Berkeley need to meet 3.3 GPA or above for CS 61 A, CS 61B and CS 70 in order to declare the CS major.
Georgia Tech is accepted to the major. May needs to maintain 3.0 GPA to remain in the Honor program.
Is it worth it for CA resident to pay extra ~17K a year to go to Georgia Tech?
Personally I won’t go to Georgia tech. First, it’s a lot more expensive. Second, GT’s overall prestige can’t beat Berkeley’s. Though you are in the honors program at GT, most employers and grad schools will still put more emphasis on the university you go to. Third, Berkeley is close to the Sillicon valley, which is a huge advantage if you want to do IT.
But I see why you are worried about the GPA requirement. Check this out: http://www.berkeleytime.com/grades/
You can see that for CS 61A, 61 B and 70, about 40% of the students actually have a B+ (3.3) or above. So I would say that it’s definitely doable, though you have to really put your effort into it. But if you REALLY tried your best and can’t do it, then I guess you might not be cut to be a great programmer. There’s no point of forcing yourself into it. Berkeley has other top departments as well. At Georgia tech however, you might not work as hard because you are already in, so you may not get that solid foundation that you would at Berkeley. Then the GPA requirement at Cal can be beneficial in some way.
And you basically have to do engineering at Georgia tech. There’s not a lot of flexibility. That being said, if you are 100% sure that you are doing engineering, you have to be cautious when choosing Cal. Because if you fail to declare CS within LS, it’s really hard for you to transfer to other engineering. You best bet would be applied math/stats/Econ/cognitive science. If you think you’d be happy, definitely go to Cal. If not, consider Georgia tech and weigh the pros and cons. And lastly, if you have time at this point, you can visit the schools to see which one you like.
Good luck! It’s very close to the deadline to decide 
Thank you for your thoughtful analysis for the pros and cons of choosing Georgia Tech over Berkeley. One of the concerns for incoming CS intent freshman is having a class size of ~1500 students in CS 61A in the coming fall. It is kind of intimidating. Since most of the students studying in CS in Berkeley are very bright, it is likely to become one of the many small fishes and the professor probably will not know most of the students in the class. In general, are the upper division class sizes in CS below 50 students per session? If not, it may become a challenge when trying to ask professors to write recommendation letters for graduate school application. If the goal is to get a job after getting a BA CS degree, then choosing Berkeley is more obvious.
It seems there may be a slight advantage in getting undergraduate CS research opportunities with professors for students in Honors Program in Georgia Tech. Is it difficult to look for undergraduate CS research opportunities with Professor in Berkeley?
BTW, no time to visit Georgia Tech. Sunday is the deadline for SIR.
Upper division CS courses can be large, due to the size of the major (374 EECS + 330 L&S CS graduated for 2015; based on low EE course enrollment, most EECS majors emphasize CS). See http://schedule.berkeley.edu/ for class sizes. See https://career.berkeley.edu/Survey/2015Majors for post-graduation destinations.
It doesn’t matter if the class size is 50 or 1500, the professor who writes LoR has to know you personally, preferably the PI of the research you’re involved in. If the LoR simply says, “He worked hard in my class, and he received and A+,” it carries no value. An effective LoR has to show your motivation, dedication, initiative, resourcefulness, and ability to do research with concrete evident.
If your aim is grad school, especially a PhD program, seriously consider research opportunities. I don’t know about GA Tech. But from the little I know about UCB (my D was an undergrad and is now a PhD student), research opportunities are abundant at UCB, but you have to work hard for it.
As a Cal CS junior considering grad school, with many friends graduating this year and into top grad programs, I would say that class size doesn’t really make a difference in getting into top grad schools. As @Pentaprism noted, just doing well in a class isn’t enough - most people’s LoRs come from the professors they did research under. Getting research isn’t that hard - after doing well in an upper-division class, it’s often enough to just approach professors in that subfield.
Also, a letter from a Berkeley professor can often carry a lot of weight. Since most CS professors went to top schools (like Cal), a lot of them will know faculty here. When a member of an admissions committee reads a glowing letter by one of their own former professors, or by one of the top researchers in the country, that’ll be a much bigger positive than a letter from someone they’ve never met.
You’re admitted to the major you want at GTech and not at UCB. Why take the risk? Both degrees are extremely prestigious, both schools are very well recruited, both will be very tough.
You’re on the Berkeley forum so of course people will defend Berkeley but I don’t see a downside to avoiding the risk of getting cut out of the major you want (as happens for 2/3 of the students enrolled in the entrance-to-major classes - and these 2/3 are no slouch because the quality of the student body at UCB, and in CS especially, is very very high.)
I’d only pick Berkeley if you’d be content in another L&S major than CS.
Took a leap of faith and decided not to switch to Georgia Tech mainly due the extra ~$16K a year needed to go there. Hope things will pan out for this decision. Go Bear!
@CalDream2020 good luck with your decision! You can’t go wrong 
I heard research can be tough at Berkeley, but it’s not that easy at GT either. And if you can get into Honor program at GT, you can do well at Berkeley. Have faith
@CalDream2020 Wishing you all the best. My son was premed at Cal at college of L & S and planing to do minor in computer science and he was able to maintain good grades without any prior computer knowledge at all in those computer classes. But those courses require hard work for sure. I have never seen him working that hard ( even for his MCAT ). He really enjoyed those classes a lot .