How powerful are the low spec MacBooks?

Jlawson118

I'm talking about the ones that are just 'MacBook', the really small ones. I'm just debating whether or not one would benefit me.

I currently have a 2015 edition MacBook Pro which I use to run high performance creative & video/photo editing software such as Adobe Photoshop, Premiere Pro & After Effects. As well as others but those are the main three that I work with. I'd love one of the new ones with the touch bar but for £3000, it's a bit much for me.

Though as much as I can run these on my MacBook Pro, sometimes I find it a little too big to take places with me just for the sake of typing a few notes up. And in August I bought an iPad Pro for the light portability, with keyboard and Apple Pencil. I thought editing software available for the iPad had improved over time, but I've ended up discovering that even the Adobe suite is just simplified and watered down as such, with nothing much available. I aim do do most of my editing on my MacBook Pro, but sometimes it's nice to play around with creative things whilst taking notes.
I'm a little bit disappointed with it as a whole really. Even the keyboard is a bit fiddly for taking notes with and unaccessible depending on the position you're sitting in. It's usability is slightly disappointing, especially for something that costs nearly £1000 along with the accessories.

I'm contemplating trading it in and getting one of these MacBooks. But is it worth having two MacBooks? And would they be powerful enough to perhaps run Photoshop and other software? It would be nice to be able to use it on the go. Or take with me if I'm on a video shoot and I want to backup my files or start to play around with them on a break or something.

I just don't know what's worth having, my current iPad Pro? Or getting another MacBook? Has anybody got one and how powerful are they? Are they worth the money? Considering I spent nearly £1000 on an iPad, I might as well buy a proper computer for not much more and have access to more things

forgotmyname

It will run any software. How long it takes to load and process data is the issue.

Depends if you mind rendering video at 3fps or 30fps+

Jlawson118

forgotmyname wrote: »

It will run any software. How long it takes to load and process data is the issue.

Depends if you mind rendering video at 3fps or 30fps+

I was aiming to maybe put together a sequence anyway or play around with it and then render it out to full quality on my Pro?

It's more sometimes I sit in university lectures and instead of taking notes, I like to get hands on and try it for myself. I'm in my third year now anyway so it's more "Do your own thing" rather than learning anything. But it's more over the next month I'll be working on a film and it'd be nice to carry something around with me that's portable to maybe shoot something and have a quick play around with the footage

System

This video may give you some insight

https://youtu.be/KnapaZYD2cU

But problems may lie in the video editing software you use but then maybe not.

Johnmcl7

I assume when you're meaning the small Macbooks, it's this one:

https://www.apple.com/uk/macbook/

I have a few laptops with this type of 5W Core-m processor, 17W ULV processor and then a fairly beefy desktop PC (4.2Ghz hex core i7). I think the Core-M processors are great for lightweight machines as they don't need active cooling and offer better performance than the Atom processors. However I don't use them or the ULV processors for video editing work as I find them too slow compared to the desktop processor although there's other factors like the small screen which count against them too.

You may have more patience than me but I found I just preferred waiting to get onto my much more powerful desktop, decent screen, controls etc.

John