Macbook pro 13-inch 2017 without TB i5 vs i7?

Hi,

No need to spend the extra $300 on the i7; it's only a little bit faster than the i5, less than 5%. Do spend the $200 on 16GBs of RAM though. 8GBs will be sufficient for now, but as time goes by and OSes and apps get more and more RAM hungry, 16 will be useful. Also, absolutely do not get the 128GBs of storage. It will not be enough in the very near future, especially considering your work with photos and videos. At least get the 256GB model ($200 more than the 128 base model) or, if you can afford it, get 512GBs of storage. I've heard plenty of people complain about not enough storage, but I can't think of a single person who's ever complained about too much storage.

The i7 is still dual core and just slightly clocked higher. There is no real advantage for the cost. The 2.3 i5 is very good. As others suggested you should get the extra ram. By the time you get extra ram and storage the price adds up quick. If you look around you can find last years 2016 15" model for a lot less than the new model. When you consider tax, apple care and any added options the 13" cost just about the same as the 15" and last years 2016 15" MacBook Pro has a 2.6 GHZ quad core Skylake processor, 16 gb ram and 256 gb ssd standard. You would also have an added bonus of a dedicated GPU for graphics which the 13" doesn't have. You will also get the Touch Bar. So from a photo editing stand point the 15" is much better and is still pretty light and portable being a student.

The new 13" model is pretty fast even with dual core but you will barely notice the $300 for the i7 but will notice a difference in the ram! Get the extra ram! Good luck!

if you plan to extend your abilities with photo and video editing then go for the most robust system you can afford to purchase or you may end up with a computer that does not address your needs and you may need to replace it sooner if it's not suitable to adapting to your progression with these hobbies and you plant to make them more professional.

If you do plan to use battery for editing do not expect the battery life to be anywhere near what Apple claims is the UP TO in their specs as tasks with editing images and videos can bring a battery down to the red as it exhausts power to meet your computers resource needs.