Beg, borrow or steal for fusion!!

[majkom]

Originally Posted by hfg

I didn't "miss the point" at all.

For a mere $200 more you get a machine with a SSD Fusion drive ... PLUS ... you get a slightly faster processor and a better GPU ... all for only $200 including the SSD.

Just what were you expecting to add a SSD option for?

Would you be happy if they just included the SSD for a reasonable (for Apple) $200 option? And then had the other upgrades for an additional $200?

??? sorry, but you really missed the point... complaint is about unrational (from consumers point of view, not apples revenues, of course) restriction on upgrade options, thats all.. not allowing to upgrade (FOR BLOODY MONEY) base model is simply ridiculous

[Steve121178]

Originally Posted by Steve121178

What is the speed of the mechanical part of the Fusion drive, 5400RPM or 7200RPM?

Anyone?

[TouchMint.com]

Originally Posted by jimbo1mcm

You are right that it is more money, but you get a better processor and a better GPU. There are guesses that the fusion will add $250 so with the extra $200 for the upgraded 21.5, it is $450 more. Is it worth it? Probably, even for casual stuff and definitely for moderate gaming or photo work. The other option is to just get the basic model and wait for Ifixit to develop a procedure for putting in a SSD. It could get tricky if Apple is glueing stuff or screen removal procedure is totally different. Ifixit usually can figure it out. If Apple has to remove the screen to get to the guts to repair it, then Ifixit can do the same. Good luck. Once you spend the $450 extra, you have a warranteed product with nothing broken.

Anyone who does serious gaming does it in windows. Fusion drive does not benefit windows without some tweaking and even if you can get it to work with windows ~120gb really only leaves room for osx and its core programs, win7/8 and a few games if that…

If you are using this mac to game you are going about it wrong.

[thekev]

Originally Posted by jimbo1mcm

it is $450 more. Is it worth it? Probably, even for casual stuff and definitely for moderate gaming or photo work.

Photo work would benefit more from ram than anything. This has been proven dozens of times. You need to at least accept that it's a lot to add to the cost of a base level machine. Going from $1300 to $1750 is significant, and it will not significantly extend the life of the machine. Personally I'd say go with at least 8GB of ram and move to external storage if you're going to consume nearly a terabyte of space. When you're working within an application, the difference should not be that great. If it is, you're short on memory, and that's a much cheaper fix.

Originally Posted by jimbo1mcm

The difference between a SSD and a spinning hard drive is just enormous. I think that once the Imac comes out, the reviews with the fusion will be unbelievably positive.

That difference is much more apparent when your OS chomps up more ram than you have available. It would be extremely noticeable under Lion or Mountain Lion with 4GB of ram for most users or 8 beyond a certain workload. Things launch faster either way, but you notice it much more if it's covering for something else.

[NorCalLights]

Originally Posted by Steve121178

What is the speed of the mechanical part of the Fusion drive, 5400RPM or 7200RPM?

Short answer: We don't know yet. We'll have to wait for a user to check.

Longer answer: It's probably 5400RPM on the 21" and 7200RPM on the 27". I'm extrapolating from the Mac Mini configurations that simply add the SSD to the stock drive specs to create a Fusion Drive.

[MorganJones]

Originally Posted by Steve121178

Anyone?

5400rpm

[Lankyman]

Originally Posted by jimbo1mcm

You are right that it is more money, but you get a better processor and a better GPU. There are guesses that the fusion will add $250 so with the extra $200 for the upgraded 21.5, it is $450 more. Is it worth it? Probably, even for casual stuff and definitely for moderate gaming or photo work. The other option is to just get the basic model and wait for Ifixit to develop a procedure for putting in a SSD. It could get tricky if Apple is glueing stuff or screen removal procedure is totally different. Ifixit usually can figure it out. If Apple has to remove the screen to get to the guts to repair it, then Ifixit can do the same. Good luck. Once you spend the $450 extra, you have a warranteed product with nothing broken.

It so absolutely isn't worth it unless you have more money than sense. The current base 21.5" iMac is often reckoned to be the best value iMac of the lot. The latest iteration has now made it the worst value iMac of all time. Personally I shall be taking a long hard look at the Mini when the time comes to change my mid-2011 base iMac. To spec up the higher cost model plus Fusion as well - totally bonkers.

[majkom]

Originally Posted by Lankyman

It so absolutely isn't worth it unless you have more money than sense. The current base 21.5" iMac is often reckoned to be the best value iMac of the lot. The latest iteration has now made it the worst value iMac of all time. Personally I shall be taking a long hard look at the Mini when the time comes to change my mid-2011 base iMac. To spec up the higher cost model plus Fusion as well - totally bonkers.

Well, if only i found nice display, i will go for mini 2011 with ATI... its just dual core, but I would rather sacrifice 2 cores than ATI GPU.. intel hd sucks (yes, another unbelievable fact for me is new generation mini without any serious GPU option)

[toddzrx]

As for the issue the OP is raising: couldn't agree more. I waited for the new iMacs to be released (or at least introduced) to make up my mind on buying a new one or look for a recent (2010 or 2011) model. When I saw the specs of the base 21.5" I was sort of appalled, especially because you are forced into the high end model to get a Fusion drive, and you can't get a pure SSD on either of the 21.5" models. Sorry, I usually go along with the "well if you don't like it you can buy elsewhere" mantra, but not on this one. And I bet that base hard drive will be a dog-slow 5400 RPM HD as seen in the Mini.

Personally, I was hoping for 2012 that Apple would install a 128GB SSD across their entire computer range, on all models, as the base option. Then, you'd be given the option for more storage in either SSD or HD form, whichever suits your needs most. Instead, Apple has sort of hamstrung the base model because of a lack of upgrade options.

The reality is that the processor is not the speed bottleneck anymore: the HD is and has been for a while. An SSD, or Apple's Fusion Drive, is the best bang for the buck available today for everyday computer usage, and it would have been nice to see both available on the whole iMac range (and Mini too).

[Lankyman]

Originally Posted by toddzrx

As for the issue the OP is raising: couldn't agree more. I waited for the new iMacs to be released (or at least introduced) to make up my mind on buying a new one or look for a recent (2010 or 2011) model. When I saw the specs of the base 21.5" I was sort of appalled, especially because you are forced into the high end model to get a Fusion drive, and you can't get a pure SSD on either of the 21.5" models. Sorry, I usually go along with the "well if you don't like it you can buy elsewhere" mantra, but not on this one. And I bet that base hard drive will be a dog-slow 5400 RPM HD as seen in the Mini.

Personally, I was hoping for 2012 that Apple would install a 128GB SSD across their entire computer range, on all models, as the base option. Then, you'd be given the option for more storage in either SSD or HD form, whichever suits your needs most. Instead, Apple has sort of hamstrung the base model because of a lack of upgrade options.


The reality is that the processor is not the speed bottleneck anymore: the HD is and has been for a while. An SSD, or Apple's Fusion Drive, is the best bang for the buck available today for everyday computer usage, and it would have been nice to see both available on the whole iMac range (and Mini too).

Sadly the iMac is now looking more and more like a Laptop on a stick I'm afraid.

[thekev]

Originally Posted by Lankyman

Sadly the iMac is now looking more and more like a Laptop on a stick I'm afraid.

It's that way to a large degree. The biggest point of differentiation below the Xeon workstation level is gpu performance rather than cpu at this point. The top options in mobile cards around the 100W level are quite powerful, but the cost to performance ratio is much worse.

Originally Posted by toddzrx

The reality is that the processor is not the speed bottleneck anymore: the HD is and has been for a while. An SSD, or Apple's Fusion Drive, is the best bang for the buck available today for everyday computer usage, and it would have been nice to see both available on the whole iMac range (and Mini too).

I'd suggest beyond trivial tasks, ram can be a significant bottleneck too. Basically it comes down to the issue being more one of IO limitations than computation for many ";everyday" tasks. Ram is faster and ssds launch applications faster. I don't pay that much attention to boot times as most people don't reboot on a daily basis. In the case of the imac you pay a massive premium to access this option.