[rickyc091]

Yep! The base model will be fine for academia; however, you might want to invest in the 16GB of RAM as Chrome and other electron apps will consume all your memory leaving your computer crawling.

When you start working, you'll probably want to invest in the pro line for a faster CPU especially if you start booting up multiple services (databases, servers, etc.), mobile development, or crunching large sets of data.