New MBP 13"

[GMac11]

Managed to talk a friend away from the base level pro - I don't think 8th gen and 8gig of ram is a sensible purchase at that price, he opted for the 1800 version with the 10th gen and 16 gig of ram... I expect it to last him years, it's what I'd be getting if I was in the market for a 13" laptop

Exactly right. Initially I was set on the base with the 16gb RAM upgrade however the more I thought about it the more the £1800 model made more sense. Then when I had gone that far I went and bought the 16" from the refurb store for just £200 more - I was partly swayed by the relative small extra cost and partly by the fact there is a two week wait from Apple for the 13 so figured I'd give the 16" a go. I'm still undecided as I've only ever had 13" models in the past and size is taking some getting used to.
Also note above the 13" (Space Grey model) is reduced to £1682 on the rainforest - a no brainer if a 13" is your (or your friend's) choice.

 

[silvagti]

I noticed Amazon has the 1Tb 13" Pro model up for £1834. That's not much more than the Apple store with discount and they have it available for next day delivery rather than the 2 weeks Apple state.

Is there any downside to buying it from Amazon rather than Apple directly?

 

[silvagti]

Decided to order a 10th Gen 13" MBP (i5/16Gb/1Tb) today so should have it in another week or so. How's everyone getting on with theirs?

 

[GMac11]

In the end I decided to keep the refurbed 16 and sold my 2017 13. I mentioned I was apprehensive about the size but you get used it. A powerhouse 13 inch is a great prospect though.

 

[silvagti]

In the end I decided to keep the refurbed 16 and sold my 2017 13. I mentioned I was apprehensive about the size but you get used it. A powerhouse 13 inch is a great prospect though.

Cool. I did contemplate a 16" but I often use my laptop hooked to to an external monitor at home so the extra screen size wasn't really necessary.

Likewise most of the apps I use for work are mainly dependent on CPU performance so the discrete GPU wasn't something I really needed either.

 

[GMac11]

Cool. I did contemplate a 16" but I often use my laptop hooked to to an external monitor at home so the extra screen size wasn't really necessary.

Likewise most of the apps I use for work are mainly dependent on CPU performance so the discrete GPU wasn't something I really needed either.

Understandable, the discrete GPU is totally wasted on me as I only really photo edit. It would be nice if Apple offered a 16 without a dGPU for less money but maybe that market isn't big enough. I usually had my 13 hooked up to 35 inch ultrawide at home as well but in truth the MacBook has a better display and I usually only use that 35 for gaming so I came round to the idea of not being tied to a monitor at home.

 

[Fusion]

10th Gen 2.0 GHz i5/16GB/512GB ordered, should be able to pick up today! First Mac, so pretty excited.

 

[Hades]

I also just got my daughter a 10th gen 2.0ghz i5/12gb/512gb MBP13. It once again underlines my love/hate relationship with Apple. It really is a lovely device. It looks and feels fantastic. I'd love it myself. It is to replace an older Windows desktop system so she has some portability for sixth form and can also play a few lighter games on it. It's easily the nicest computer we have and she is very happy with it so far. But the duality comes from Apple's quality control once again. I've complained on here previously that nearly every Apple device we buy has to be replaced within the first few weeks or months. This happened again with the MBP. It arrived with clear defects in the aluminium lid just above the Apple logo. We returned it to the store and swapped it but the replacement had similar defects on the bottom. So we had to swap it a second time. Apple's service was superb and they allowed us as much time as we wanted to inspect the second and third machines in the shop until we were happy. I can't fault their service. It was brilliant. But I've completely lost confidence in being able to get a correctly working, non marked device form them the first time. This is just another in a long list of devices with issues. Unfortunately returning the device at least once is something we now assume will happen which is disappointing when it is a gift for someone.

 

[Fusion]

I also just got my daughter a 10th gen 2.0ghz i5/12gb/512gb MBP13. It once again underlines my love/hate relationship with Apple. It really is a lovely device. It looks and feels fantastic. I'd love it myself. It is to replace an older Windows desktop system so she has some portability for sixth form and can also play a few lighter games on it. It's easily the nicest computer we have and she is very happy with it so far. But the duality comes from Apple's quality control once again. I've complained on here previously that nearly every Apple device we buy has to be replaced within the first few weeks or months. This happened again with the MBP. It arrived with clear defects in the aluminium lid just above the Apple logo. We returned it to the store and swapped it but the replacement had similar defects on the bottom. So we had to swap it a second time. Apple's service was superb and they allowed us as much time as we wanted to inspect the second and third machines in the shop until we were happy. I can't fault their service. It was brilliant. But I've completely lost confidence in being able to get a correctly working, non marked device form them the first time. This is just another in a long list of devices with issues. Unfortunately returning the device at least once is something we now assume will happen which is disappointing when it is a gift for someone.

It is a shame that they aren't defect free. Funnily enough, mine has a really small mark on the underside. It was one of the first things I noticed when unboxing. But, it is very minor, and I never see it anyway on that side.

I wonder if the Macbooks are made by Foxconn like the iPhones etc. are? QC should be there though, no doubt, when they charge what they do. There's really no excuse as they could automate a lot of it on a production line too with cameras.

I love my machine, it's a joy to use. Silent running, lovely screen, great build quality. I was using an Acer Aspire before that I'd had for years, so it's a massive leap forward in just about every regard. It was a good move going for the 10th gen processor with the improved cooling. If the fans are on, I can't hear them at all.

 

[squerble]

I'm still on an Early 2011 MBP and looking to upgrade. Almost all of the posts in this topic are pre-Silicon announcement. I'm still thinking it'll be fine to buy at this point as I'm not entirely keen on first-get hardware with the switch to Apple Silicon, however there could be huge battery and performance gains if they get it right, at which point I'd be hankering after one immediately even though I'd have a few month old MBP anyway. It's a bit of a pickle as I'd prefer the laptop to last 7+ years as this 2011 has but we now know the end of Intel support is a given, and even if they say "years" it may only be 2-3 after the transition has finished, so I could be out of supported OS updates within half of what I want the lifespan to ideally be.

My usage is mostly just web, Netflix/YouTube, general home productivity. The only "heavy-ish" work I do is very, very occasional Lightroom work, and MainStage when I'm playing guitar as I run my guitars and basses through Line6 Helix plugin. I think I'd like to go for the £1800 version (which is actually £1620 with my edu discount) for the two fans, more ports, faster RAM, faster CPU, and faster storage. I considered a MBA or base MBP, but my current machine is 8GB RAM with a 256GB SSD I added a few years ago, so I'd be essentially paying for just slightly newer hardware and a Retina display, so jumping to the £1800 model to get 16GB RAM and 512GB SSD is the only one that really makes sense.

EDIT: Probably worth saying that my current MBP is working just fine for what I need, and it still quite fast thanks to the SSD. It's just I'm now stuck on High Sierra (10.13), so I'm already a couple of years behind and now won't be able to get Big Sur. It's got older hardware so I don't get the handoff features that came in a few years ago, I can't upgrade past 8GB RAM, and of course no Retina display. Other than that, everything is fine, I just want a new laptop at this point.

 

[Fusion]

There are always technology improvements in the pipeline, that's just the nature of this industry. It never stands still and probably never will. You won't be disappointed with performance or battery life- it's still rated at 10 hours.

 

[silvagti]

You won't be disappointed with performance or battery life- it's still rated at 10 hours.

Battery life was one area I felt was quite mediocre on the MacBook Pro 13" 2020. I was only seeing about 6-7 hours use in real world use. YMMV though!

It was actually worse than my 2016 12" MacBook disappointingly.

No complaints about the CPU performance which is stellar though.

 

[squerble]

Battery life was one area I felt was quite mediocre on the MacBook Pro 13" 2020. I was only seeing about 6-7 hours use in real world use. YMMV though!

It was actually worse than my 2016 12" MacBook disappointingly.

No complaints about the CPU performance which is stellar though.

Either way, I'm sure it'll be orders of magnitude better than my current 2011 MBP which has "Service Battery!" warning and gives me about an hour of casual YouTube watching before dying.

 

[Hades]

Battery life was one area I felt was quite mediocre on the MacBook Pro 13" 2020. I was only seeing about 6-7 hours use in real world use. YMMV though!

It was actually worse than my 2016 12" MacBook disappointingly.

No complaints about the CPU performance which is stellar though.

Same here. It seems fast but the battery life is average rather than great.

 

[kingteeb]

Yeah, im generally getting 7, maybe 8 if im very lucky

 

[Fusion]

Suppose it’s all relative. My old Acer at that point in its life was good for about 70 minutes at best.

 

[GMac11]

Can I ask what may be a very silly question - I didn't see the need to start a whole new thread.

Do the current (or any) MacBook Pros have 8 or 10 bit panels? I can't seem to find that particular technical information anywhere. Perhaps they have something beyond that still?

 

[Domo]

The 13" 9300 XPS is a nice machine, but it's nowhere near the capability of this MBP. It's interesting the marketing on the i3/i5 and i7, I suspect a lot of people find them a bit misleading as obviously the TDP makes a TON of difference to the real-world performance. It's an i7/16Gb unit...and yet in reality it's replaced my 12" Macbook as a travel machine.

I'm very surprised to hear anyone say the higher spec'd 9300 is merely a replacement for a Macbook.

Having seen my mid 2012 MBP Pro recently pass onto the next life I'm in the market for a replacement albeit with a smaller budget. I can at a push purchase the 2020 MBP with the 2.0 i5, but in contention is the XPS with it's i7, 16GBs and 1TB drive (+ the 4K display). That XPS normally retails at the same price as the MBP but Dell are doing some amazing deals (I've probably said too much on here already).

It's a tough one, probably 70/30 in the MBPs favour. Need to decide before the end of the week.

 

[Hades]

I'm very surprised to hear anyone say the higher spec'd 9300 is merely a replacement for a Macbook.

Having seen my mid 2012 MBP Pro recently pass onto the next life I'm in the market for a replacement albeit with a smaller budget. I can at a push purchase the 2020 MBP with the 2.0 i5, but in contention is the XPS with it's i7, 16GBs and 1TB drive (+ the 4K display). That XPS normally retails at the same price as the MBP but Dell are doing some amazing deals (I've probably said too much on here already).

It's a tough one, probably 70/30 in the MBPs favour. Need to decide before the end of the week.

Another couple of devices to consider are the new Thinkpad T14 AMD and T14s AMD - only the AMD models, not the Intel ones. They don't have Thunderbolt and the screens will not be as nice as either the Macbook or the XPS. It won't look or feel as nice. But, they have the new Ryzen 4750u 8 core, 16 thread CPU with a Vega 7 GPU. They are substantially faster than the MBP 13 or XPS 13 both in terms of CPU and GPU in a 14" (16:9) form factor and the T14s weighs the same as the XPS 13. Reviews of other laptops with similar CPU's put them faster than the full fat Intel 9750H 45w CPU, but consuming ultrabook power instead. They also have more ports and a better keyboard.

I doubt you'd be interested in a Thinkpad if you're looking at an MBP or XPS. But I thought I'd lay it on the table as an option to take a look at.

Only just launched in the UK so it may take a few weeks for more options and a customisable model to be added:

https://www.lenovo.com/gb/en/laptops/thinkpad/t-series/ThinkPad-T14s-AMD-G1/p/22TPT144SA2
https://www.lenovo.com/gb/en/laptops/thinkpad/t-series/ThinkPad-T14-AMD-G1/p/22TPT14T4A2

The 's' model is less upgradable, more expensive but slimmer and lighter than the non-s.


EDIT: I'm currently deciding between an MBP13, XPS13 and T14s AMD. It's a tough decision because each has its benefits. I bought my daughter an MBP13 2020 and it's a truly lovely machine. But I'm leaning towards the T14s for the CPU and GPU.

An early review from a user here. It also has some performance scores:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9rouZidhjmY

 

[LiE]

I think it will depend on what you actually use your laptop for. If your workflow requires some heavy lifting and genuinely you're life will be made better by the performance it will be hard to justify a slower spec. For example, does waiting an extra 30 seconds importing a batch of RAW files mean I should buy a faster Lenovo over a MBP? No not really, that 30s isn't going to be noticeable.

Apple has always been a little behind in spec but they do well in other areas - support, quality, device interoperability, physical store with great customer service, strong resale value, etc. It also seems people get a long life out of their products.