Big Data on the Cheapest MacBook

Re:Big Data on the Cheapest MacBook by rob on Thursday March 12, 2026 @09:25AM (#47350226)

It's starting to show its age, but I've been using a 2019 MacBook Pro with the Intel chip and 16GB of memory. Still handles multiple terminal sessions with Claude Code and Codex simultaneously, building in Xcode, running Docker in the background, etc.

(Maybe the fans sometimes sound like they're a jet engine taking off…)

Finally just put an order in for a new 16" MBP M5 Max with 48GB memory only because it looks like they're going to stop supporting the Intel stuff this year and no more software updates. It'll probably be obsolete in six months with the rate things are going, but I've been averaging seven years between upgrades so it should be good!

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Re:Big Data on the Cheapest MacBook by Robdel12 on Thursday March 12, 2026 @09:44AM (#47350457)

Oh my. All I have to say is cherish the first week of your M* experience. :D When I got rid of my intel MBP (it was an i7) for my MBA it was astonishing how fast and smooth it was.

So, the m5 with 48gb of ram will be amazing.

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Re:Big Data on the Cheapest MacBook by cipehr on Thursday March 12, 2026 @11:50AM (#47352582)

I agree. It was utterly ridiculous how noticeable the improvement was. I was doing z3 solving for ICFP contest the first couple weeks after getting the m1 air. And it was consistently smoking my teammates maxed out i7 MBP

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Re:Big Data on the Cheapest MacBook by swiftcoder on Thursday March 12, 2026 @02:16PM (#47355004)

Hah. yeah. I went from a 64GB i9 to a 32GB M2, and it was night and fucking day

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Re:Big Data on the Cheapest MacBook by ghaff on Thursday March 12, 2026 @10:45AM (#47351312)

I use a 2015 MacBook Pro all the time--like right now. It does have 16GB of memory. It's what sits on my dining room table where I do most of my writing/browsing and which I take for travel. I do have an Apple Silicon MacBook Pro in my office but my downstairs "office" is a lot lighter and airier.

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Re:Big Data on the Cheapest MacBook by reaperducer on Thursday March 12, 2026 @12:02PM (#47352842)

I use a 2015 MacBook Pro all the time--like right now.

I have a 2010 MacBook Air that I still use when traveling.

The battery is completely shot, but it works fine when plugged in. And if I'm on the road, I don't use my computer until I get to the hotel anyway. And even then, it's just fine for e-mail, browsing, and even Photoshop.

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Re:Big Data on the Cheapest MacBook by ghaff on Thursday March 12, 2026 @12:49PM (#47353706)

I think this one had a battery replacement because it was bulging. But it's definitely in the class of devices that, if it gets swiped or lost, is basically in the <ehh> category as opposed to my newer one.

Am probably giving newish iPad and magnetic keyboard a spin on my next trip mostly to see how it goes.

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Re:Big Data on the Cheapest MacBook by qingcharles on Thursday March 12, 2026 @05:44PM (#47357624)

I have one of these (it's my only Mac), but it only has 2GB of RAM, so it's kinda rough. I tried Mint on it, but IIRC it might not have the GPU drivers? I just bought it a new SSD which helped a bit.

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Re:Big Data on the Cheapest MacBook by ngai_aku on Friday March 13, 2026 @02:43AM (#47361365)

Linux? Outdated version of macOS?

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Re:Big Data on the Cheapest MacBook by eru on Thursday March 12, 2026 @10:15AM (#47350823)

Well, Claude Cod and Codex should be doing most of their heavy lifting in the cloud?

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Re:Big Data on the Cheapest MacBook by amonith on Thursday March 12, 2026 @10:27AM (#47351007)

Sort of, they have no "hands", LLMs can only respond that they want to execute a tool/command. So they do that a lot to: read files, search for things, compile projects, run tests, run other arbitrary commands, fetch stuff from the internet etc.

Obviously the LLM inference is super heavy, but the actual work / task at hand is being executed on the device.

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Re:Big Data on the Cheapest MacBook by coldtea on Thursday March 12, 2026 @10:38AM (#47351191)

The AI part yes. But they also use quite inefficient rendering on the cli.

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Re:Big Data on the Cheapest MacBook by exe34 on Thursday March 12, 2026 @10:29AM (#47351029)

yeah I run Claude code on a 2013 Mac book air that refuses to die, I don't think it's very compute heavy.

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Re:Big Data on the Cheapest MacBook by conception on Thursday March 12, 2026 @10:54AM (#47351480)

Try running Teams on it though!

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Re:Big Data on the Cheapest MacBook by oldandboring on Thursday March 12, 2026 @12:38PM (#47353524)

Former employee of mine had the 2019 MBP as well. After a few years he had the same problem with the fans -- if you haven't already, pop it open and clean the fans and vents. You'll probably need a little brush along with compressed air. Lots of stuff comes up on Google. Great machine btw. Good luck!

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Re:Big Data on the Cheapest MacBook by ayewo on Thursday March 12, 2026 @12:57PM (#47353821)

Thanks for this tip! The fans of mine have been spinning up regularly, especially noticeable when I upgraded to Tahoe a few days ago.

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Re:Big Data on the Cheapest MacBook by pauljonas on Thursday March 12, 2026 @04:39PM (#47356747)

Still using that 2019 MBP (16 inch, 16G memory) as a daily work machine.

Is still handling the load well, though at times, fans get quite loud, especially with all the background processes and VM setups.

Hope to get a new MBP this year, as being on Intel means lots of software that won't run on it (ie, Codex app for example, won't run on Intel Macs)

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