Choosing between macbooks

[AndreLebrao]

My friend is about to buy a macbook air and hes very convicted about it, just need to know if the i7 is worth the extra 200 bucks instead of the i5

[Max_Settings]

Step 1 of choosing a MacBook: You don’t 

[flibberdipper]

It's not worth the extra 200 smackaroos, but the MBA isn't worth buying really because they're so damn outdated and the screens are pretty shittacular from what I remember.

1 minute ago, Max_Settings said:

Step 1 of choosing a MacBook: You don’t 

Step 1 of being a typical PCMR douche: Hating MacBooks

[Badger906]

an i5 will be more than enough in an air. theyre not fully fledge chips and are limited by cooling so an i7 isnt going to shatter any records.

 

ive got nothing against macs myself, ive owned several including a couple of airs. theyre well built machines with almost unlimited viewing angles and a damn good battery.

i sold my last mac and bought a gaming laptop.. instantly regretted that then went to an xps13 as i was the closest to a mac that was windows based!

[WQXGAisStillGreat]

While not cutting edge in the slightest, I think the macbook air is one of the smartest buys for a set-it-and-forget-it apple user. In my years as a consultant, I've seen them survive various beverages spilled into the keyboard, dropped from irresponsible places, and even once run over by a car on the highway (this one needed a new LCD panel, but otherwise lived to see another day.) Aside from that, they carry two legacy USB 3 ports for good compatibility in the current tech world, thunderbolt for fast I/O should you want it, and 12-hour battery life. The 1440x900 13" screen is nothing to rave about, but it's not really anything to complain about either. It's important to note that these machines have not seen a lot of change since 2013 (introduced Haswell Architecture, PCIe SSD) and that the last significant update was 2015 (the i5 received a speedbump in 2017, but the i7 is identical, and even carries the same machine ID as the 'brand new' one you can get in a retail store.) You can pick up a '2015' model on the used market for as little as $600, which I consider well worth the machine. The speed difference between i5 and i7 is negligible (+8% for i7), while I strongly suggest finding a model with the full 8GB of RAM, as this is not upgradeable and will likely be the first reason to replace an aging model. The SSD can be changed, and aftermarket upgrades are available, but SSDs are expensive, so finding one with your desired capacity isn't a bad idea either.

[Ja50n]

I chose a used Retina 13" MB Pro myself, with Core i5. It's been perfect for me, the only thing is I wish I would have chosen 16GB of RAM instead of 8, because you can't upgrade it after purchase.

[jj9987]

For what kind of workloads will you be purchasing it?

[AndreLebrao]

19 hours ago, jj9987 said:

For what kind of workloads will you be purchasing it?

He will be using it for college, some 3d modeling but no rendering. And I already tried getting him out of the macbook ideia but hes really onto it