IMac for Architecture/CAD/Photoshopping

Personally I would max the system out if you have the cash. You are going to be requiring a lot of juice from the system. I do a lot of Cad, PS, illi, etc. for my school (Product Design). Its runs fine but I think my next comp will be a mac pro. The expandability is nice. My iMac specs are in my sig.

the only spec you really need to pay attention to is the video RAM. complex 3D assemblies need that...but I doubt you'll need 2GB, if your stuff is that complicated you should probably be getting a Windows workstation with a proper video card.

there's no point in getting an i7, which is just an i5 with HyperThreading (virtual cores). PS uses up to four cores, CAD software is mostly single-threaded, and I'm not aware of any 2D design software that can use (or even requires) that much power.

install RAM yourself. any DDR3-1333 laptop RAM will work. 8-12GB total will be sufficient.

trnce.lam said:

Cheers, I'm not sure how complicated work will get however I imagine doing some rendering, 3d modelling and possible video editting.

So I think i'm going to go for this:

3.4GHz Quad-Core Intel Core i7
4GB 1333MHz DDR3 SDRAM - 2x2GB
1TB Serial ATA Drive
AMD Radeon HD 6970M 2GB GDDR5
Magic Trackpad

And then upgrade the RAM manually:
http://www.crucial.com/uk/store/mpartspecs.aspx?mtbpoid=A3272CC2A5CA7304

Is this the right one? And is it easy to install?

Also my friend told me that SSD is the most important upgrade: however i think I'll worry about this at a later date..

but i think i'll use bootcamp on most of the rendering etc

Click to expand...

Looks good and yes its very easy to install RAM. Get the SSD now. It's really a pain to take apart the iMac later. You will not regret the SSD upgrade.