Joined Jun 2004
L5: Journeyman
Forum Thread
Mac Laptop for daughter college- deciding on specs...
March 21, 2025 at
09:11 AM
I'm a 100% PC guy, so I know nothing about Mac's.The college / program my daughter is looking into states the following for recommendations:
Apple MacBook Pro (preferred) OR Windows 10 64 Bit:
- I7 Processor
- 16 GB minimum system RAM
- Integrated Graphics w/ 4 GB memory
- 512 GB SSD minimum
I looked on the Apple site and this one looks like it'll do just fine, but I would love to hear from a "Mac" person, do you recommend any of the listed upgrades?:
MacBook Pro
Apple MacBook Pro (preferred) OR Windows 10 64 Bit:
- I7 Processor
- 16 GB minimum system RAM
- Integrated Graphics w/ 4 GB memory
- 512 GB SSD minimum
I looked on the Apple site and this one looks like it'll do just fine, but I would love to hear from a "Mac" person, do you recommend any of the listed upgrades?:
MacBook Pro
- 14-inch Liquid Retina XDR display
- Apple M4 Pro chip with 14‑core CPU, 20‑core GPU, 16‑core Neural Engine
- (Apple M4 Max chip with 14‑core CPU, 32‑core GPU, 16‑core Neural Engine + $600.00)
- (Apple M4 Max chip with 16‑core CPU, 40‑core GPU, 16‑core Neural Engine + $900.00)
- 24GB unified memory
- (48GB + $400.00)
- 1TB SSD storage
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Many applications will run on a PC or Mac so it may come down to what else she wants to use the computer for an your budget. You can buy a PC Laptop with 4 years of onsite support so a tech will come to her room or library to fix her laptop or replace it. With Dell you can get an accidental damage policy if she spills a beer or glass of almond milk in the keyboard.
Applecare is similar but has a co-pay so to speak
https://www.apple.com/support/products/mac/
Dell has a nice laptop for 2600.00
Latitude 7450 Ultralight
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1
$2,378.50
Tech Specs
Base
Dell Latitude 7450 BTX
Processor
Intel® Core™ Ultra 7 165U, vPro® (12 cores, up to 4.9 GHz Turbo)
Operating System
Windows 11 Pro, English, Brazilian Portuguese, French, Spanish
Memory
16 GB: LPDDR5x, 6400 MT/s (onboard)
Base Options
Integrated Intel® Graphics, Core™ Ultra 7 165U vPRO Processor, 16GB LPDDR5x Memory
Systems Management
Intel vPRO Enterprise Management Enabled
Hard Drive
512 GB, M.2 2230, TLC PCIe Gen 4 NVMe, SSD
Intel Responsiveness Technologies
Intel Responsiveness Technologies Driver
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Warranty & Support
ProSupport Plus with ProSupport and AD and KYHD and Service Account Mgr, 36 Month(s)
14: macbook pro with the m4 processor would be around 2K
But a Dell Scratch and Dent would be less with 4 years of coverage
Latitude 14" 7000 (7450) Laptop or 2-in-1
Intel Core Ultra 7 Processor 155U (12 Core, Up to 4.80GHz, 12MB Cache, 15W), Thunderbolt 4
512GB PCIe M.2 NVMe Gen 4 Class 35 Solid State Drive
16GB Memory
Windows 11 Pro
Laptop, 14 inch FHD+ (1920 x 1200) Anti-Glare IPS 250-nits Non-Touch Display, WWAN Capable
Intel Integrated Graphics
Aluminium
Dell Outlet Latitude 14 - 7450
Outlet Price
$1,270.00
Add-Ons
$306.46
Total Price
$1,576.46
The price includes this
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+ $54.42
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Accidental Damage Service
Accidental Damage Service
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None
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Macbook AIR can be plenty for college.
PRO may only be needed if doing high intensity prolonged tasks such as video editing or needing to have 2 external displays.
Best to ask at...
https://www.reddit.com/r/macbookair/
https://www.reddit.com/r/macbook/
https://www.reddit.com/r/macbookpro/
https://www.reddit.com/r/mac
Intel processors were phased out a few years ago.
Macbook AIR and Macbook PRO have transitioned to Apple Silicon M chips in 2020 and 2021
https://en.wikipedia.or
Looks like all you will need is a MacBook Air with 16 GB of Ram and 512 GB SSD.
Check out Apple Refurbished that are as good as new direct from Apple.
https://www.apple.com/shop/refurb...-16gb-24gb
If mac, I'd say a macbook air with 16gb of ram (it annoys me tremendously how overpriced their storage and ram upgrades are), probably ok if it's the previous generation with the M3. The M4 model has better battery life. Good drive backups honestly matter more than most of the machine specs. Within reason, battery life and weight are the things that will matter most day to day for her.
Her major does matter some, but often in my experience the specs the college may recommend for a laptop are a bit inflated over what you really need. As for the expensive upgrades you were pondering, if she ever needed the additional computing power supplementing with a mac mini or pc desktop would be the better choice.