Mac mini vs MacBook Pro 13" with retina display

Either one will meet your needs fine. The laptop has a little better graphics but the Mini has a lot more on-board storage.

The laptop has its own screen and KB and mouse/trackpad so it is more portable.

Both Macs should be supported for the same amount of time in the future. However, the laptop is more prone to damage jut because it gets moved a lot.

SPrent16 wrote:

• MacBook Pro with Retina Display 13" 2.7GHz 8GB RAM 256GB SSD (see it here)
• Mac Mini 2.8GHz 8GB RAM 1TB Fusion Drive (see it here)

So, to summarise:

• The Mac must last me for the next 5-6 years; I don't want to have to replace it between now and then if that can be avoided
• I would like it to be portable enough to carry it around rarely, even if I have to plug it into a monitor somewhere
• It must have an SSD
• I would like to have a machine which is going to run productivity applications (like MS Office) fairly quickly; I shan't be using quad-core programs much (if at all)
• I am a University student, so keeping costs down would be appreciated as well!

I agree with everything lllaass mentioned.

Personally, I would recommend the laptop as it should do everything you want and easily last 5-6 years. It's also much more mobile than a Mac Mini that requires a monitor, keyboard and mouse. I have a late-2012 13" Retina MBP and it's performing just like new. With the laptop, you can also use Clamshell Mode which lets you connect a keyboard, mouse and monitor to it with the lid closed. Or you can keep the lid open to give yourself dual monitors. So you have the flexibility with the laptop to use it daily like a desktop. I use the wireless Apple trackpad and keyboard and just the laptop's screen on a daily basis because I like the Retina screen presentation. Cost-wise, the Mac Mini is less expensive, but it's not as mobile unless you have a monitor/keyboard/mouse where ever you take it to use.

As far as storage, a 256GB SSD should be plenty for your needs and is fast with the current technology of a PCI-e bus. Any files that begin to load up the SSD that could be archived could be placed onto an external USB 3 drive freeing up space on the SSD and still accessible. The Mac Mini Fusion drive, so you know, has a 128GB SSD "fused" with a 1TB 5400rpm HDD. So the benefit is faster file retrieval for most frequently used files on the SSD. The CoreStorage functionality which is used to manage the Fusion drive, handles file management between the two drives. So you don't get 1TB of SSD unlike the laptop which is all SSD.

One other note, you might want to check out Apple's Refurbished page for Mac Minis and MBP Retinas. My Retina MBP and a late-2012 Mac Mini were both purchased from Apple's Refurbished pool and both are like brand new. No dents or dings or cosmetic issues, they both came with the same 1 year warranty and option for AppleCare and all the hardware functions exactly like a brand new Mac. So, you'll save some money on refurbished and still get an excellent product with the same warranty as new.

I’ve been telling my customers the same thing for 20 years: if you need portability buy a notebook otherwise buy a desktop. Of course past experience is no guarantee of the future but all my Macs have lasted at least 10 years except for a notebook that was totalled along with my car. I currently am running a Mac computer as my server that is 14 years old. Just because notebooks get carried around, bumped about, and the innards are crammed into tight quarters they are more fragile and liable to be damaged.

The 2014 model Retina you show in your link has the fast PCIe bus for the flash storage, just like the 2015 models. So you would be getting the same speed SSD flash storage as the 2015 model.

There was a bus upgrade from SATA SSD to the faster PCIe SSD in 2014.

The 2015 retina MBP SSD is significantly faster than the 2014 model’s.