To the collective IT minds of singletrack,,

Ok, so I've decided to blow a chunk of my annual bonus on a new 13 inch macbook pro, I'll use it for some word processing, spreadsheets etc so intend to get the iWorks installed on it. I'll also be using iTunes and doing some picture editing, but nothing too flash.

Should I splash the cash and go for the 4gb with 250g hard drive or will the 2gb with 160g hard drive be fast enough? I've heard macbooks tend to be quicker than pcs. But this may be a myth. It's an extra £250 so I don't want to spend if I don't have to.

I'm not into buying it,cracking it open and upgrading anything. I'd just break it so I want the best out of the box option.

I'm also going to invest in an external hard drive, I've lost too much stuff through pcs dying over the years so it makes sense to back up when I can. Any suggestions for sub £100 external hard drives?

Cheers

Big G

I'd go for the cheapest one available because to be honest you could do all the above on an iPhone 😉

On a serious note though just go for a low-end one because unless you are doing higher end graphics work (which you are not) then you don't need a biggy. Spend the money on two good drives and use them in conjunction with Time Machine as a fully automated, mirrored back-up solution. Simple and effective.

never mind go for the cheapest one, dont go for any MAC unless you are using Photoshop, or want to write a hit single for Jedwood and the Cheeky girls!!!!!!!!! for normal people macs ate B*****it!!!!!!!!

Stevie, thanks for that. I already have an iPhone and struggle to do much of the above without driving myself nuts.

I've been looking at the "configure your own" options on the apple website and it looks like i can buy the £918 pro, upgrade the processor and hard drive and get the same spec for £1100 quid, quite a saving, unless I've missed the obvious somewhere

G

The Lacie Rugged ones are firewire and USB, but cost a fair bit more than a standard Iomega Select for example.

If you haven't made up your mind on the Macbook Pro, let me know as I have a Dell XPS Studio 1340 that I'm selling. It'll be in the classifieds shortly. Slightly higher spec to the MBP.

It's probably worth holding off buying unless you're desperate, new MBP's are probably just around the corner!

I got my 13" MBP just after release, and went for the 2/160GB option, and then upgraded to 4/500GB… I know you say you don't want to, but it's cheap and really very easy (I'm sure somebody would do it for you if you're not happy yourself!). To be honest, it doesn't sound like you'd need the 4GB of RAM, but only you know how much storage space you need on the laptop itself!

Western Digital, and Samsung external drives are nice and good VFM, but to be honest you can't really go too far wrong!

You wont really need the additional RAM. I need mine for photo editing and i currently only have 2gb and it pretty much copes with everything, so you should be fine In terms of what size harddrive, well depends how much stuff you have! But if at some point in the future you did need more, its very very easy to upgrade it!

I have a neil poulton lacie 500gb and it works fine, pretty qucik for a USB drive aswell. Got it for about £50 off amazon!

My 15' MacBook pro burnt it self out last week and I replaced it with a MacBook and very happy with it, the LED back lit screen is amazing. I didn't need the SD slot or Firewire port and to be honest the back lit keyboard I found to be a pain.

I got mine from John Lewis as it was only £770 instead of £816 and they give an extra years warranty for nothing.

Just go for the £816 MacBook and give me the rest 😉

That's what I'm writing this on now (although an older model). I'm a designer and I use my studio G4 (old and trusty) for production and my MacBook for client meets and admin. It's perfect and bog standard! Like Alex said, you only need the extra performance if you are using creative apps (including, but not limited to, Photoshop).

Save yourself some pennies.

i have a 2.26mhz, 2gig ram 13 inch macbook pro, not sure if this is still current? it is fast enough for most things, at least for now. i can run Photoshop, office, etc. it might take a little longer to do things than a higher spec machine, but it is has been slow enough for me to think i should have spent the extra on the higher spec model.

Word of caution I hope it never happens to you but if you are going to spend a lot take out the extra warranty or insurance as a new logic board for mine was going to cost £900.

The RAM upgrade will cost £100 from Crucial and shouldn't be too much hassle to change at a later date. My macbook has a 120GB hard drive and to be honest I find it a little limiting so I keep movies and TV shows on a separate Hard Drive.

£100 will get you a 500GB external hard drive although be aware that this will drain the battery as the computer has to run two hard drives rather than just the one.

Thanks for all of this, having trawled the apple website and my paranoia about slow laptops I think I'll go for the 160gb hard drive but upgrade the processer to the 4g (only £80) to make sure.

I'll continue the search for a hard drive, it's unlikely I'll be away from a power supply for hours at a time so the power drag shouldn't be an issue for the amount of time i'll be using it.

BTW the MacBook comes with a 250gb hard drive.

I have a 13" alu macbook 13" (rebadged these days as macbook pros). I find 2gb memory plenty fast enough – but the 160g hard drive is a bit on the small side – i only have 18gb free and I don't feel I have much on here yet – so I may need to upgrade that soon.

I use a western digital 1tb My Book for time machine back-ups. I only plug it in once a week or so to back-up, but no problems at all. I got the "mac" version so it was all pre-formatted and ready to go

At the moment I see no reason to get a 13 inch Pro over the new white Macbook. Is a silver body or a FireWire port that important to you?

I recently bought the new full throttle MBP 13 with 320gb HD as I tend to keep a mac for years and years.. something saps with windows never get to enjoy. I discovered years ago buying the fastest processor you can afford will usually get you an extra year or more of life after 5 or 6 years when new apple software is all being written for the latest models with much faster processors than you have, that said my old 2004 12"PB G4 is still going well as is this 2005 2ghz dual G5 PowerMac. Drive wise i bought a lacie rugged and note that apple techs in the geek area use them. I could not live without firewire the sd slot is very useful as I do a lot of video and photo work. Firewire drives are a whole lot more versatile then usb, I dont miss the pcmcia slot i wish the 13 was the same dimensions as my 12

I have to agree with Kuco here, whatever you decide on, take out the extra Applecare warranty. It only takes one thing going wrong to pay for itself.

Big HD, minimal RAM.

Upgrading hard drive later is a bit of a PITA, upgrading the RAM later is a piece of piss (go to crucial.com, they tell you what you need and send it to you. You take the battery out and plug in two little boards that only go in one way).

Do you work in education in any way shape or form?? The apple educational discount is great and their definition of education is fairly broad:

For example just priced up the 13" MBP with 2.53GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor, 4Gb RAM and 500Gb hard drive – £1160.90

What makes you say that upgrading the HD is a PITA? They are right next to each other once you take the cover off – to take one out is the same as to take the other out, surely?

As far as transferring files, just stick the new drive in, install the Mac OS X disk and when it asks if you have a Time Machine backup, just say yes and where to find it.

Getting Apple to build the macbook of your desire with a big drive makes life easy, however hardrives are classified as a user upgradeable item and it does not void the warranty. Ever since my first mac in 1991 the world of mac users have been unified in that Apple ship macs with enough ram to run the operating system and Claris Works and for anyone want itng to do more you need at least to double the amount they give you.. shoving more of the stuff in is essential not advisable and before Billy G's boot boys turn up it's not just Apple doing this all pc manufacturers do the same or run with lots of low grade ram, lets them keep the rrp down. One of the benefits of dealing with an apple reseller rather than apple is often they give a rebate to cover the cost of the ram they take out…

Allthegear – Only said it was a bit of a PITA. The OP says he doesn't want to have to do too much to it as he probably break it. I've replaced the hard drives in both the mac laptops i've had and it's a bit more tricky than adding some RAM (speciallythe first time as it was pre time-machine). So IMHO large HD, minimal RAM would be the way to go for the OP to get a machine that works well out of the box and is easily and cheaply upgradable.

quick update on this..

My lovely new macbook pro arrived today, loving it so far, any top mac tips i should know?

G