New Mac

I'm after a bit of guidance. I have a MacBook Pro (15" core 2) and I now mostly use it 'clammed' and linked to a large HP monitor. It's about 2 years old now and is struggling with some of the video and image software it is running. I think I should upgrade it and buy a true desktop Mac, the question is will the upgrade be substantial enough to shift programs like Lightroom around at some speed? (I tend to leave programs running and switch between them as I work)

To summarise, are the new i7 or i5 Macs a substantial enough improvement in Macs or should I plod on with what I have?

I cannot spend more than 1700! Which in the Mac world ain't much, I know.

Before you buy, check if you have maxed out the RAM If you are seeing slow downs when running lots of apps more RAM can help.

Edited by stniuk (Wed 21-Sep-11 21:27:13)

£1700 is a handsome budget for an iMac and you will notice the difference. It's a damn shame SSD is so expensive (£400) for an iMac because this type of storage is the biggest game changer.

I use After Effects, FCPX, Aperture and Logic - on a late 2010 Macbook Air. It's amazing the difference a year or two has made to the performance of newer computers, especially those with flash or SSD storage.

i have just upgraded to a 3.1Ghz i5 iMac from an 2.4Ghz core2Duo model. the difference when transcoding video is huge.

after sticking a bit more Crucial RAM in (total now 12GB) it totalled about £1800, but i did opt for a BTO 2TB HDD, which was a £120 option. so without that, it's within your budget

In reply to a post by WishPerfect:

I cannot spend more than 1700! Which in the Mac world ain't much, I know.

Maybe consider a MacBook Pro with the 27" Thunderbolt monitor... although it is extremely new.

If you know somebody who's either at university or a teacher take them along to "purchase" the gear for you, there's usually between 10-15% discount and the Applecare is almost given away with a 75% reduction!