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A Tale of Two iMacs...

M

MacDarcy

macrumors 65816
Original poster
Jul 21, 2011
1,011
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I plan to buy an iMac. I'm into video editing my gopro footage, photography, creating southpark style animations, photoshop, illustrator, & indesign.

I've narrowed it down to two BTO 27" iMacs. Both with the i7 and 2gig VRAM. But I am torn between ordering one with a 3TB fusion drive for $2,394 or one with a 512GB SSD for $2,594.

Any thoughts? :)
 
$200 difference between no regrets and always wondering if it was worth it the extra ~$200.
As it is not my money I will go with the higher end one.
 
Lol. I hear ya. It's always easier making the decision when it's not your money. :)

Actually, it's not really a money thing. It's really a size vs speed thing. Would love to go full SSD, I know it'd be faster...but wondering if 512GB would be too limiting size wise.

The 1TB SSD is just too overpriced for me right now.
 
A USB 3.0 Hard Drive could be used for stuff that doesn't need to be on an SSD. But some people prefer to keep everything on one disk. Since you're looking at a 3TB Fusion Drive, I doubt 512GB will be enough for you.
 
Actually, I was looking at the 1TB fusion drive, but the 3TB fusion drive was only $100 more.

I think I could get by with the 512GB SSD...since I plan to get an external thunderbolt drive down the road for editing HD video.

Was wondering if those who have a full SSD drive on their iMacs can chime in here.
 
There is a possibility that the 1tb ssd will go down to 500$ like the mbp's. That might be pretty good for speed and storage combo for yah.
 
MacDarcy said:
...video editing my gopro footage, photography, creating southpark style animations, photoshop, illustrator, & indesign... two BTO 27" iMacs. Both with the i7 and 2gig VRAM. But I am torn between ordering one with a 3TB fusion drive for $2,394 or one with a 512GB SSD for $2,594.
Click to expand...

I'd definitely suggest the 3TB Fusion. I edit lots of video from several GoPro Hero3 Black cameras. Using three GoPros for 7 megapixel time lapses and 1080p/60 video, I have shot nearly 100GB in one day. You will blow through 500GB quickly, then have to use external storage. That storage is generally much slower, unless you get an expensive RAID drive.

The 3TB Fusion drive is an excellent combination of speed and size. I have two iMac 27s with 3TB Fusion drives, and they work very well.
 
I know it's advice not asked for, but why not go with the 4gb of vram for just $150 more? Seems like a steal, especially considering there's no way to replace it.
 
Ddyracer said:
There is a possibility that the 1tb ssd will go down to 500$ like the mbp's. That might be pretty good for speed and storage combo for yah.
Click to expand...

Not going to happen - the 1TB upgrade is already the same price, as you are comparing the upgrade from 512GB on the Macbook Pro with the 1TB HD to 1TB SSD on the iMac.
 
My experience is that the Fusion Drive is great for the iMac. I'm on my second iMac with a Fusion drive now and the performance, while not SSD levels, is FAR superior to that of a typical HDD.

I've had two MacBook Airs and a RMBP now as well with full SSD, two with PCIe flash memory and these are fast but I don't notice the difference much at all when I'm at the desk using my iMac.

If you are going to be editing HD video footage I would strongly recommend the 3TB fusion drive because that stuff can eat up disk space FAST. That or make sure all your footage goes to an external USB3 drive if you go SSD.

I personally would rather just fall in the middle for storage performance and have a lot more space on a desktop machine between video editing, iTunes, iPhoto, etc.

Not even sure if the latest iMacs have PCIe flash memory. If not, paying that premium right now would also be a bit of a waste, IMO.
 
Unless you're short of RAM, an SSD isn't going to do you much good, unless you're one of those people who spend hundreds extra just so your programs open faster.

I don't see why the logic in a 3 TB drive either. Your files should be on external drives, not the internal drive.
 
fa8362 said:
I don't see why the logic in a 3 TB drive either. Your files should be on external drives, not the internal drive.
Click to expand...

Why should they be on external drives unless he is looking to complicate the setup? If you have a large enough internal you should use the space and backup to an external (time machine or otherwise) but what is to be gained from simply dumping them to a single external drive? Failure risk is the same, performance is lower, etc.

Not sure I understand your perspective there.
 
ckeck said:
Why should they be on external drives unless he is looking to complicate the setup? If you have a large enough internal you should use the space and backup to an external (time machine or otherwise) but what is to be gained from simply dumping them to a single external drive? Failure risk is the same, performance is lower, etc.

Not sure I understand your perspective there.
Click to expand...

Failure risk is not the same. An external drive doesn't get anywhere near as hot as the internal drive.

Performance is typically irrelevant. Working files should be in RAM.

Also if the files are on an external, it's easy to work on another computer.
 
fa8362 said:
Failure risk is not the same. An external drive doesn't get anywhere near as hot as the internal drive.

Performance is typically irrelevant. Working files should be in RAM.

Also if the files are on an external, it's easy to work on another computer.
Click to expand...

Well you're assuming a lot of things here...

- that multiple computers are in question which is not common for many, at least with the same files in question

- that heat is an issue in the first place (this is also not the only cause of drive failure)

All I'm saying is that using your logic, no computer should have an internal hard drive except to boot the OS and everything should be done externally. You might be a fan of the new MacPro and all the external attachments many will have to use for it :)
 
I just did a speed test on my Thunderbolt 8TB G-Raid, 275MB/s read, 285MB/s write. If you don't need huge storage now, big fast storage is available as an add on later.], and it's only going to get cheaper.

As it's not my money I'd say get the SSD option, then expand later if you need to.

EDIT:
This is an older iMac, 3.4Ghz i7 with 256SSD, 2TB HDD, 24GB Crucial RAM and 2GB GPU. The SSD is a lot slower than the ones installed now, but it's still really fast. Use is for pro photography.
 
Last edited:
Everybody likes to drive exotic cars, but the useful,reliable, and comfortable cars are SUV and normal sedans...
 
Mike Oxard said:
I just did a speed test on my Thunderbolt 8TB G-Raid, 275MB/s read, 285MB/s write. If you don't need huge storage now, big fast storage is available as an add on later.], and it's only going to get cheaper.
Click to expand...

With the 3TB Fusion drive he can not have to worry about dropping anything into external storage later...and TB storage will demand a premium for a while yet.

Using the Blackmagicdesign Disk Speed Test I recorded these numbers from my 3TB FD on my 2013 iMac:

1GB Test File
318 MB/sec Write & 686 MB/sec Read

5GB Test File
317 MB/sec Write & 689 MB/sec Read

While the write speeds are roughly half of what he would see on the SSD the read speeds are pretty darn fast and this is much faster than what you're seeing with the external TB storage.
 
Last edited:
ckeck said:
With the 3TB Fusion drive he can not have to worry about dropping anything into external storage later...and TB storage will demand a premium for a while yet.

Using the Blackmagicdesign Disk Speed Test I recorded these numbers from my 3TB FD on my 2013 iMac:

1GB Test File
318 MB/sec Write & 686 MB/sec Read

5GB Test File
317 MB/sec Write & 689 MB/sec Read

While the write speeds are roughly half of what he would see on the SSD the read speeds are pretty darn fast and this is much faster than what you're seeing with the external TB storage.
Click to expand...

I see, I'm comparing Fusion with my older iMac that although has an SSD and HDD is pre-fusion. I didn't know it could perform so well.
 
Mike Oxard said:
I see, I'm comparing Fusion with my older iMac that although has an SSD and HDD is pre-fusion. I didn't know it could perform so well.
Click to expand...

I actually didn't expect much from the Fusion drive but when buying my last iMac (late-2012) model the highest end configuration in the stores at the time were all 1TB FD models, so I reluctantly picked one up and was very surprised.

Since that one worked out so well I decided to just stick with the FD in this one, except that it's the 3TB version. Next-gen may be different as flash storage prices drop more but Apple is still charging a hefty premium at this point.
 
SSD isn't "higher end." Fusion is for people who need internal storage, SSD is for people who need the best performance possible. Do you need internal storage?
 
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