Apple MacBooks 2008 to 2012 Pre-Retina

Detailed Google Spreadsheet

Hello everyone, I’ve been wanting to do one of these for a long time, mostly because… I want to rip people off flip MacBooks. About a month ago my old employer had come across a bit of iMacs and MacBooks from one of their clients and asked me to help them out. A lot of people say ThinkPads all look the same, but to me, MacBooks look to be all the same… other than the I/O and touchpad.

The MacBooks covered here have Core 2 Duos up to 3rd Gen i7 Processors. I am including White Unibody MacBooks, and the UniBody MacBook that isn’t a “Pro” but looks like one. All these MacBooks have rounded corners, MagSafe 1 adapters, and use DDR3 RAM except the Air model. The older MacBooks with less rounded corners, and silver keyboards are not covered here. The MacBook Air will have its own page (and MacBook respectively), due mostly because its a whole different form factor & use, a bit less upgradey.

Do these kind of suck?

There are quite a bit of caveats, the Core 2 Duo systems have issues playing youtube @ 1080p with a great framerate. The Apple Eco-System & Price. Installing MacOS without having a USB preformatted with it. The latest OS is El Capitan or High Sierra, some newer programs won’t work. A lot of these MacBooks can get that nVidia GPU issue, I believe the AMD GPU recall isn’t active anymore, & the display on most of these are pretty pleb tier. Upgrading RAM can be tricky because the MacBooks accept certain types. The MacBook Air requires specific SSD because Apple went through a few iterations before soldiering them. Oh yeah, the processors are all soldiered on, so you can’t upgrade them.

So what doesn’t suck?

Its not Windows, so it almost won’t get you a virus & the OS won’t bluescreen. Any MagSafe 1 power cords can charge any of these laptops when turned off. Some people sell these cheap because they forgot the login password. Opening the bottom requires just a P0 Philips, and you get access to HDD, RAM, DVD, & Heat Sink. You can toss in almost any kind of 2.5″ SSD or HDD as an upgrade, can swap the DVD for another HDD if you buy the tray. Removing the heatsink & fans are easy, so new thermal paste can be done within 20 minutes. These particular MacBooks have a wealth of parts and don’t have that shitty hinge design the previous MBPs were plagued with or that stinky keyboard. Touchpad kicks ass compared to other laptops. Memory & storage is upgradable compared to the retina models *minus the Air*.

Does Saucey like them?

Some can be a quick buck, others… will take longer to sell at the right price. People who buy these literally just want a safe laptop to web browse & word. Software on Windows might be on here, also Adobe products work perfect on Macs. I like the 2009 White MacBook & currently own a 2011 MBP 15, which I’m typing on right now… Keyboard is meh to a Thinkpad, I do like how many levels of brightness the keyboard can do. But I can’t use my Logitech MX Ergo via bluetooth, so I’m using the Triathlon M720 w/ USB dongle. Maybe I’ll write a review about having this machine.

Thank the Internets for EveryMac

There is no simple model hierarchy on these laptops. ThinkPads? T410, T420, 14″ laptop, higher means newer, likewise W520, W530, 15 laptop, workstation. Dell? E6400, 6410, E6420, all 14″. HP? uh… I’ll skip that one. Apple doesn’t really have any of these, you could go by the year they came out but they have early, mid and late whatever year AD. Nowhere on the laptop does it say what it is, even if you look up the A1455 or whatever the fuck it is, its just the basic chassis its based on. You have to have the laptop turned on and then click ‘About this Mac’ to get that information.

But sometimes it doesn’t say what it is. I’ve had a 2012 Mac Pro that said ‘Mac Pro’ only, it could of been a 2008 model, because no where does it say what year it is. Now you can search the serial number to find out what it originally came with, but some people selling them black that part out, I don’t even know why they do it. You might be to lookup the serial number on the bottom of the laptop, but thats kind of null if the bottom case had been swapped out.

Model Number is the next best thing, if a listing has one of those, you’ll be able to find out the CPU and GPU it has if the seller didn’t put that info in it. RAM and Storage might of been modified so I don’t count on it, however most of them are fairly accurate if the end user has replaced it, however I’ve seen GPU specs to be off sometimes…

Lets get this shit started!

As always, more specific information will be provided via the spreadsheet. I had sorted them by release date, then screen size, & then priced each one by CPU/GPU model. I did do a separate search by RAM sizes & Storage size like I had on other postings.

All prices here are in USD, laptops are based on sold eBay listings available in America with shipping cost included. If a listing is international and has shipping available to the USA, then it can be included. eBay by default doesn’t show listings from sellers in a country/area where it doesn’t ship to you, or in this case, me. The low price I have here are listings that at least show it is booting. I skip over most as is & obviously broken laptops. Only some 17″ MacBook Pros seem to be faulty at the lower price range.

Prices in EU can be up to 40% more than USA, in Austrialia it can be up to 70% more… Not so what Mexico, Russia, Israel, or Africa’s rates can be, sorry. 

13″ MacBook Pro, White Unibody & Unibody

These following MacBooks have Core 2 Duos, nVidia graphics, support a max of 8GB RAM, all can run off a 60W MagSafe 1 AC Adapter, & most here can have El Capitan as the latest macOS.

• I love the 2009 White Unibody more than the 2010 Uni, because it accepts more RAM than the 2010 model.
• P8800 is the fastest CPU, Passmark @ 1741, & P7350 @ 1291, but that isn’t saying much…
• Some of the ‘better’ ones aren’t as expensive, mostly due to the condition & upgrades on ‘worse’ models.
• Also only the MBPs have SD card from hereon after, previous didn’t.
• 2009 & later can run High Sierra, because of their slightly better GPUs

• The good part on these MacBooks is that they have integrated graphics, so no GPU issues like the 15 or 17 models.
• Out of all of these, I’d recommend the Early 2011 MBP
• The Mid 2012 model has a big jump in price, a lot of bunk on the lower side of listings, hence the higher low price.

15″ MacBook Pro

Pleb 15″ MacBooks had a 1440 x 900p display, otherwise 1680 x 1050p was an upgrade. Unless they specify it, you wouldn’t know, however there is the matte display, and that is easily recognizable with its silver LCD bezel vs standard black borders.

• All of these units have nVidia GeForce GT 9400m w/ 256MB or 9600m with 512MB, latter obviously better.
• So, the P8xxx units have the lesser GPU, T9xxx have better GPU
• I’m guessing the Early 2009 unit was phased out early, because everyone wanted an SD Card slot, hence less availability, & lower price.
• The ‘silver bezel’ mattle LCD upgrade is not really highlighted in listing titles.

• GPUs – 2010 nVidia 330M, 2011 AMD 6xxx, 2012 nVidia 560/660m Series, all in an assortment of RAM depending on CPU
• Having a 2011 2GHz unit, full brightness w/ music & 8 Chrome tabs, I seem to get about 4 hours of battery life. If I had Ivy bridge, probably 5 or 6 hours.
• The AMD units had that GPU recall, dunno about the nVidia ones being safe, though I’d say OK if it was the 2012 one.
• Do a new thermal paste and maybe get a fan control app to stay safe?
• Mid 2012 might sound the best, but if you’re going past the $600, consider looking at the Retina MBP with its soldiered RAM.
• I have no idea why Apple didn’t go with quadcore CPUs in 2010 and stuck with dualcores… skip em unless its a really good deal.
• I compared the 2.5/2.6GHz CPUs on Passmark and… dunno why.
• I don’t recommend these for video editing, but if you so incline, nab the 1GB dRAM units.

17″ MacBook Pro

The ThanosBook!

• Early models had a 320GB HDD and Mid models have a 500GB HDD by default
• All of these have a nVidia GT 9600M 512MB graphics card
• Whilst it seems there aren’t many of these, I believe a lot of them are just listed & sold as “MacBook Pro As Is”.
• My bets are on the Mid 2009 2.8 model, $250 for nostalgia. If its higher than that, consider a 15″ i7 model instead for performance… or a Dell M6600

• Think the 2011 models are expensive? These are my recommended prices, way below what some niche Apple sellers list them for.
• Really sad that Apple killed these off, I’m not holding my breath for the 16″ model either
• Even though I put some of these sub $500 for “mid” price, the nicer ones that get auctioned off are in the $700 mark
• There are a LOT of non working, toasted GPU laptops here… stay positive tho, because these are getting collectable status!

Conclusion

Jesus these are expensive compared to a ThinkPad, Latitude or EliteBook, up to 3x more. Thats a lot of money for what it can do computing wise… but if you need that budget MacBook to buy, with some upgrade options, then these are it. Now if you need a simple MacBook, there are some super cheap Airs out there vs the MBP 13″.

Personally, I am liking my 2011 MBP 15, partially because I got is basically for a day’s worth of work. I wish the SD Card fit flush with the laptop, but it does work good for Adobe Lightroom Classic, but I’m not holding my breath for Final Cut Pro X. It looks like non-OEM batteries can be bought for under $40 USD, and most of them come with the damn tri-star screwdriver.

The 17″ models are super fucking expensive, but not as expensive as a W701ds. There was quite of bit of people selling MacBooks that had the GPU recall fixed under warranty, but those look to be phasing out. If someone specifies they got one of those fix in 2015 or later, I’d lean to getting one of those. However, if you want to buy an old model, bake it or heat it, I’d say give Louis Rossman tutorials a look if you want to solder em, to fix them for good.