Specs for a Macbook Pro

£3000 is insane! I got my wife an HP Probook 14" for £700 that would work fine, but for £900 (less about £50 cashback) you can have this 15.6" probook with 16GB RAM, fast processor, 15.6" screen, and a separate GPU that would work great!

But its running W10

I'm platform agnostic: had been a PC user for 3D animation and recently have whole Apple environment devices (iPhone, iPad Pro, and MacBook Pro). There's no doubt that the MacBook is way more expensive compared to PC. But what you get is the Mac OS (as I've needed for that intension) and good specs for a portable workstation (multicore i-9 in small form factor). I do think it funny that you can find a cheap PC laptop that has touchscreen, while Apple is adamant that a touchbar is all you need. For software development, I am enjoying the certain ease I'm finding with a Unix environment. But I'm also finding I should stay cross platform. Just recently have been having to scan documents with my older Canon flatbed scanner. The Mac will not recognize it unless I buy 3rd party software, while Windows 10 recognizes it and can easily scan with WIA import.

I'm a long time Mac user who is just now putting my toes back in the PC water with Windows 10. But I've still got a recent IMac and Macbook pro to compare.

I love the Mac operating system. Windows just feels clunky and counterintuitive. But there is a very steep premium for Mac hardware, particularly when you're talking about increasing performance with faster CPU, increased SSD space and memory. That stuff is dirt cheap for PCs and user upgradeable. Not so for current Macs with a few exceptions like memory on IMacs.

I do a lot of digital photography using mostly Capture One, Photoshop and some Lightroom. On my IMac, during some recent testing of hardware to see where the bottle necks are, it seems having the editing program and raw files located on the Mac's internal drive gave the most significant improvement in speed. Mac has a very well implemented and particularly speedy internal SSD system. I think the speed increase accessing working files on internal drives versus even the fastest thunderbolt 3 external connections is almost always in the range of one hundred to several hundred percent.

I first noticed this trying to back up a large Capture One catalog to an external SSD via thunderbolt 3. I thought something was wrong. For an internal backup it would usually take about 30 seconds. The first time I tried it to external SSD it took several minutes. I tried various external drives and connections all with the same or worse results compared to internal backups.

I don't think getting a faster processor or adding more ram is likely to produce speed gains above one hundred to several hundred percent.

So, I'd probably opt for a system that had a minimum of about 16g ram but with as large an internal SSD as possible -- at least a 2tb or 4tb. And I'd keep all my current working files on the internal drive.

I don't do much video editing so this applies mostly to doing stills with the above mentioned programs.

I’d still downplay needing a large internal SDD with the MacBook Pro. Reason being that for system files, it’s going to be way less than 1TB, you can easily save data via the external thunderbolt 3, and since everything is soldered onto the Mac, you will lose all data if there is a short (when certain Youtube channels do highlight how there are some certain cheap chips on the logic board short and render the SSD dead).

davesrose wrote in post #19075926
I’d still downplay needing a large internal SDD with the MacBook Pro. Reason being that for system files, it’s going to be way less than 1TB, you can easily save data via the external thunderbolt 3, and since everything is soldered onto the Mac, you will lose all data if there is a short (when certain Youtube channels do highlight how there are some certain cheap chips on the logic board short and render the SSD dead).

That's what backups are for.

Accessing externally stored raw files substantially increases wait times and imo far exceeds any gains made with faster processors and/or more memory by many orders of magnitude. Even with a relatively slow processor in my basic MacBook Pro with 8g ram and 500gb internal ssd, I have almost instantaneous execution of any editing changes in Capture One or Photoshop. But when using external storage of raw files there is always a bit of a delay accessing new files, saving them and generating previews. That wait time is cut drastically if I transfer those same files to the internal drive.

You're not wrong but whilst I'm not an Apple fanboy by any means it's not a wholly fair comparison. The PC would definitely work but it doesn't list the gen. of the i7- the clock speed is under half that of the Macbook base build, the SSD is half the size, it's a lower res screen and the GPUs are barely comparable - https://gpu.userbenchm​ark.com …ro-5500M/m439531vsm960765

I tried to build a Dell XPS to as near as the Macbook spec as I could and it was 'only' £300 less. I'm willing to pay that premium for the support you get at the end of the phone but I'm aware it doesn't add up for some.

For my sins, I also collect watches which is another area where I am frequently convinced to spend over the odds on shiny things...

I find I have plenty of space with 500GB to have all my programs, development projects, current photos I’m editing, current videos I’m compressing, and Bootcamp installed. I’ll offload data files when I’m done with them...but even so, the new external thunderbolt 3 SSDs are quite fast on their own.

Held off on the purchase as I found a decent SSD and the kit to get the front off the old iMac. Someone is going to give me some extra RAM and assures me you can actually fit to the 2015 model. We’ll see how that turns out

Man good luck as that procedure is not for the faint of heart.

gossamer88 wrote in post #19079024
Man good luck as that procedure is not for the faint of heart.

Yep, I would be reading the thread at https://forums.macrumo​rs.com …ion-drive-to-ssd.2123013/ and make sure this “kit” has all the needed parts. In the thread there is mention of a drive mounting bracket, some form of cable, some special tools, etc. Getting the original machine open and finding you need parts isn’t fun!

Update - this model didn't need the thermal sensor cable so it was a pretty simple swap out for the SSD. RAM can't be touched as I suspected. Strangely only this particular iteration of iMacs came with it soldered on. Anyway, this thing is flying now. Boot up is under 10 seconds (it was minutes), reading from disk is instant in Photoshop and even Lightroom has no lag.

Now, what to spend the saved money on instead.....?