Help me choose between iMac and Lenovo A730

[James_C]

thanks a lot for taking me through this james. Once I get the system in first week of may perhaps, I will get back with another bunch of questions.. ..

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not really much calculating. only one program is about calculation and generating signals, while others need fast data transfers over the internet and also between those 3 programs.

Yeah I will get the best available router and a good internet connection. any suggestions on routers ? Currently I am using a belkin one for my regular connection at home. But I am planning on a dedicated internet connection and router for my trading purpose, so I will have to buy a new router along with the new connection. As of now, I zeroed upon a 30MBPS connection and can get 50Mbps too by the time I have my whole setup in place, but what router would you suggest ? Or is it ok if I directly connect the Ethernet cable to iMac, bypassing the router ?

you meant to say "Go with regular hard drive and 512 GB SSD ?" I can also go with a 1TB fusion and 512 GB SSD if needed. I just want to ensure that parallels doesn't lag my program(command exchanges between 3 programs specified above)because if they crash for a minute or so during a critical trade, I may have to face a loss of 3 or 4 grand... so I am a bit worried about the lag.

The best way to reduce latency (lag) is to use a direct connection to your iMac from the router/cable modem, rather than use a wireless (WiFi) connection.

I am not sure which country you are based in, and the technology you use will depend on how you are connecting to the internet. I am based in the UK, and our internet is based on ADSL or VDSL2, or sometimes through a cable modem. Generally you need a router to convert that incoming signal to Ethernet or WiFi, which is what your computer can understand.

You can't have more than one hard drive in your iMac. You will need to choose either a regular hard disk, or Fusion drive or SSD. A fusion drive typically gets you around 80% of the speed benefit compared to a SSD drive. Most people would recommend choosing SSD over Fusion. However Fusion does allow you to have a drive with significant data storage capacity with most of the speed benefits of SSD. It is difficult to assess how much of benefit having an SSD drive compared to Fusion is in your case, as I am not familiar with the apps that you are running. It sounds like most of your data is coming direct from the internet, so one one hand hard disk (SSD) storage should not make much difference, however if the programs are accessing historical data on past trades stored on the hard disk then it may make a difference. If you are not sure I would go for SSD to be safe.

 

[akhill]

The best way to reduce latency (lag) is to use a direct connection to your iMac from the router/cable modem, rather than use a wireless (WiFi) connection.

I am not sure which country you are based in, and the technology you use will depend on how you are connecting to the internet. I am based in the UK, and our internet is based on ADSL or VDSL2, or sometimes through a cable modem. Generally you need a router to convert that incoming signal to Ethernet or WiFi, which is what your computer can understand.

You can't have more than one hard drive in your iMac. You will need to choose either a regular hard disk, or Fusion drive or SSD. A fusion drive typically gets you around 80% of the speed benefit compared to a SSD drive. Most people would recommend choosing SSD over Fusion. However Fusion does allow you to have a drive with significant data storage capacity with most of the speed benefits of SSD. It is difficult to assess how much of benefit having an SSD drive compared to Fusion is in your case, as I am not familiar with the apps that you are running. It sounds like most of your data is coming direct from the internet, so one one hand hard disk (SSD) storage should not make much difference, however if the programs are accessing historical data on past trades stored on the hard disk then it may make a difference. If you are not sure I would go for SSD to be safe.

No need of any great historical data access. Though I run the same programs for historical data access too, that will be only after my work hours, so a little lag at that time is completely acceptable. However, during the work hours I only need live data that I am getting from internet and my programs make some calculations on them, I assess those calculations, put up orders, which are transmitted again over the internet.

I am from India. Whatever the internet connection I get, I connect the cable to router (no modem in the middle) and the Wi-Fi is broadcasted. sometimes when I feel that my Wi-Fi is slow, I connect the cable directly to my system or laptop and get on with it. is that ADSL line ? I think so.

I need better storage capacity and if Fusion gives me a speed of 80% of SSD, I think I am good with that, as long as my parallels doesn't lag. I think I am being a bit paranoid here, but my programs usually don't make much use of system, it is more dependant on internet, except some communication between the programs themselves, in that case I believe it has to be with a better hard disk.

Also, can you give me a hint about how much the cost is for a 1 TB fusion drive and 1 TB SSD ?(Price in UK is also good because apple price doesn't vary much over the countries) that will help me select between the two. Though money is not my concern, I don't want to spend too much on something I wont make best use of.

 

[James_C]

The problem is windows crashes my programs a lot. Currently I am running windows 8 with a quad core processor and 16 gigs ram, 7200 rpm HDD, still my programs crash bunch of times a day. At the same time, a friend of mine is using a MacBook pro and using fusion to run the same programs and though he sees a bit of lag, the programs doesn't really crash as they do in my desktop. Note that the MacBook pro (ofcourse with SSD), a laptop is running the programs better than my desktop. That was the reason for me to look at an iMac. And not to hide, I really wanted to get an iMac from so long too

Just to be clear using a program like Parallels or Fusion creates a virtual PC environment on your Mac so that you can run Windows on top of Mac OS X. At the end of the day you are still running windows, and it is just as likely to crash as running Windows on a PC. It sounds like you have a specific problem with your current windows system, that could be related to a hardware or software problem. Running these programs on a Mac won't make them run any better or reduce the risk of them crashing, except with the benefit that you are going to be installing them from scratch in a clean system.

 

[akhill]

Just to be clear using a program like Parallels or Fusion creates a virtual PC environment on your Mac so that you can run Windows on top of Mac OS X. At the end of the day you are still running windows, and it is just as likely to crash as running Windows on a PC. It sounds like you have a specific problem with your current windows system, that could be related to a hardware or software problem. Running these programs on a Mac won't make them run any better or reduce the risk of them crashing, except with the benefit that you are going to be installing them from scratch in a clean system.

I am pretty much sure it is related to my hardware configuration(My fan rotates with too much speed at times and the programs crash) because as I said above, my friend running the same programs on MacBook pro with fusion program and he is doing pretty good. he hardly sees any crash over a month, whereas I am experiencing 3 or 4 crashes a week.

Also I am using 32 bit windows 8. I think that makes a difference too. When I get an iMac, I made it a point to get 64 bit windows 8 for parallels.

 

[James_C]

No need of any great historical data access. Though I run the same programs for historical data access too, that will be only after my work hours, so a little lag at that time is completely acceptable. However, during the work hours I only need live data that I am getting from internet and my programs make some calculations on them, I assess those calculations, put up orders, which are transmitted again over the internet.

I am from India. Whatever the internet connection I get, I connect the cable to router (no modem in the middle) and the Wi-Fi is broadcasted. sometimes when I feel that my Wi-Fi is slow, I connect the cable directly to my system or laptop and get on with it. is that ADSL line ? I think so.

I need better storage capacity and if Fusion gives me a speed of 80% of SSD, I think I am good with that, as long as my parallels doesn't lag. I think I am being a bit paranoid here, but my programs usually don't make much use of system, it is more dependant on internet, except some communication between the programs themselves, in that case I believe it has to be with a better hard disk.

Also, can you give me a hint about how much the cost is for a 1 TB fusion drive and 1 TB SSD ?(Price in UK is also good because apple price doesn't vary much over the countries) that will help me select between the two. Though money is not my concern, I don't want to spend too much on something I wont make best use of.

You should always connect via ethernet rather than WiFI if you want to reduce lag. WiFi connections can be downgraded and get interference from other users nearby. If a 1 second delay really is the difference between losing $4,000 you want to be using ethernet not wifi.

I think you will be fine with a Fusion drive, you can see the prices in the screenshot I posted, a 1TB fusion drive adds GBP 160 to the base price. The same cost as the 256GB SSD. The 1TB SSD costs an extra GBP 800, which is why myself and others have not suggested it

It is worth pointing out the iMacs offer a high throughput connectivity port called Thunderbolt so it is easy to add external storage at a later stage, as whatever internal storage you choose now is not designed to be upgraded by the end user later.

 

[akhill]

You should always connect via ethernet rather than WiFI if you want to reduce lag. WiFi connections can be downgraded and get interference from other users nearby. If a 1 second delay really is the difference between losing $4,000 you want to be using ethernet not wifi.


I think you will be fine with a Fusion drive, you can see the prices in the screenshot I posted, a 1TB fusion drive adds GBP 160 to the base price. The same cost as the 256GB SSD. The 1TB SSD costs an extra GBP 800, which is why myself and others have not suggested it

It is worth pointing out the iMacs offer a high throughput connectivity port called Thunderbolt so it is easy to add external storage at a later stage, as whatever internal storage you choose now is not designed to be upgraded by the end user later.

thanks..all my concerns have been addressed now.

Yeah .. Forex trading is a bit hectic and dangerous too. If you dont exit at the right time, the loss will be too heavy, given the recent wild swings in the present markets but its not always the same. I am just being extra cautious because now i am a budding entrepreneur and dont really want to take any chances.


So it is going to be a 27 inch iMac with 16 gigs and 3.9 Ghz turbo and 1 TB fusion drive, GTX780M

 

[James_C]

thanks..all my concerns have been addressed now.

Yeah .. Forex trading is a bit hectic and dangerous too. If you dont exit at the right time, the loss will be too heavy, given the recent wild swings in the present markets but its not always the same. I am just being extra cautious because now i am a budding entrepreneur and dont really want to take any chances.


So it is going to be a 27 inch iMac with 16 gigs and 3.9 Ghz turbo and 1 TB fusion drive, GTX780M

I am sure you will be very pleased with it. Post back when you get it and tell us what you think.

 

[akhill]

I am sure you will be very pleased with it. Post back when you get it and tell us what you think.

yeah sure.. definitely ..