Macbook Pro and Pro Tools advice: Upgrade?

[protoolsjimmy]

Hey, everyone. About a week and a half ago, I purchased a Macbook Pro with a 2GB (1Gb x 1Gb) Intel Core 2 Duo processing chip and 120 Gb of Hard Drive space for $2500. I'm currently running Pro Tools LE and an MBox 2 Mini with it and I've added a 500Gb External Drive from Lacie to back up sessions.

Apple has just launched a new line of Macbook Pros for the same price I paid with an extra Gig of Ram (2Gb x 1Gb) and 40 Gigs more of hard drive space (160 Gb total). I called Apple and they said there is a two week grace period and I can return my Macbook Pro for the upgrade as long as I pay a restocking fee of 10%. This comes to about $250.

Here are my questions:

1) Is it worth upgrading to the newer Macbook Pro after I've installed everything including Pro Tools on my current computer? What will the extra power really do for me that I cannot do now?

2) What kind of issues might I encounter installing my Pro Tools LE software again on the new Macbook Pro?

3) Will I have to re-register everything with Digidesign?

Thank you.
Jim

[JohnnyG]

It'd be cheaper to just buy 1gb ram through ebay or a 3rd party retailer that sells qualified Apple ram for your Mac Book Pro. That it would be to spend the $250 and the hassle of shipping it all back.

I mean it's up to you, the RAM benifits do sound nice, but too bad that restocking fee applies, that's what kills it for me.

The drive upgrade, if it's just the space and not a speed upgrade, isn't going to do anything for Pro Tools. Because you want to be recording to an external drive anyhow. I never fill up my internal notebook drives since it's a bad idea to run them beyond 70% full. Fragmentation starts slowing everything down, so I just mainly use my 1394 Lacie drive and call it a day.

[Stiff]

Well... Hard to say. I'm not entirely sure what the differences between the new and the old MacBook Pros are, I just remember them to be very few. Anyhoo... The new features might benefit you in a longer perspective, like, isn't the new one supposed to be able to handle more RAM? If I were you I'd check into the details on what's really new. 10 ghz more or less means nothing to me, but there might be other differences.

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EDIT: One more thing, you're in the wrong forum for LE

[protoolsjimmy]

This forum is great. Much love and respect to everyone here. You've all been very helpful and respectful.
Thank you.

EDIT: One more thing, you're in the wrong forum for LE

Appreciate that!