2012 MacBook Air running Photoshop and Logic Pro

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Level 1

8 points

2012 MacBook Air running Photoshop and Logic Pro

Looking to buy a laptop. The most I do with my current iMac is record music using logic pro, edit video in iMovie and edit photos in photoshop.

I'm planning on travelling for a decent length of time and would like to continue to do this on a laptop.

The weight and SSD of the macbook air are really appealing to me. I'm wondering if it will be able to perform the above tasks? I read some reviews of people using photoshop on a 2011 macbook air with no issues, and from what I understand, the cheapest 2012 macbook air 13' is faster then the ultimate macbook air of 2011?

So I'm considering purchasing a 2012 MacBook air 13' with the 1.8GHz dual-core Intel Core i5 and upgrading the RAM from 4gb to 8gb.

Will this be able to meet my needs? I say I will be editing photos and recording music with it, but I'm still really amateur and I'm sure my needs are also.

Posted on Jun 18, 2012 3:42 AM

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Answer 1

dwb

Level 7

33,256 points

Jun 18, 2012 6:07 AM in response to SpiFace

The big question is ports and the lesser question is drive space. My original video camera only had a FireWire port and if it hadn't died a horrible death last summer I'd not be able to use my MBA to transfer the video. Similarly, what port do you use to import audio into your computer? The MBA has only USB and Thunderbolt and right now there are a shortage of Thunderbolt adapters.

Also, for me, 256GB is sufficient for my needs but that's because I only edit short videos (less than 10 mintes) on it. Longer videos I do on my iMac because there's not enough room on my MBA and USB isn't fast enough to conveniently work from.

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Answer 2

dwb

Level 7

33,256 points

Jun 18, 2012 7:27 AM in response to SpiFace

iMovie & PS both run great on the 2011 MBA so they're gonna run okay on the new ones. Check the Pro forums to so about the other 2

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Answer 3

SpiFace Author

Level 1

8 points

Jun 18, 2012 6:36 AM in response to dwb

Thanks for the reply DWB,

USB should be fine as far as I can see. Is there a firewire adaptor just in case?

I was planning on keeping an external drive, and if I wanted to edit any substantial amount of footage, transfer it from the external drive to the MBA hardrive then just edit it from there.

The main thing I'm wondering about is wheter or not the applications photoshop CS6, imovie (maybe even final cut pro?) and logic pro will run smoothly on a 2012 13-inch 1.8GHv i5 macbook air with 8gb ram.

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Answer 4

SpiFace Author

Level 1

8 points

Jun 18, 2012 8:38 PM in response to SpiFace

Thanks, any other opinions?

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