What Year Macbook Should I Buy UPD
Best answer: If you have access to an older or hand-me-down MacBook Air or Pro from the last seven years or so, it should still work well as a tool for most students. Otherwise, look elsewhere for a newer machine.
what year macbook should i buy
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The MacBook Air is also a great option, and it has traditionally led our list of the best MacBooks for students. These machines are typically lighter than MacBook Pro models and offer fewer features that probably won't mean much to non-creatives. It may prove challenging to use, however, for those students who work with high-end scientific, engineering, or content creation applications. But most students studying business administration, early childhood education, or English literature should get everything they need from a MacBook Air.
Unless someone you know is giving or selling you an older Mac, you'll need to do some shopping. Your safest bet when buying an older Mac is probably to get a refurbished unit from either Apple's Certified Refurbished store or Amazon. There are Macs available from those outlets at reasonable prices, and you shouldn't need to worry about scams.
As long as you keep to the list of older MacBook models above, you should be able to find a MacBook at your price point that will work with macOS 13 Ventura. Be careful of buying one older than those; you might save some big bucks, but you could end up with many headaches.
I know a lot of examples when people used MacBooks for longer than ten years and were happy with their laptops. And if it is reasonable to assume that an average MacBook (Air or Pro) can last for ten years, you can decide which used laptop is right for you.
Mechanical parts tend sich as fans or HDDs tend to break down over time. However, things like SSD, RAM, and CPU should perform as well as they used to 10 years ago. Fortunately, the latest MacBooks have minimal mechanical parts, so in theory, they should be fine.
The problem is as always with the software. If you keep using the same software and never update it, then you should be ok. But, if you install a new version of the game or Microsoft Office, then the new software may work slower.
The first obvious option when shopping for a refurbished Mac is the Apple web site. Apple certifies all products here, and they are backed by a 1-year warranty. They come with all the required accessories and cables and get packaged in a brand new box.
These stores have a limited quantity of refurbished MacBooks from all years. If you are looking for reputable refurbished MacBook stores, it makes sense to browse what they offer. However, I find their prices are too high.
This platform is the least safe place to look for deals. Craiglist has safety guidelines which everyone should follow. They include tips such as meeting at public places, avoiding inviting strangers into your home, having a friend accompany you.
In this article we will address the above, as well as give advice about which Macs are still supported by Apple, the Macs that can still be repaired if required (Apple stops providing the required parts after a number of years), and the Macs that Apple considers obsolete and vintage.
Apple also has a list of Vintage Macs. These are Macs that Apple stopped selling between five and seven years ago. (If you live in France where a law means you can get support for spare parts for up to seven years after Apple stops selling a Mac).
Case in point: I have a three year old Huawei UltraBook that is basically dying and my MacBook Pro, now almost six years old, is running just as good as it did a couple of years ago, which is to say it runs great.
Back when I was at college, many moons ago now, I used Windows PCs and laptops. I ended up going through a couple every year or two. After getting annoyed by the constant updates from Microsoft and the issues, plus the fact they always seemed to break, I decided to switch to a MacBook.
I got my first MacBook in 2002 and I used that until 2010. Then I got a MacBook Air which I ran until 2014. Then I updated to a MacBook Pro and, later that year, bought an iMac once I started working from home.
I am currently shopping for MacBooks... My twins are in the Junior year of college and it's time to replace their Asus Chromebooks (2011) and MacBooks from like 2003... So...which model? Which 'year' of construction? What is the ideal trade off for refurbished Mac performance at 'gotta buy two' pricing?
The scam potential is there as well for Craigslist and Facebook Marketplace, but since you're likely to be able to put your hands on the machine before you buy, you stand a better chance. Of course, in these days of the pandemic, going face-to-face with a seller, even if you're both masked, carries its own risk. Additionally, to do a purchase this way, you have to be very comfortable with your ability to validate product model year and features, and the seller has to be willing to let you spend time with the machine.
One of the more interesting challenges in buying used MacBook Pro machines is understanding which model year you're buying. When buying a used car, you always want to know its model year, but oddly enough, many Mac resellers (both the commercial ones and private ones) seem to gloss over the production year in favor of specs.
That said, you need to do a certain amount of OS calculus. According to Apple, the new version of macOS (called Monterey), which was released in October 2021, supports MacBook Pros and Airs going back to 2015, as well as iMacs and Mac Minis going back to 2014. If you're looking to buy a used MacBook or iMac from these years, chances are they're running macOS Mojave. If that's the case, be warned: Apple's support for Mojave ended on October 22, 2021. This means that while you can still use your MacBook or iMac for everyday tasks, you won't be able to receive software, firmware, or security updates. Big Sur supports MacBooks and iMacs going as far back as 2013, so if you're ok with using a slightly older version of macOS, you can pick up an older Mac on-the-cheap and still get regular software and security updates.
While Apple has never officially published their timetable policy for ending support for older Mac devices, the general rule has been a maximum lifespan of about 7 years post-release. So, you can assume that certain models will drop off the OS support list each year. You can check if the used Mac you've got your eye on is supported with the Big Sur and Monterey compatibility lists. This way, you can get a better idea of how long you'll be able to use your older Mac and plan for when you'll need to buy another one.
For example, I own one 2011 machine, which I couldn't upgrade when Mojave came out last year. I have three more 2012 machines, which I can upgrade now but will hit OS obsolescence in later this year when MacOS 11 Big Sur is released. There are hacky ways to bypass Apple's OS limitation, but they're still hacks.
And then there's the newest elephant in the room: Apple's move off of Intel x86 processors to Arm (or what Apple calls "Apple Silicon"). If you haven't been following along, Macs running Intel processors are going to be phased out over the next two years, and Macs based on Apple's own chips will replace them. That puts an obsolescence countdown clock on every Intel-based Mac.
That said, Apple will be supporting Intel Macs for a long time, and if you got a kid in school, they're not going to want to wait years for Apple to fully test out a brand new architecture. Get an Intel Mac now-- but get the latest and with the fastest processor and most amount of memory you can afford.
One of the problems with Craigslist, eBay, and Facebook sellers is they often won't specify the year of the machine you're buying. I spoke to several sellers who claimed they had no idea. If you encounter a seller who claims no knowledge of the model, ask for a serial number (it's available on the unit or in the About this Mac dialog under the Apple menu), and then run the number through Apple's Check Coverage page. It will generally give you model year information as well as some other details.
As mentioned above (and as you should know if you're braving buying a used Mac locally), About This Mac is a small screen located under the Apple menu. Have the seller take a photo of that screen and text it to you. That should give you model, serial number, amount of RAM, OS currently running, and type of storage. If any of those specs bother you, stop right here.
Knowing the model year of the device your considering will help with this step. You'll want to choose a USB 2.0, 3.0, or USB C-based drive, depending on the age of the device. Generally, MacBook Pros before 2012 supported USB 2.0, from 2012 to 2015 supported USB 3.0, and those after supported Thunderbolt 3 and USB-C. Take my advice, though: Don't buy a Mac that doesn't support USB 3.0 or later. It'll just be too slow.
If you can test the network, go to this YouTube video. Scale it to full screen and run, looking for stuck pixels or dots on the screen. This test runs through a bunch of basic colors and should help tell you if there's discoloration or missing or stuck pixels. If you have screen problems, walk away from the deal.
When it comes to Amazon, you can do a search for used MacBook Pros by model year, but the company doesn't list them that way. Instead, it lists the model number of the Mac, which makes it harder to know what you're looking at.
On Craigslist in my area, I found three Mac laptops for sale. They included an "iPad mini and MacBook Pro" for $700 with no indication of either model year or configuration, a model listed as 2013 MacBook Pro (also with no configuration information) for $400, and a 2011 MacBook Air with an i7 processor, 256GB SSD, but only 4GB RAM for $247. 041b061a72