I'm breaking in a new computer. My old Mac Pro Tower was getting a bit long in the tooth (it was at least 10-12 years old). Now it was a pretty good machine in it's day, with dual 3.0 Ghz Xeon processors, 24GB memory, 1.5 TB of internal storage and a really good liquid-cooled graphics card. The problem was that while it was a 64-bit system, the instruction set was still only 32-bit so most of the software I was using was obsolete and couldn't be updated to the latest versions. Also the OS was stalled at about 6 versions back.
The other issue was that when I was working I had a company-issued laptop. Granted it was a PC (not a Mac) but since it didn't cost me anything and since I brought it home every night and took it with me when I traveled, my old desk-side Mac Pro Tower was OK, but since I had to turn-in my laptop when I retired I had been without anything portable.
Anyway, a few weeks ago I found a really good deal for a two-year old refurbished 15 inch Apple MacBook Pro with retina display, 512GB solid-state drive, 16GB memory 2.7 Ghz Intel quad-core i7 processor (I saved about $800 over buying an equivalent new model). While this was supposed to be a 'refurbished' machine, it looks brand new. Not a scratch on it not even the rubber pads on the bottom looked like they had ever touched anything. And when I turned it on it booted just like an out-of-the-box machine with the OS installed for the era that this model was from (I immediately updated it to the latest macOS Sierra 10.12.1).
Now I already had one of those pocket-sized 1TB external USB3 drives that I used to back-up my work PC (which I simply reformatted for the Mac) so I'm back to 1.5 TB of storage (that can be taken with me when I travel). Now I also have a 2TB external eSata hard-drive that I use as my back-up and as an archive for my photos and such. All I had to do was get an eSata to USB3 adapter so I can still use it as I was before. I had to get some adapters for my full-size monitor as well as a large USB3 hub to connect all the peripherals since the MacBook only comes with two USB3 ports and two Thunderbolt2 ports one of which is used for the monitor cable. I'm also going to add an Ethernet adapter (it'll go in the other Thunderbolt2 port) as that will give me a faster connection to the internet. I'm running wireless at the moment and even if I'm the only one in the house doing anything, I'm still getting only about 75% of my old hardwired speed, so I'll get that back with the Ethernet adapter.
All in all, it's working pretty good and it should use less power and it certainly is not going to generate as much heat (that old Mac Pro Tower could heat a small room).
Anyway, it's nice to move up to 'almost' the latest technology, and I can now take it with me when we travel (and it weighs less than half of that old work-issued HP laptop. The power-supply alone on that HP laptop weight about what my MacBook Pro weighs and they have the same size screen, storage and memory).
OCU
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