MacBook Pro??

[cmcollar]

Hello, everyone.

I've recently completed a fairly thorough search on this topic, but nevertheless forgive me if I missed the thread that definitively answered my question.

I'm looking at the other investments I need to make while I decide on the D850 or D500 and corresponding lenses and have decided I need to update my 6+ year old MacBook Pro and plan to continue to use Lr, Ps, etc., for processing.  It seems, based on my research, that many of you are successfully using the MacBook Pro to accomplish this, correct?  It also appears that for many of you the Retina display is adequate versus an auxiliary monitor. It also looks nearly split between the upgraded large internal SSD and opting for an external drive. Is this generally true?  I just want to make sure I make a wise purchase given the large file sizes I will be encountering.  I want to stay with Apple hardware.  Based on your responses, I may have a follow-up question or two. 

Thank you, as always, for your wisdom!

[Birna Rørslett]

On a general note, upgrading the internal drive to the largest SSD one can afford is always highly beneficial. Plus maxing out the memory installed.

Never saw a Retina display that didn't strain my eyesight thus I much prefer adding external monitor(s), however this is a personal experience and may not apply to every one else.

[pluton]

Using the native display of a high quality laptop is fine IMO for initial experiments and early fun, but---If you are picky about color rendering and particularly if you intend to make prints, plan on the eventual acquirement of an external hardware-calibrated display.
When I go back and look at the hundreds of prints I made using a pre-Retina Macbook Pro (on Epson pigment inkjet printers) before and then after I acquired a calibrated monitor, the early prints done uncalibrated are, frankly, pretty bad.  The prints made using the external calibrated monitor are utterly superior.
The matter of external drives is mainly a matter of available storage. With the relatively large file size generated by the D850, external storage may/will eventually become necessary.
I currently have a 2012 Macbook Pro connected to an NEC 27" display, with several external hard drives attached for storage.  The laptop's built-in display works as a convenient, if smaller and uncalibrated, second display.

[CS]

Considering Apple's prices for internal SSD's, I would not look at the larger sizes they offer, but would opt for capacity in external units. My own personal preference for externals is to avoid sealed units, such as the WD MyBook, and similar units in favor of separate enclosures and hard drives where I can hot swap the drives at will in seconds.

[cmcollar]

Birna / Keith / Carl,

Thank you all for your responses.  Very informative!

Regarding the comment about the prices for the internal SSD's, very true.  One gets into a very expensive laptop if you price in a 1TB or larger SSD.  In contrast, there are many Western Digital external drives in the 4TB size which appear at first glance to be compatible with the Mac OS for around $100. 

I assume that upgraded quantities of memory for the MacBook Pro is still a wise choice, correct?  Or is the standard 16GB adequate?

Finally, what about the screen size?  If I likely will opt for an external monitor, should I spec out the 13" model or 15" model?

Thanks again for taking the time to respond to my inquiry!!

Chris

[CS]

Birna / Keith / Carl,

Thank you all for your responses.  Very informative!

Regarding the comment about the prices for the internal SSD's, very true.  One gets into a very expensive laptop if you price in a 1TB or larger SSD.  In contrast, there are many Western Digital external drives in the 4TB size which appear at first glance to be compatible with the Mac OS for around $100. 

I assume that upgraded quantities of memory for the MacBook Pro is still a wise choice, correct?  Or is the standard 16GB adequate?

Finally, what about the screen size?  If I likely will opt for an external monitor, should I spec out the 13" model or 15" model?

Thanks again for taking the time to respond to my inquiry!!

Chris

Before you buy, check with Adobe to see if the issues with Ps & Lr running on MacOS Mojave OS 10.14, have been resolved. A new MacBookPro will come with MacOS  10.14 Mojave and Apples new fie system, APFS. Be aware that currently there is no way to repair a disk formatted with APFS. No utility, like Disk Warrior, Drive Genius, etc, and including Apple themselves can repair an APFS formatted disk, at this time. Talk with Apple about boot disk requirements with the new Mac in case you want to create bootable clones, as a hedge against an internal drive problem or failure.

Configuring your new Mac is a choice that you alone can make, I can't spend your money. 13" or 15"? Bigger is always better, but it's also more expensive. You have to decide at purchase time how much memory you want as it's not user replaceable. 32GB of memory is going to make things smoother, and keep in mind that new OSen comes every year with each new release needing more memory to function at it's best. This is why I avoid laptops, and go with iMacs.

[Ann]

Something to consider is where you will be using the machine?

If always on a desk at home, go for the largest screen; if you intend to take it everywhere with you (as I do!), the little 13-inch MBPro Retina will probably serve you very well. I have actually retired my iPad and now take my 13" MBPro with me instead.

A Spider-5 can profile a Retina screen quite effectively but the Retina is only an sRGB monitor so it doesn't measure-up to a NEC wide-spectrum (Adobe RGB) screen.

You have to get the specifications right from the beginning because the MPBs are not user-upgradeable these days.
I would suggest that a 500 GB internal SSD is absolute minimum and I would double that if you can.

Ps will run on just 16 GB DRAM (more is obviously better but I have never run out of memory with just the 16GB and I use many Layers and usually have several applications running) but the capacity of the GPU (at least 1500 MB VRAM and Metal-supporting) is becoming increasingly important.

A bunch of 2 TB external USB drives are very inexpensive, seem to be quite rugged and can probably hold more images than you can ever need to have with you — plus a TimeMachine Back-up. External SSDs are faster but are a lot more expensive.

-------
Correction:
I have just discovered that OWC Mac Sales  is now offering User-installable internal SSDs for the Late 2013- 2015 MBP r machines at about $430 for a 1 TB SSD.

[charlie]

I've got a mid-2014 13" base model macbook pro w/16GB RAM, I use it primarily as a capture machine shooting tethered to it and will sometimes do editing work when I don't transfer the images to my desktop. It does decent enough with Ps, Lr, Pr, & Capture One, but could certainly be improved upon.

If I was upgrading today I'd change a few things. I've got the internal 256gb SSD, it typically has enough space for smaller projects but not larger projects which means I'm often using external drives which slows down my workflow (HDD's). I'd get a 500gb internal SSD then as projects get older and aren't being worked on as frequently move them to an external drive. The Intel integrated GPU is weak, at this time Lr & Ps don't utilize GPU's all that much but if you use software that does it could be a source of bottleneck, and depending on your external monitor it could slow things down as well. The CPU is weak for some tasks, this is most noticeable for me when processing out large numbers of images from Lr or Capture One, it takes for ever, especially when working from an external HDD. Processing 3000 22mp CR2's to JPG images took something like 12 hours, takes 2 or 3 on an iMac.

I've never seen the 16GB RAM bottleneck the computer, its always been CPU bottlenecked when there are slow downs so I think 16GB is fine unless you're working with very large files or video editing. Based on these experiences if I was buying again I'd upgrade the CPU & GPU to the best specs I could afford. Moving to the base model 15" MBP would in itself upgrade the CPU & GPU but still I'd consider maxing out the specs as much as possible.

All that said it holds its own and will do most all tasks I throw at it, some just require some patience. I like the 13" for portability and as my general purpose computer, though I do find it a bit small for photography purposes.

A Spider-5 can profile a Retina screen quite effectively but the Retina is only an sRGB monitor so it doesn't measure-up to a NEC wide-spectrum (Adobe RGB) screen.

I was under the impression Retina's are not sRGB but DCI-P3, which is larger than the sRGB color space yet not quite Adobe RGB.

[MFloyd]

The Retina is indeed a DCI-P3 with a gamut as large as RGB, but not exactly covering the same area.

[Jan Anne]

As my output is digital only I shoot and process in sRGB, currently on a 2017 MacBook Pro 15" with Retina screen which works very well.

My 2011 MacBook Air btw also had no issues with the 36MP D800E and 42MP a7RII files as long as you don't do batch processing (which I don't).

Screen calibration and processing in aRGB is nice when you print or do pro stuff but is pretty useless when the majority of your public is watching the pics in sRGB on uncalibrated screens found on smartphones, laptops, TV's and such.

As for the configuration of the Mac, I went for max RAM (16GB back then), max GPU, 500GB SSD. I use a couple of Samsung T5 USB-C SSD's for backup while on the road, they can also be used as a boot drive incase the internal drive fails.

[CS]

Here's a link to a site with a lot of info about comparing various Macs. You might find it useful in deciding how you want to configure a new Mac. There are serious tests to be found at that site, and Rob answers email inquiries if you have any.

http://barefeats.com

My personal recommendation is to not be in a hurry to adopt MacOS 10.14 Mojave. Many of us in the Mac community are staying with OS 10.13 High Sierra until Apple resolves issues with Mojave. Be aware that you cannot go backwards to an earlier OS on a new Mac. If it comes with Mojave, which new Macs now do, you can only stay at Mojave or upgrade to the next OS.

[CS]

It looks like Mojave is now showing improvement, and here's the Adobe link that you might find useful.

https://helpx.adobe.com/photoshop/kb/photoshop-and-macosmojave.html

In addition, Keith has mentioned a great NEC monitor, but if it's more expensive than you can handle then you might consider this BenQ, but whatever monitor you get make sure that it's wide gamut.

https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1176775-REG/benq_sw2700pt_27_photographer_monitor_with.html

I'll also recommend the X-Rite i1 Display Pro for calibrating.

https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/search?Ntt=x-rite%20i1display%20pro&N=0&InitialSearch=yes&sts=ps

[Steven Paulsen]

I don't seem to be able to make paragraphs. (My Mac is putting the Kbosh on my nonsense.)

<I'm giving my old 2011 "Sandy Bridge" a bit of un-retirement. Apple stuff always was/is somewhat of a performance and status symbol.

(In in the early 90's, I wanted to use photoshop, no one knew anything about computers, so I sought out PS users and they pointed me directly to a Mac.) I still have PS 2.1, on floppy disks somewhere.

My favorite box was a Performa 6360 (I think.) I added a graphics card, AV card (analog) in & out, Television tuner card, USB/Firewire and a cutting edge, Sonnet G3 processor. I also had a flatbed scanner that featured an A4 size transparency lid. I could scan 4- 4X5 negs from an old Graflex press camera. (& I did have a 90mm Schneider.)

I went through many, many Macs. I purchased, repaired & sold over 100 on the internet, before ebay really took shape. I also did the same with photo gear.

Sorry for the intro/history. Just an old guy rambling. I went ape when the Powerbook G3 appeared. I still have the old black plastic monster, pristine, tucked away in the original box. I had a couple G4 laptops. They were ok, not excellent. When the Sandy Bridge MacBook Pro's appeared, I bit again. (Both the G3 an the 2011, doubled the speed of the previous model.

I honestly would love to take a current 15" MBP for a test drive, however my circumstances puts me outside the "Mac-ism Glow." I cannot tinker, upgrade, switch anything anymore & it seems that you now have to follow the yearly OS upgrade to stay in the click. It was also a nightmare connecting to an external monitor.

I had some issues with my 2011 and eventually ventured & learned MS windows. Mac OS 10.6 and Win 7 are nearly identical under the hood. I recently pulled my MBP out of hibernation, and it needed a new battery. The original failed with 3 charging cycles. (It was my fault, I should have plugged it in every now & then.)

I have no qualms with Apple. I have an iPhone that I only use for calls & drum loops and low end recording when I bang on one of my guitars. Currently I'm using 2 Dell Lattitudes with quad i7's. Dell provides a manual to guide you through replacing every component on the darned thing, if it fails. (The Genius Bar is a Nightmare.)

From a power user point of view, those i9, 4K Gaming notebook albatross rigs make me rubber neck more than Apple's latest offerings. The Dell Precision line of notebooks really look good. (Why don't they offer a 4K 17" IPS screen.) The M4800/4K is really interesting. A Dell refurb of the same costs 1/4 the $$ of a new MBP. (It's also 4 times as big & heavy.)

Best wishes on your new Mac. Just couldn't sleep & had the urge to ramble.

Cheers,
Steve

[JohnBrew]

Before you buy, check with Adobe to see if the issues with Ps & Lr running on MacOS Mojave OS 10.14, have been resolved. A new MacBookPro will come with MacOS  10.14 Mojave.

Thanks for this. I had recently upgraded to Mojave 10.14 and have been having fits with PS. What a mess!

[MFloyd]

I have a MBP 15” 2016 with the latest OS and version of Lr & Ps CC Cloud and Classic: with the exception of some minor sync problems, everything runs fast and smoothly.