Best MacBook for a med student (5 years)

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Best MacBook for a med student (5 years)

I'm currently looking to buy a laptop for my course in college and preferably the one I choose would last for as much of my degree as possible, a bit over 5 years. My main concern then is longevity and I'm trying to choose accordingly.

At the moment I'm thinking of getting the 13-inch 2.7GHz Retina MacBook Pro with 128GB storage. I also want to upgrade the RAM to 16GB so that it'll still be able to keep pace with software a few years down the road.

In terms of budget I'm trying to keep it reasonable (i.e. I'm not going to max out all of the specs just for the sake of it) but at the same time this is a bit of an investment and if there's an upgrade that could potentially buy the laptop another year or two of life it'll be worth it. Do you think this setup is decent? Do you think 128GB is enough, considering that in terms of usage I'd usually have 2 or 3 games and for my documents and other media I'd be happy to supplement the SSD with external storage? I don't think I'll update the CPU but any opinions on that would also be more than welcome.

Thank you!

Michael.

Posted on Mar 29, 2015 1:07 PM

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Answer 1

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dwb

Level 7

32,920 points

Mar 29, 2015 2:00 PM in response to MichaelFeely

I’ve maintained that the two primary upgrades to seriously consider are RAM and SSD. Obviously there’s no way to upgrade the RAM and given that the last notebook 3rd party vendors offered an SSD upgrade for was the 2013 it is safe to assume there will be no SSD upgrade coming. Your decision to upgrade RAM is a good one. Frankly I think you would be wrong not to upgrade to the 256GB SSD. I’ve played the “I don’t have enough space so I have to improvise” game and I repeatedly lost. Granted, the 13” rMBP has an SD slot so you can improvise additional storage with an SD card - and there are flush mounting SD cards for just that purpose. I used one myself - and I had a 256GB SSD on my MBA. As a student you are going to have all kinds of book files on your computer and I wouldn’t be surprised given what you’ll be studying if they aren’t picture and diagram heavy which will be bigger than your typical eBook. Add some music, a couple videos and poof, 128GB is gone.

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Answer 2

OGELTHORPE

Level 9

57,305 points

Mar 29, 2015 2:05 PM in response to MichaelFeely

In my opinion, the ideal Mac for a scholastic environment is a 13' Mackbook Air. It is light and has excellent battery run time. It may not be as powerful as a MBP, but configured properly, it will be more than ample to accommodate your needs and with a lesser cash outlay. Food for thought.

Ciao.

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