[convert31]

Hey folks I have long been a PC guy but the new MacBook Pro (MBP) has forced me to finally change sides. I am happy to say that my wife will be very please as she has been an incredibly loyal Apple consumer for over 20 years. Although I can barely stand her smug "you finally see the light" attitude I cannot deny how advanced the form and function of Mac products are in comparison to the competition. I will say however that I consider myself far from a newbie to technology and rolling up my sleeves and personally upgrading my hardware/software.

Now getting to the main event: I am going to purchase a MBP next Thursday but now after tirelessly researching my options and all the available after-market upgrades I have turned a joyous moment into an agonizing decision. Any and all advice/insight is greatly appreciated. Below is a break down of what I am considering and how I am rationalizing my purchase:


MACBOOK PRO 15-INCH

Processor - 2.3GHz Quad-core Intel Core i7
This is the max available when I configure my MBP online. This is an easy choice for me because I typically want the greatest computing power I can get my hands on and can afford. My primary reason for this is that I want a computer that will still hold its own in years to come. However, I am worried that MBPs with Intel's Ivybridge will come out in less than a year and I should simply wait. Although I am comfortable with pulling the trigger now because I know that the trend of faster processors constantly coming out is apart of the CPU culture.


Memory - 8GB 1333MHz DDR3 SDRAM - 2x4GB
Again this is the max that is offered on the Mac website so its a no brainer. Although, I was concerned about Apple's "All MacBook Pro models support up to 8 gigabytes of RAM" statement because I would like to upgrade my memory as the years pass. I did look on macsales.com (OWC) and see that there is currently a 16GB memory upgrade available. Is a 16GB memory upgrade even possible? If it is, is it the most I'll ever be able to upgrade my MBP with? I see 32GB (2x16GB) of memory being common place in the near future. Also, I was considering ordering my MBP with the stock 4GB (2x2GB) and upgrading the memory with 8GB (2x4GB) from OWC myself and save ~$100 but I questioned the quality difference between what I would get from apple and what I would get from OWC.


Hard Drive - 500GB Serial ATA Drive @ 7200 rpm
Although having 750GB is appealing the speed of the 500GB seals the deal for me and I have a 1TB external HD if I need extra storage. Honestly, to really the unlock the true power and speed of my MBP I plan on switching over to a 240 GB SSD as soon as they become more affordable or when I can afford their current price (~$400).


Display - Glossy Widescreen Display
I am convincing myself this is an area that I can save money without sacrificing having a great notebook. However, I am wondering if a $90 Hi-Res Glossy upgrade is really worth it or would even hurt. I mean, when spending $2k whats another $90? A drop in the bucket, right? Moreover, whats another $45 on top of that $90 for the top of the line Hi-Res Antiglare display?


Service and Support - AppleCare Protection Plan
I am sure you'll all recommend and agree that it is in my best interest to purchase this coverage with such an investment, right?


Please forgive me for the wordiness but as you can see my anxiety is getting the best of me. Hence, the above agonizing and ambivalence. Again, any and all advice/insight is VERY much appreciated.

[Lateralus]

RAM-wise, just get this.

[Waragainstsleep]

Processor:
There will almost always be a new one due within a year, worrying about it is silly so just go for the 2.3 if you can afford it.

RAM: 16GB is possible, OWC test all their kit with Apple products and most of their RAM is guaranteed for life which the Apple stuff is not. Its a no-brainer to go with the longer guarantee. I never heard of Mushkin so if quality is a concern I'd go with OWC personally. 8GB modules might be a bit over the top price wise for now though. I'd go with 8GB from OWC.

HDD/SSD:
If speed is your goal then the 500 is a better choice then the 750GB but you really want an SSD. The rule seems to be that third party SSDs are faster (sometimes much faster) but that Apples own drives support TRIM. I'm not convinced TRIM gives you that much of a benefit on a Mac but a lot of people will scream the opposite. Again I expect OWC is a good place to look for one.

Display:
I agree $90 on top of $2k is well worthwhile. It would cost a hell of lot more to do it later on. Antiglare is a personal thing. I don't have an issue with the glossy panels but several here do. I suggest you go into an Apple store and have a look for yourself. A lot of them do keep an antiglare model on display these days.

Applecare:
Great if you need it, very expensive if you don't. Much less expensive if you know someone who qualifies for an edu discount and is willing to but it for you later on.

[mduell]

My philosophy is you're better off planning for a 3 year replacement cycle (with an 18 month upgrade if you really want) rather than trying to max it out and having to use it longer (to keep the cost in budget).

CPU: The 2.3Ghz isn't cost effective over the 2.2Ghz model. Are you really going to be sitting there in 2-3 years and say "well I need a new laptop, this one is 3% too slow"? Putting that $250 into an SSD immediately will pay off way more. Unless you're really going to lean on the GPU (with one of those rare white moose OpenCL driven apps), I'd even say take the 2.0. You're looking at a ~10% performance difference and I'd repeat my question above.

RAM: Get 4GB from Apple, upgrade to 8GB immediately: it's practically free from Crucial ($53). Don't pay OWC's inflated prices, they've been scamming the Mac community for years. The memory and service from Crucial is fantastic. I expect you'll want 16GB in 18 months when the price becomes more reasonable like $100 instead of $1000.

HDD/SDD: GET SSD NOW. $400 OCZ Agility 3 240GB is my pick. The crippling of TRIM support for non-Apple SSDs is obnoxious, but if performance does degrade you can always boot into Windows and TRIM it. I like to stick the stock 500 or 750GB 5400RPM drive in the optical bay (you need like a $50 bracket) since it doesn't support BluRays anyway and I almost never use DVDs. Not much reason to get the faster drive since you're getting the SSD from the start.

Display: Get the resolution upgrade unless your sight is going bad. Glossy vs matte is all about personal preference, try both (ideally outside an Apple store) and see what you like.

AppleCare: Given the price of Apple's replacement logic boards/displays, it's a bad idea not to get it, especially if you can get someone with the edu discount to buy it.

[convert31]

Man.....Everybody, thank you so very much for all the input. Its funny, this is my first foray into actually engaging in a forum instead of simply reading them.

First, I apologize for not including my usage. I may have subconsciously left it out because I don't want you all making fun of me for being that guy who likes to have a Ferrari engine under the hood but never take her over 80MPH...silly i know (especially because i consider myself a frugal guy as well). Honestly, although currently my uses are quite pedestrian, at various points in my life I find myself doing all kinds things (CAD, photo/video editing, gaming, etc) and I want to be sure when it comes up my CPU can cover my needs as much as possible. That is why I really want the 2.3GHz. With your input, I think I will save on the memory and upgrade with a 8GB (crucial or OWC) myself. It does seems like more people recommend crucial over OWC, what do you think? I realize it may be a "splitting hairs" question but I thought i would still ask. Also I will be sure to go to the Apple store and check out the different displays. I really want a SSD but I would only be able to afford the 120GB and my current CPU that I bought in 2007 has 150GB and I was hoping my next CPU would have more as I often have to delete and/or move things to my external HD to make space.

I plan on buying my MBP with edu discount but I am intrigued by the comments about the educational discount helping with the AppleCare Plan. Are you saying I can think of the $100 you save going towards this cost or does the edu discount affect the cost of the AppleCare Plan directly? I hope the question is clear.

@mduell: In terms of the SSD, i heard about the issue with TRIM and I am excited about your solution of booting in Windows. However, I have no idea how a guy like myself with a 15" MBP would achieve this. My guess is that I would run something like Boot Camp?

[Waragainstsleep]

Applecare plans are up to 70% off with an edu discount.

Will Windows TRIM an HFS+ volume?

[SierraDragon]

Buy now or wait?
Unequivocally, buy now.

CPU
IMO the graphics processing difference from the 2.0 configuration to the 2.2/2.3 configuration is very significant but the CPU difference from 2.2 to 2.3 is insignificant relative to the $250 extra cost.

Memory
Buy 2x4 GB via third party and install it yourself. Lots of tiny screws but the process is easy enough. I buy from OWC but Crucial is also good. OWC will buy back the original two 2-GB DIMMs from Apple.

Mass Storage
SSD from Apple. IMO having this still-evolving technology directly under the Apple warranty provides significant value add. And at only +$100 the 128 GB SSD is an absolute bargain. SSD is the only way to go in a performance laptop. Note that 2.5" laptop hard drives just do not perform like desktop drives do.

If a 128 GB SSD is not enough on-board mass storage, replace the optical drive with a third-party hard drive.

I cannot say enough good things about the MBP/SSD combination. The SSD literally changes workflows in ways one might not expect. E.g. when Photoshop CS5 loads in less than 3 seconds there is no need to have it open all the time, sucking RAM when working in Aperture. Or, since it only takes 20 seconds to boot one gets used to shutting down more often - which saves battery and clears memory leaks.

Display
Personally I prefer the added screen real estate, EC/34 slot and pixel count of the 17" size. When I finally moved to the 17" size I was amazed at how much better everything works on the 75% more pixels and hella more screen real estate of the 17" size. And I use it in my lap a lot. OTOH some folks connect to external displays most of the time, in which case the value of the 17" size diminishes.

High resolution 15" or 17" displays do have a downside of smaller fonts that some folks including me do not like. Personally I tolerate the small fonts because images are much better viewed on high-resolution. Someday we should get resolution-independence out of the OS but I am not holding my breath.
 
Many image pros prefer anti-glare displays and I am one of them. The glare displays absolutely gag me, but it is each individual's choice. Check them all out at an Apple Store, and experience the various different lighting angles that are forced on us when we use a mobile display. Also evaluate high resolution vs. regular resolution. Like War said, choice of display size and type is a matter of personal preference.

AppleCare
At $349 AppleCare is IMO much too expensive, but folks report $185 cost via third-party which makes AppleCare more reasonable.

I went through this same decision-making early this year and bought a 17" MBP: 2.2 GHz, 128 GB Apple SSD, high rez matte display. Added 2x4 GB RAM from OWC, a vendor that I rate at 5 stars after using them for more than a decade. I will be replacing the optical drive with an OWC hard drive or SSD, and that chore I may send the MBP to OWC to do.

HTH

-Allen Wicks

[Edit] P.S. The trouble with booting into Windows is that you need to own a copy of Windows...

[Waragainstsleep]

Swapping the ODD out is no more taxing than doing the RAM. Its like 3 extra screws.

[CharlesS]

The next MBP probably won't have an optical drive in it. This, combined with the fact that the current MBPs are awesome, leads me to conclude that now is a great time to buy a MBP.

[Lateralus]

Originally Posted by SierraDragon 

OWC will buy back the original two 2-GB DIMMs from Apple.

How gracious of them...

3rd Party 2GB DDR3 module - $6.00
Apple Original 2GB DDR3 module - $7.00

Ouch.

[mduell]

Originally Posted by convert31 

First, I apologize for not including my usage. I may have subconsciously left it out because I don't want you all making fun of me for being that guy who likes to have a Ferrari engine under the hood but never take her over 80MPH...silly i know (especially because i consider myself a frugal guy as well). Honestly, although currently my uses are quite pedestrian, at various points in my life I find myself doing all kinds things (CAD, photo/video editing, gaming, etc) and I want to be sure when it comes up my CPU can cover my needs as much as possible. That is why I really want the 2.3GHz.

It sounds like the 2.2Ghz/6750M is the better choice for you over the 2.0Ghz/6490M.

You are severely degrading your experience by deferring the SSD, or going with small SSD, to get a 3% clockrate bump. After I switched to SSD based systems I'll never go back. There is no difference between the 2.2 and 2.3Ghz models w/r/t their ability to cover your needs. Consider your current computer. Would it be fine for another year if it had a 3% higher clockrate?

I wouldn't object so strongly to the 2.3 if you had the budget to get the 2.3 and a 240+GB SSD. But to give up the larger SSD for 3% clockrate is insane.

Originally Posted by convert31 

With your input, I think I will save on the memory and upgrade with a 8GB (crucial or OWC) myself. It does seems like more people recommend crucial over OWC, what do you think? I realize it may be a "splitting hairs" question but I thought i would still ask.

There's no reason to get ripped off by OWC. They're a cancer on the Mac community. Crucial has great products and support.

Originally Posted by convert31 

@mduell: In terms of the SSD, i heard about the issue with TRIM and I am excited about your solution of booting in Windows. However, I have no idea how a guy like myself with a 15" MBP would achieve this. My guess is that I would run something like Boot Camp?

Yes, you'd run Boot Camp to partition the drive, then install Windows.

Originally Posted by SierraDragon 

OWC will buy back the original two 2-GB DIMMs from Apple.

This is a bad idea given the ongoing flak from AppleDoesn'tCare when users have 3rd party RAM installed. You want to switch back to the OEM RAM if you ever have to take it back for service.

Originally Posted by SierraDragon 

SSD from Apple. IMO having this still-evolving technology directly under the Apple warranty provides significant value add.

Utter bollocks and FUD. Apple's warranty provides no advantage with the SSD, and their SSDs are not very good.

[SierraDragon]

Originally Posted by mduell 

This is a bad idea given the ongoing flak from AppleDoesn'tCare when users have 3rd party RAM installed. You want to switch back to the OEM RAM if you ever have to take it back for service.

Very good point.

Utter bollocks and FUD. Apple's warranty provides no advantage with the SSD, and their SSDs are not very good.

Not FUD. As you point out with the RAM reinstallation, there is great benefit in being able to assign 100% turnkey responsibility to Apple when a problem occurs. And reinstalling RAM is one thing, but reinstalling a boot drive to go in for warranty service seems a bit much. OTOH (arguing against myself) taking out the boot drive before a trip to Apple is probably a very good idea since Apple Service does not precopy drive data and may wipe data.

I do agree that third party SSDs are probably better but at this point there just seem to be enough evolving variables of hardware, firmware and OS that sticking with the $100 Apple SSD makes sense (for the free warranty year anyway), and adding mass storage when needed by replacing the optical drive.

...After I switched to SSD based systems I'll never go back.

Me too.

-Allen

[SierraDragon]

Originally Posted by Waragainstsleep 

Swapping the ODD out is no more taxing than doing the RAM. Its like 3 extra screws.

Thanks for that! I will do it myself.

-Allen

[OreoCookie]

Originally Posted by SierraDragon 

\And reinstalling RAM is one thing, but reinstalling a boot drive to go in for warranty service seems a bit much. OTOH (arguing against myself) taking out the boot drive before a trip to Apple is probably a very good idea since Apple Service does not precopy drive data and may wipe data.

That has nothing to do with you changing the hard drive. It is a user replaceable part and so Apple will service your machine just fine if you have upgraded your hard drive.

[convert31]

I just got back from the Mac store and spent about an hour talking with the geniuses and checking out the difference in displays. My excitement continues to build, I feel so ridiculous for getting this excited but I can't help it. One thing that they repeatedly said was replacing the optical drive with a hard drive would void the warranty. Can anyone confirm this? Perhaps the obvious thing to do is put the original optical drive back in if I ever need to take it in for service.

I must admit, more and more I am being convinced and persuaded to save $ money and get the 2.2GHz (rather than the 2.3GHz) and spend that $ (plus some extra $) on the Hi Res anti-glare display and a 240GB SSD. I know this question has been asked a million times before but forgive me for asking it one more time, is the difference between the 2.3GHz and 2.2GHz really that negligible?

[SierraDragon]

Originally Posted by convert31 

...is the difference between the 2.3GHz and 2.2GHz really that negligible?

Yes the clock difference is negligible. I guess certain apps might notice the small L3 cache difference but unless you specifically intend primarily using such an app it is not worth $250.

[SierraDragon]

Originally Posted by convert31 

One thing that they repeatedly said was replacing the optical drive with a hard drive would void the warranty. Can anyone confirm this?

I do not know for sure, but I would guess that making a two-drive box out of a box engineered for only one drive would qualify as a warranty-voiding action. That won't stop me from doing it or OWC, MCE, etc. selling the hardware to do it with.

Perhaps the obvious thing to do is put the original optical drive back in if I ever need to take it in for service.

Yup.


-Allen

[Lateralus]

I'm amazed Apple offers 2.3GHz as an upgrade option, especially for $250 - it's a waste of money in every measurable way.

Indeed, invest that money elsewhere.

[Waragainstsleep]

Apple and its employees are absolute sticklers for details.
Case in point, I was helping a customer get their free Lion upgrades having bought Macs after June 6th but before it shipped. They sent Apple a scan of their Apple Store receipt and were rejected because the Apple receipt itself does not explicitly state the date on it. Each item on an Apple store receipt has a latest return date on it which is always 14 days after the date of sale and the reference number by the barcode actually starts with the date of sale before an Apple generated reference number. Despite this, they failed to take it as-is as appropriate POP.

Replacing the optical drive before servicing is the way to do it. What they don't know will not hurt (or confuse) them.

[convert31]

Alright folks, thanks to all your great input I am zeroing in on my purchase specs (which feels like a major accomplishment). Here it is:

15-inch MacBook Pro - $2,373.00

- 2.2GHz Quad-core Intel Core i7
- 4GB 1333MHz DDR3 SDRAM - 2x2GB
- 500GB Serial ATA Drive @ 7200 rpm
- Hi-Res Antiglare Widescreen Display

As soon as I get my MBP I will immediately upgrade the memory to 8GB. However, I am unsure which after-market brand to go with. It almost seems like there some political thing with OWC. I noticed a couple comments about "OWC's inflated prices" and that they've been "scamming the Mac community for years." On the other hand the same individual said that the "memory and service from Crucial is fantastic." I typically like information (including prices) that is unbiased and based on specifics to help me make an informed decision.

As for the 240GB SSD, I think I'll have to wait a lil while (in other words, a couple paychecks) until I can upgrade this part of the equation because $2400 is plenty to spend right now. However, I would like some solid insight on available SSD options. After stumbling upon a great article (Best SSD Upgrades for the MacBook Pro | MacGateway) I discovered that all SSDs not are not created equal (e.g. different rates of sequential read/write & random read/write). Ultimately, I want to experience the "once you go SSD you'll never go back" feeling. Also, discussions around issues with TRIM and the longevity of SSDs have me somewhat concerned. Again, any insight with these dynamics is very (very) much appreciated.

[SierraDragon]

Originally Posted by convert31 

... I want to experience the "once you go SSD you'll never go back" feeling.

It only takes +$100 to Apple. Yes there are lots of choices and variety among SSDs and some much faster than others, but any SSD is orders of magnitude faster than a 2.5" laptop hard drive.

[CharlesS]

Originally Posted by convert31 

As soon as I get my MBP I will immediately upgrade the memory to 8GB. However, I am unsure which after-market brand to go with. It almost seems like there some political thing with OWC. I noticed a couple comments about "OWC's inflated prices" and that they've been "scamming the Mac community for years." On the other hand the same individual said that the "memory and service from Crucial is fantastic." I typically like information (including prices) that is unbiased and based on specifics to help me make an informed decision.

Crucial is the consumer division of Micron, which is one of the most respected memory brands on the market. OWC RAM is a store brand. Not only that; it's a store brand that often costs as much as Crucial, and sometimes more.

OWC makes some nice stuff (I really like their external disk enclosures), and I certainly wouldn't call them a "cancer on the Mac community", but for RAM I'd go with Crucial over them any day.

[Lateralus]

Indeed, I love OWC as well, they produce some fantastic peripherals and they're about as friendly to deal with as you could reasonably expect from any medium business. But their memory pricing has never really been enticing to me.

[Waragainstsleep]

Compared to some of the other Apples specialist resellers and manufacturers OWC have been brilliant for many many years. Compare their prices to an average Authorised Service Centre and you might see what I mean.

I used to see a lot of Crucial RAM fail back when I was an AASP service tech. On that note, I never penalised anyone for having third party RAM in their in-warranty Mac and in my more recent experience Apple Stores seem happy to put Apple branded RAM in for testing purposes when they need to.