Which of these two second hand macbook pros?

Eoin

Hi all, hoping I can get some advice - I'm looking at two Macbook Pros on adverts.

This one for €475 has the following specs:

CPU 2.16MHZ dual core
15' screen - 1440x900
Ram 3 GB
120GB HDD
OS X Snow Leopard Installed (10.5.7)
Battery Holds about 2 hours worth of charge
DVI to VGA adapter Included
DVI to Video Adapter included

And this one for €550 has the following:

macbook pro processor intel core 2 duo
memory 2gb 667 mhz ddr2 sdram
320GB HDD
2.4ghz
nice clean laptop photo shop cs3 and word excel and lots more

Not sure which one will suit me best.

HDD capacity isn't really that much of a priority, but the RAM might be as I'd like to be able to run a Windows VM pretty regularly. The first one has a completely clean OS, while the second one has lots of handy software on it already. That said, I already have an MS Office 2010 licence for Windows, so I suppose I could run that from the VM.

The first one has more RAM, but that doesn't look too expensive a part to upgrade. The second one has a quicker processor.

thanks in advance!

Eoin

nvm, went for the first one.

hi Eoin,

theres a difference between dual core and Core 2 duo,
1. the specs in the text says "Dual Core"
2. the specs in the screen shot says "Core 2 Duo"
3. screen shot says 10.6.7 not 10.5.7 as in text

if 1. -> you won't be able to install Lion if you want to
if 2. -> you should be ok
if 3. -> you're ok,, otherwise you'll ned to upgrade to Snow Leopard before you can get Lion

Lion specs

also i think the first one has max ram installed.
according to crucial.com

but as you seem to have bought it i'm probably just rambling on..

Eoin

Thanks very much for that ed1604 - as you said, it looks like it's at max RAM already, and it doesn't look like I'll get much benefit by bumping it up to 4GB:

The MacBook Pro "Core 2 Duo" 2.16 GHz/2.33 GHz models use the same type of memory, but officially support up to 3 GB with "a 2 GB SO-DIMM in one slot and a 1 GB SO-DIMM in the other." Apple notes that "you can use RAM module sizes of 1 GB or 2 GB in the top or bottom slots." However, is possible to install 4 GB of RAM in these models, but only some RAM in excess of 3 GB actually can be used by the system.

As you pointed out, the screenshot would indicate that I'm good to go. I like the looks of OS Lion, so it seems worth the €24 upgrade cost.

Thanks again - picking it up tomorrow, so really looking forward to playing around with it.

Edit - I was looking at the earlier spec 2.16 - this one can "unofficially" take 4GB I think.

Eoin

Picked it up at lunch time today - it looks like new, and I am pretty happy with the speed of it so far, though I've not installed a huge amount so far. Very nice to use so far though.

K.O.Kiki

TBH the 2nd one was a much better deal.

Bigger HDD (saves you the headache of installing your own).
Faster, 2nd/3rd gen Core 2 Duo.
LED screen.

Ah well, it's still a MBP -- and that's what counts

Eoin

Too late now!

tadhg999

i always check out which year first, i prefer a slower hard drive, 5500 rpm, and alswus chech out the model number,

MiniNukinfuts

old thread is old, don't comment on them please.