, 2019
4
0
Indiana
Hello everyone,

Currently, I own a 2010 Macbook Pro 13". This laptop has done me well and still does everything I need it to. I upgraded the harddrive to an SSD, put in a new battery, and expanded the memory from 4GB to 8GB. Everything is snappy and it runs well, just I am wanting something newer.

I have been wanting to upgrade for sometime, but my expertise is in iPhones, not Macbooks, and despite research, I cannot seem to find what people consider the 'best' MacBook Pro. Every year, they seem to have issues that cause people to look for another or hold back and wait. From my research, my current MacBook Pro seems to be pretty worthwhile with no issues, or 'Apple Gates' that I could find about it.

I have been looking at the 2015 Retina, because it is the last of the models to have a USB port and HDMI input, but am finding issues that could affect me. The whole 'staingate' thing?

Anyway, I have come here looking for some expertise and wondering what the community on here would recommend. I don't need anything special, am just looking for an upgrade. Better screen, better battery, generally faster. Basically, if you own a Macbook Pro (before 2016) that has lasted a while with no issues, or just know a lot about MacBook Pro's, and would care to recommend, it would be greatly appreciated.

Thank You!
-Caleb
 
I bought a Mid 2015 15 inch MacBook Pro in May 2018 when Apple still sold it. The specs are certainly a bit out dated that time but it is powerful enough for what I usually use it for (e.g. data analysis in R, writing documents in LaTex, and other casual use such as web browsing, watching video, and FaceTime calls). Before that, I had a 2013 15 inch MacBook Pro as the work computer. It has the same design as the mid 2015 version. I moved to a new job and thus has to leave the 2013 MBP to my work place. I like that iteration of MBP a lot. It has been very reliable and practical. I have never had the 13 inch MBP but the 15 inch retina MBP has been great.
 
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I have a late 2013 MBP and 2010 MBP and think the 2015 MBP is pretty good choice. There's a whole of them being sold secondhand now. I would advise you to get a model that it best suited for prolong usage. About 16 GB of RAM, a decent size SSD, etc because this stuff is glued into the machine. Also, I wouldn't worry about the staingate debacle. If it hadn't gotten it by now, it probably won't in the future.
 
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My 2014 13 inch rMBP still running flawlessly. In your case since you're in no urgent need to upgrade and if you would prefer to make the best purchase decision for longevity, I would suggesting waiting for the next models to be announced this year. There is a redesign coming soon, along with the Mac Pro. If these new aspects interest you, I would advise to wait it out until then. The current generation is trash, keyboard and display issues guaranteed down the road.
 
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F23 said:
My 2014 13 inch rMBP still running flawlessly. In your case since you're in no urgent need to upgrade and if you would prefer to make the best purchase decision for longevity, I would suggesting waiting for the next models to be announced this year. There is a redesign coming soon, along with the Mac Pro. If these new aspects interest you, I would advise to wait it out until then. The current generation is trash, keyboard and display issues guaranteed down the road.
Click to expand...

Thank you for your response! I have been keeping an eye on the Late 2013 15" MacBook Pro with dedicated graphics as of right now. Seems to have had no issues that I can find, and with dedicated graphics, any task I do should work flawless (mainly editing word documents, video streaming, school stuff, etc.). The main thing I am looking for is really just a better screen, battery, slightly quicker/snappier and a HDMI port, and hence why I said any model before 2016. Though, I may wait till Apple releases their 2019 models because, as you said, are expected to have a redesign, especially with the current screen issues (I personally haven't seen any), and the notorious butterfly keyboard issues, which I refuse to use because I don't want to be left in the dust if something happens after a repair.

Thank you!
[doublepost=1554770793][/doublepost]
TMRJIJ said:
I have a late 2013 MBP and 2010 MBP and think the 2015 MBP is pretty good choice. There's a whole of them being sold secondhand now. I would advise you to get a model that it best suited for prolong usage. About 16 GB of RAM, a decent size SSD, etc because this stuff is glued into the machine. Also, I wouldn't worry about the staingate debacle. If it hadn't gotten it by now, it probably won't in the future.
Click to expand...

Thank you for your response! I have been looking at the late 2013 15" with dedicated graphics. I don't have any special power house needs, just general use and am looking for an upgrade. My current 2010 runs perfectly with a 512 GB SSD and 8 GB of RAM, so anything more would just be icing on the cake for me.

Thanks!
[doublepost=1554771012][/doublepost]
coldwaves said:
I bought a Mid 2015 15 inch MacBook Pro in May 2018 when Apple still sold it. The specs are certainly a bit out dated that time but it is powerful enough for what I usually use it for (e.g. data analysis in R, writing documents in LaTex, and other casual use such as web browsing, watching video, and FaceTime calls). Before that, I had a 2013 15 inch MacBook Pro as the work computer. It has the same design as the mid 2015 version. I moved to a new job and thus has to leave the 2013 MBP to my work place. I like that iteration of MBP a lot. It has been very reliable and practical. I have never had the 13 inch MBP but the 15 inch retina MBP has been great.
Click to expand...

Thanks for your response! I am currently eyeing the 15" Late 2013 with dedicated graphics. I personally love the 13" as it is the perfect size for me, but the one I am looking at seems to have very few issues, even with the dedicated graphics. My main usage is similar to yours, just editing documents, video streaming, school stuff, etc., so anything better than what I have now is more of a convenience. I do love the design though and want the HDMI port since mine does not, hence me asking for anything before 2016. I hate, or well strongly dislike the dongles, especially with how expensive they are.

Thank you!
 
coldwaves said:
I bought a Mid 2015 15 inch MacBook Pro in May 2018 when Apple still sold it. The specs are certainly a bit out dated that time but it is powerful enough for what I usually use it for (e.g. data analysis in R, writing documents in LaTex, and other casual use such as web browsing, watching video, and FaceTime calls). Before that, I had a 2013 15 inch MacBook Pro as the work computer. It has the same design as the mid 2015 version. I moved to a new job and thus has to leave the 2013 MBP to my work place. I like that iteration of MBP a lot. It has been very reliable and practical. I have never had the 13 inch MBP but the 15 inch retina MBP has been great.
Click to expand...

What tool do you use for writing LaTeX? I use texmaker but am always looking around to see if there's something better out there.
 
pshufd said:
What tool do you use for writing LaTeX? I use texmaker but am always looking around to see if there's something better out there.
Click to expand...

Great to find a Tex user! I just have MacTex on the computer, which use TexLive as the engine and TexShop as the editor. I am not a power user in any means so these basic tools are sufficient for my need. I like the clean interface and simplicity of TexShop. Many of my friends like TextMate, a general text editor that can edit LaTex file as well. Some of my computer science friends likes Sublime with packages for Tex document editing.
 
Love my 2015 model. And it was only the mid market one (splashed out a little). It’s still going strong and at the time presumed by now models would be so much better but don’t think they are in terms of ability v cost. On eBay at least in the UK they are very much holding their price. Don’t know how the performance compares to your upgraded earlier version, but would not hesitate to recommend the 2015 one. Reading back not sure if there were two that year.
 
[doublepost=1554854768][/doublepost]
sector457 said:
Hello everyone,

Currently, I own a 2010 Macbook Pro 13". This laptop has done me well and still does everything I need it to. I upgraded the harddrive to an SSD, put in a new battery, and expanded the memory from 4GB to 8GB. Everything is snappy and it runs well, just I am wanting something newer.

I have been wanting to upgrade for sometime, but my expertise is in iPhones, not Macbooks, and despite research, I cannot seem to find what people consider the 'best' MacBook Pro. Every year, they seem to have issues that cause people to look for another or hold back and wait. From my research, my current MacBook Pro seems to be pretty worthwhile with no issues, or 'Apple Gates' that I could find about it.

I have been looking at the 2015 Retina, because it is the last of the models to have a USB port and HDMI input, but am finding issues that could affect me. The whole 'staingate' thing?

Anyway, I have come here looking for some expertise and wondering what the community on here would recommend. I don't need anything special, am just looking for an upgrade. Better screen, better battery, generally faster. Basically, if you own a Macbook Pro (before 2016) that has lasted a while with no issues, or just know a lot about MacBook Pro's, and would care to recommend, it would be greatly appreciated.

Thank You!
-Caleb
Click to expand...


I bought a second hand MacBook Pro mid 2015 16GB 18 months ago with a 256GD SDD drive. This is a really nice and powerful machine. The screen is really good and flawless until now. I clean the screen once every 2 months because 99% of the time this machine is on the desk with just a dump cloth.

This weekend I will upgrade the SDD drive to a Samsung 970 EVO 500GB which will increase the performance of this machine. I will let you know in this thread how it goes.

Yes, I will recommend this machine. One thing that you must keep on mind at the time of making the decision is to get a MacBook Pro with 16GB of memory because the operating system (Mojave) along uses 5GB to 6GB just to boot. At this very moment I only have Safari and 3 utilities and it shows 9.10 GB Available. If I load Xcode with only 1 simulator it shows 2.74GB memory available. For that reason, get a machine with 16GB of memory.

Good luck with the machine you choose.
 
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TokMok3 said:
[doublepost=1554854768][/doublepost]


I bought a second hand MacBook Pro mid 2015 16GB 18 months ago with a 256GD SDD drive. This is a really nice and powerful machine. The screen is really good and flawless until now. I clean the screen once every 2 months because 99% of the time this machine is on the desk with just a dump cloth.

This weekend I will upgrade the SDD drive to a Samsung 970 EVO 500GB which will increase the performance of this machine. I will let you know in this thread how it goes.

Yes, I will recommend this machine. One thing that you must keep on mind at the time of making the decision is to get a MacBook Pro with 16GB of memory because the operating system (Mojave) along uses 5GB to 6GB just to boot. At this very moment I only have Safari and 3 utilities and it shows 9.10 GB Available. If I load Xcode with only 1 simulator it shows 2.74GB memory available. For that reason, get a machine with 16GB of memory.

Good luck with the machine you choose.
Click to expand...

I have exactly the same mid 2015 MacBook Pro with the same configuration. I agree that it is useful to have 16GB memory, which is the maximum you can get from Apple that time. I don't see as much memory use as you. It is about 3.8GB with Safari opening MacRumors.com. But having a few apps open will quickly consume the memory. So I would second the suggestion of getting as large RAM as you can if you decide to buy a mid-2015 MBP.

Regarding the hard drive, I believe Apple actually uses Samsung SSD in this generation of MacBook Pro. But the Samsung 970 EVO should be a good upgrade to the SSD Apple put in the MBP. I remember reading somewhere that the 970 EVO should give about 50%-60% increase in read and write speed, if not more. I am curious to see your experience. And I am also wondering about the ease of installation and whether you need any adapter for the SSD as Apple used its own type of connector.
 
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.
[doublepost=1554910965][/doublepost]
coldwaves said:
I have exactly the same mid 2015 MacBook Pro with the same configuration. I agree that it is useful to have 16GB memory, which is the maximum you can get from Apple that time. I don't see as much memory use as you. It is about 3.8GB with Safari opening MacRumors.com. But having a few apps open will quickly consume the memory. So I would second the suggestion of getting as large RAM as you can if you decide to buy a mid-2015 MBP.

Regarding the hard drive, I believe Apple actually uses Samsung SSD in this generation of MacBook Pro. But the Samsung 970 EVO should be a good upgrade to the SSD Apple put in the MBP. I remember reading somewhere that the 970 EVO should give about 50%-60% increase in read and write speed, if not more. I am curious to see your experience. And I am also wondering about the ease of installation and whether you need any adapter for the SSD as Apple used its own type of connector.
Click to expand...

This upgrade requires an adapter. I will let you know the results after the upgrade.
 
My 2012 MacBook Pro is the most reliable laptop I've ever owned. Someone bought it from me and they are still using it no problem, except for a battery replacement. My 2015 MacBook Pro is the 2nd most reliable laptop. Its 4 years old and works fine. The 2012 might be slow for a non-casual user but there is no application that is computationally demanding enough to think about upgrading my 2015.
 
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coldwaves said:
Great to find a Tex user! I just have MacTex on the computer, which use TexLive as the engine and TexShop as the editor. I am not a power user in any means so these basic tools are sufficient for my need. I like the clean interface and simplicity of TexShop. Many of my friends like TextMate, a general text editor that can edit LaTex file as well. Some of my computer science friends likes Sublime with packages for Tex document editing.
Click to expand...

My 50 cents on this:

I just use Text Mate 2, haven't found anything more convenient. But these days I rarely use LaTeX directly, I write markdown with some custom Pandoc filters, works like a charm and is more straight-forward.
 
leman said:
My 50 cents on this:

I just use Text Mate 2, haven't found anything more convenient. But these days I rarely use LaTeX directly, I write markdown with some custom Pandoc filters, works like a charm and is more straight-forward.
Click to expand...

Yeah, many of my graduate school friends use Markdown, particularly R markdown so that they integrate document writing, data analysis, and figure production together.
 
coldwaves said:
Yeah, many of my graduate school friends use Markdown, particularly R markdown so that they integrate document writing, data analysis, and figure production together.
Click to expand...

I had a look at Markdown and it looks like a different product. I also had a look at MathJax which is an interesting concept but it looks like both of these just want to support TeX and LaTeX for math mode and don't really support LaTeX for writing books.
 
i have both late 2014 mbp and 2018 both 15"
both are great, just the 2018 is much better in almost everyway
i should reco 2018, those quad cores for the 13" or 6 cores i7, also better ssd
About keyboards:
-as typing feeling i still think i prefer the scissor keyboard but i think this is because i still use them both
-i type faster on the new ones
-i prefer the backlit keyboard of the 2018 one
About Speakers
- no doubt the 2018 one , now that apple fixed a lot of audio issues with the 10.14.4
Display
- clear the winner is the 2018
Battery life
-i still get around 6-7 hours of my late 2014 mbp at light-medium usage (around 2 hours under fully loaded)
-i get on the same load around 9-10 hours on the 2018 (around 3-4 hours under fully load)
Trackpad
-first i felt its too big the 2018 one, but after around 20 hours spent on it, i like it a lot
- i feel the tiny trackpad on the 2014 mbp in not a good way, also click noise is worse than 2018
Build quality
- i prefer the 2018 because of the hinge, the combo of the lighter lid and also lighter hinge, gives you a more pleasant feeling when you close/open it
Ports
-clear the 2018, because you can do almost endless things with usbC/tb3
 
I have a mid 2014 13”, a 2018 13”, and now, after a repair, a 2017 15”. I’ve also had various laptops (air & other mbp’s) since about 2008/9.

I’ll take the 2018 13” mbp w/tb over all of them, any day (mid ‘14 as a close second, but it can’t touch the power of the ‘18).
 
I just got the 2017 13" MacBook Pro Non-Touchbar Brand new from Best Buy. I have to say I love it. I'm not a power user. Just web browsing, emails, word processing, catching up on my shows. text messaging when I don't feel like tracking down my phone, and FaceTime. I kept going back and forth between Windows, Chrome, an ended up back to Mac, which works excellent with my iPhone 7plus. I no desire to get anything newer. This is more than enough for my needs. :)
 
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coldwaves said:
I have exactly the same mid 2015 MacBook Pro with the same configuration. I agree that it is useful to have 16GB memory, which is the maximum you can get from Apple that time. I don't see as much memory use as you. It is about 3.8GB with Safari opening MacRumors.com. But having a few apps open will quickly consume the memory. So I would second the suggestion of getting as large RAM as you can if you decide to buy a mid-2015 MBP.

Regarding the hard drive, I believe Apple actually uses Samsung SSD in this generation of MacBook Pro. But the Samsung 970 EVO should be a good upgrade to the SSD Apple put in the MBP. I remember reading somewhere that the 970 EVO should give about 50%-60% increase in read and write speed, if not more. I am curious to see your experience. And I am also wondering about the ease of installation and whether you need any adapter for the SSD as Apple used its own type of connector.
Click to expand...

I installed the Samsung EVO 500GB in my MacBook Pro mid 2015. This was the easiest installation I have done. Before the upgrade the disk speed was:

BEFORE: 1210 writing and 1880 reading

AFTER: 2440 writing and 3027 reading

Machine feels fast.
 
TokMok3 said:
I installed the Samsung EVO 500GB in my MacBook Pro mid 2015. This was the easiest installation I have done. Before the upgrade the disk speed was:

BEFORE: 1210 writing and 1880 reading

AFTER: 2440 writing and 3027 reading

Machine feels fast.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the updates. What adapter did you use for the Samsung EVO SSD?
 
Would it be a terrible thing if I were to ask if there is a particular YT video everyone watches to perform this spectacular feat of technical precision? (I want to swap out my SSD too, and it might save me untold amounts of time searching through posts and previewing every video ever made on the subject :)
 
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