The Notebook Review forums were hosted by TechTarget, who shut down them down on January 31, 2022. This static read-only archive was pulled by NBR forum users between January 20 and January 31, 2022, in an effort to make sure that the valuable technical information that had been posted on the forums is preserved. For current discussions, many NBR forum users moved over to NotebookTalk.net after the shutdown.
Problems? See this thread at archive.org.

    Buying new 13" rMBP

    Discussion in 'Apple and Mac OS X' started by burkle25, Dec 1, 2013.

  1. burkle25

    burkle25 Are you a color?

    Reputations:
    1,339
    Messages:
    898
    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    30
    I am going to buy one within the next two weeks. I am getting the 1499 spec'd system

    13-inch: 2.4GHz
    with Retina display
    Specifications
    2.4GHz dual-core Intel Core i5
    Turbo Boost up to 2.9GHz
    8GB 1600MHz memory
    256GB PCIe-based flash storage1
    Intel Iris Graphics

    My question is: should I upgrade to 16GB ram? I normally upgrade my computer every two years or so. Is there a big jump in performance? I've had trouble finding articles comparing 8 and 16gb ram in graphic intensive applications. The new thing for me, I'll be lightly running Final Cut Pro, from a hard drive, and doing the more intensive work on my iMac. I do not want the 15".

    Also, which OWC external hard drive? @ least 500GB.

    Thanks :)
     
    burkle25, Dec 1, 2013
    #1
  2. Zero000

    Zero000 Notebook Deity

    Reputations:
    26
    Messages:
    902
    Likes Received:
    69
    Trophy Points:
    41
    The CPU will likely hold up back so you may not get the full benefit of the 16GB of RAM. You can always benefit from more RAM if you use a RAM disk though.
     
    Zero000, Dec 1, 2013
    #2
  3. KCETech1

    KCETech1 Notebook Prophet

    Reputations:
    2,527
    Messages:
    4,112
    Likes Received:
    449
    Trophy Points:
    151
    with FCP, I do recommend 16 especially if you are working in HD or higher and too many effects. if you get into heavy or 4K editing you will probably find 16 even not enough. for light projects or partial edits to run on a larger machine 8 may be sufficient.

    ( assuming FCP-X and associated plugins and third party add ons )
     
    KCETech1, Dec 2, 2013
    #3
  4. Zero000

    Zero000 Notebook Deity

    Reputations:
    26
    Messages:
    902
    Likes Received:
    69
    Trophy Points:
    41
    Wouldn't the CPU hold back the performance or are those things purely RAM intensive?
     
    Zero000, Dec 3, 2013
    #4
  5. diggy

    diggy Notebook Deity

    Reputations:
    193
    Messages:
    939
    Likes Received:
    35
    Trophy Points:
    41
    I got the same CPU but went with 16GB of RAM for the simple fact that at times I run a VM or two
     
    diggy, Dec 4, 2013
    #5
  6. KCETech1

    KCETech1 Notebook Prophet

    Reputations:
    2,527
    Messages:
    4,112
    Likes Received:
    449
    Trophy Points:
    151
    RAM and GPU now as well. Alot of your encoding and transcoding is done via GPU ( OpenGL on FCP, OpenCL in most everything else now ) and uses a lot of RAM buffers. my main FCP rig is now a hackintosh as the 16GB barrier was destroying my productivity and slowing things to a crawl.

    the days of just CPU dependence are well behind us and we have to be very careful on our hardware especially in pro apps to find a working balance on CPU, GPU, RAM and storage.

    as to external hard drives. just grab a cheaper drive from almost anywhere. OWC just uses a standard Seagate drive in their own enclosure, no need to spend the extra money
     
    KCETech1, Dec 6, 2013
    #6
  7. j0hnwall

    j0hnwall Notebook Consultant

    Reputations:
    0
    Messages:
    103
    Likes Received:
    5
    Trophy Points:
    31
    I agree that the CPU will bottleneck you far before the ram will, especially with the efficiency of Mavericks.
     
    j0hnwall, Dec 10, 2013
    #7