Flashy
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- Apr 20, 2006
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Other half desperately wants a new laptop, I desperately want a Mac of some description to sit alongside our two iPhones, iPad and Apple TV. She seems happy enough with this suggestion, which is half the battle won.
Hoping to get something we can get a good few years out of, not particularly interested in selling on, so resale value not a factor. Looking at the 11in MacBook Air refurbs which come in and out of the Apple Store. June 2013 model (1.3GHz dual core Intel Core i5, 4GB RAM, 128GB flash storage, Intel HD Graphics 5000) is £599.
But, inevitably, I have quite a few questions for those in the know. Appreciate a lot of it could come down to "buy the best you can afford", but really I want to spend as little as possible while balancing that with getting the best deal for those pounds and not selling myself short by being a miser. So...
1) Is the spec enough? Usage would be some work (Office or similar), general web stuff, maybe occasional Netflix and possibly some Football Manager if I can find the time. Also the odd bit of amateur photo editing and I would like to give iMovie a go, too. Also the possibility of it acting as an iTunes server for the other iDevices in the house.
2) Is it worth spending another £40 to get the 2014 model (processor 1.4GHz instead of 1.3, plus 4GB of 1600MHz LPDDR3 onboard memory, 128GB PCIe-based flash storage , Intel HD Graphics 5000), or would we really not notice much difference with the usage above? Consideration for futureproofing?
3) Is 128GB storage enough, or should I be looking at 256GB? Neither's enough, really, given the size of my iTunes folder, which currently sits on a 500GB portable hard drive, but there's no way round that, beyond also getting a NAS/Mac Mini, or iTunes Match, or having the hard drive dangling from a USB port all the time. But ignoring the media side of things, 128GB or 256GB? The latter means going up to £749 or thereabouts.
4) Okay to leave it on for long periods of time acting as an iTunes server, with regard to general health of the machine and with power consumption if plugged in?
I think that's it. And, actually, I think in asking number 4 I've realised that I probably need a Mac Mini, and have that serving up the iTunes content. This could get costly...
If you've read this far, thanks, really appreciate it, and any feedback/answers/help would be great.
Hoping to get something we can get a good few years out of, not particularly interested in selling on, so resale value not a factor. Looking at the 11in MacBook Air refurbs which come in and out of the Apple Store. June 2013 model (1.3GHz dual core Intel Core i5, 4GB RAM, 128GB flash storage, Intel HD Graphics 5000) is £599.
But, inevitably, I have quite a few questions for those in the know. Appreciate a lot of it could come down to "buy the best you can afford", but really I want to spend as little as possible while balancing that with getting the best deal for those pounds and not selling myself short by being a miser. So...
1) Is the spec enough? Usage would be some work (Office or similar), general web stuff, maybe occasional Netflix and possibly some Football Manager if I can find the time. Also the odd bit of amateur photo editing and I would like to give iMovie a go, too. Also the possibility of it acting as an iTunes server for the other iDevices in the house.
2) Is it worth spending another £40 to get the 2014 model (processor 1.4GHz instead of 1.3, plus 4GB of 1600MHz LPDDR3 onboard memory, 128GB PCIe-based flash storage , Intel HD Graphics 5000), or would we really not notice much difference with the usage above? Consideration for futureproofing?
3) Is 128GB storage enough, or should I be looking at 256GB? Neither's enough, really, given the size of my iTunes folder, which currently sits on a 500GB portable hard drive, but there's no way round that, beyond also getting a NAS/Mac Mini, or iTunes Match, or having the hard drive dangling from a USB port all the time. But ignoring the media side of things, 128GB or 256GB? The latter means going up to £749 or thereabouts.
4) Okay to leave it on for long periods of time acting as an iTunes server, with regard to general health of the machine and with power consumption if plugged in?
I think that's it. And, actually, I think in asking number 4 I've realised that I probably need a Mac Mini, and have that serving up the iTunes content. This could get costly...
If you've read this far, thanks, really appreciate it, and any feedback/answers/help would be great.