Mid 2011 21.5" iMac bulk purchase - worth it?

[Jimmy-Chivas]

Someone in my local area has several mid 2011 21.5" units in the original box with magic mouse and keyboard, and includes power cord. He says they were bulk sell off's from various businesses. Not sure what he paid per unit, but he's offered to sell them to me for $100 each.

Whaddya guys think? Presuming excellent or very good condition with decent specs, would it be worth picking up 2, 3, or more of these units? He agreed that I will test each one individually first to make sure they power up.

 

[TrenttonY]

Someone in my local area has several mid 2011 21.5" units in the original box with magic mouse and keyboard, and includes power cord. He says they were bulk sell off's from various businesses. Not sure what he paid per unit, but he's offered to sell them to me for $100 each.

Whaddya guys think? Presuming excellent or very good condition with decent specs, would it be worth picking up 2, 3, or more of these units? He agreed that I will test each one individually first to make sure they power up.

I think it would be a good Chrome OS Flex machine (if compatible). I would highly recommend upgrading it to a SSD though.

 

[Jimmy-Chivas]

I think it would be a good Chrome OS Flex machine (if compatible). I would highly recommend upgrading it to a SSD though.

Yes, will definitely upgrade to SSD in each and use Zorin OS.

 

[padams35]

In that case go for it. 2011s are a cheap way to get a quad-core all-in-one system with upgradable ram.

The three weaknesses are: (a) no USB-3, (b) only 512MB VRAM if you had gaming ambitions, and (c) MacOS High Sierra is now old enough to have compatibility issues with modern software / iOS devices (N/A if installing linux).

 

[Nguyen Duc Hieu]

Someone in my local area has several mid 2011 21.5" units in the original box with magic mouse and keyboard, and includes power cord. He says they were bulk sell off's from various businesses. Not sure what he paid per unit, but he's offered to sell them to me for $100 each.

Whaddya guys think? Presuming excellent or very good condition with decent specs, would it be worth picking up 2, 3, or more of these units? He agreed that I will test each one individually first to make sure they power up.

The working Magic Mouse + Keyboard combo alone can be sold for 40$.

 

[pshufd]

No. Used 2011 iMac 27s are $100 in my area.

Those old iMacs are very power-inefficient too.

 

[Fishrrman]

There's a reason these are being sold cheap.
Save your money.
Buy something newer and more useful.

 

[Jimmy-Chivas]

No. Used 2011 iMac 27s are $100 in my area.

Those old iMacs are very power-inefficient too.

There's a reason these are being sold cheap.
Save your money.
Buy something newer and more useful.

I guess it depends on how one defines 'more useful', i.e. what needs to be accomplished with a given device.

 

[wilberforce]

Worth it if you need them.
Not worth it if you don't need them.
Also, not worth the time to flip them, as there is not enough margin or quantity to make it worthwhile.

 

[EugW]

No. Used 2011 iMac 27s are $100 in my area.

Those old iMacs are very power-inefficient too.

Wow, that's really cheap. That's half of what they go for here.

I think it would be a good Chrome OS Flex machine (if compatible). I would highly recommend upgrading it to a SSD though.

Those machines will run OS X 10.13 High Sierra, which is still supported by Chrome browser. I run OS X on my 2010 iMac 27". Plus, the 2010 27" can be used as a monitor. Unfortunately, the 2011 can't with current macOS versions.

 

[pshufd]

Wow, that's really cheap. That's half of what they go for here.

imac 27” late 2013 model - computers - by owner - electronics sale

iMac 27-Inch "Core i5" 3.2 (Late 2013) 3.2 GHz Core i5 (I5-4570) Intro. September 24, 2013 Disc. October 13, 2015 Order ME088LL/A Model A1419 (EMC 2639) Family Late 2013 ID iMac14,2 RAM 8 GB VRAM 1...

nh.craigslist.org

iMac (27-inch, Mid 2011) 24GB, 1TB disk - computers - by owner -...

An eleven year old iMac. Still Works but slowly. Bluetooth keyboard included. Mouse not included. 2.7 GHz Intel Core i5 24 GB Memory 1 TB Hard Disk. MacOS High Sierra 10.13.6 This is the highest...

boston.craigslist.org

iMac, 27 inch, Quad-core i7, with SSD and DVD drives - computers -...

This is my 27 inch iMac. It has a new install of MacOS High Sierra. mid-2011 model. It could also run Linux or Windows 10. The left half of the screen is a bit dimmer than the right. This is most...

boston.craigslist.org

M1 Mac mini - computers - by owner - electronics sale

M1 Mac mini 256 GB SSD 8 GB RAM

boston.craigslist.org

 

[EugW]

imac 27” late 2013 model - computers - by owner - electronics sale

iMac 27-Inch "Core i5" 3.2 (Late 2013) 3.2 GHz Core i5 (I5-4570) Intro. September 24, 2013 Disc. October 13, 2015 Order ME088LL/A Model A1419 (EMC 2639) Family Late 2013 ID iMac14,2 RAM 8 GB VRAM 1...

nh.craigslist.org

iMac (27-inch, Mid 2011) 24GB, 1TB disk - computers - by owner -...

An eleven year old iMac. Still Works but slowly. Bluetooth keyboard included. Mouse not included. 2.7 GHz Intel Core i5 24 GB Memory 1 TB Hard Disk. MacOS High Sierra 10.13.6 This is the highest...

boston.craigslist.org

iMac, 27 inch, Quad-core i7, with SSD and DVD drives - computers -...

This is my 27 inch iMac. It has a new install of MacOS High Sierra. mid-2011 model. It could also run Linux or Windows 10. The left half of the screen is a bit dimmer than the right. This is most...

boston.craigslist.org

M1 Mac mini - computers - by owner - electronics sale

M1 Mac mini 256 GB SSD 8 GB RAM

boston.craigslist.org

If I were in your area, I'd consider buying the $350 M1 Mac mini. They usually go for about 25% higher here. Mind you, I'm in Toronto. I find that for Mac stuff, at least here in Canada, it's often easier to find buyers at higher prices in the big city than in small towns.

 

[pshufd]

If I were in your area, I'd consider buying the $350 M1 Mac mini. They usually go for about 25% higher here. Mind you, I'm in Toronto. I find that for Mac stuff, at least here in Canada, it's often easier to find buyers at higher prices in the big city than in small towns.

There's a thread in the AS forum about never buying 8 GB RAM models.

I have 300 GB of RAM in my personal systems so I tend to go for more RAM, if possible. That is a great deal as more usual asking is $450 - $500. That person originally had an ask of $450. If he were located closer to Boston, it would have sold at $450. I see a lot of those at $500 that don't move unless they're including a keyboard and/or trackpad or mouse. One other thing is that there are no 16 GB refurbs with 256 or 512 GB SSD at the Apple Refurbished Store right now. The 16 GB models are very popular.

I see Canadian deals showing up in Craigslist and the prices are ridiculously high. I don't know if it's taxes, currency exchange or whatever but it's hard for me to imagine paying $1,000 for stuff that costs a lot less here.

 

[EugW]

There's a thread in the AS forum about never buying 8 GB RAM models.

I have 300 GB of RAM in my personal systems so I tend to go for more RAM, if possible.

For my work computer I run an 8 GB 2014 Mac mini, for relatively light business app usage. Runs fine most of the time although occasionally it can bog down if I load a bunch of business apps and browser windows simultaneously. Nonetheless I’m sure an 8 GB Apple Silicon machine would run much better, especially considering the glowing reports I see by light users of the 8 GB M1
Mac mini. Most of the complaints I see about the 8 GB model are by multimedia content creators and devs.

The Apple Silicon Mac mini I’d get would replace that 2014 Mac mini. However, I also have a 2017 iMac with 24 GB RAM. The Mac mini might also eventually replace that too so if I’m thinking in that context I maybe would get 24 GB or minimum 16 GB. I’ll decide when the new M2 series machines appear.

I don’t know what I’d do with 300 GB RAM in any machine, even in the next decade. I foresee 32 GB likely being sufficient for me even in 2030.

I see Canadian deals showing up in Craigslist and the prices are ridiculously high. I don't know if it's taxes, currency exchange or whatever but it's hard for me to imagine paying $1,000 for stuff that costs a lot less here.

Curious, I decided to look outside my area and just found an M1 Mac mini (entry level) for CA$$300 (US$230). Seems legit so wow. It’s only missing a power cord which on the Mac mini is easily replaced AFAIK (and doesn’t come with any accessories). However, it’s on the other side of the country and is local pickup only.

 

[pshufd]

I have a 16 GB M1 mini and a 2014 iMac with 32 GB of RAM. I run my production on the M1 mini and my office stuff on the iMac. Basically combining the best of both worlds.

Selling Macs in rural areas is probably quite difficult. I see Macs for sale in Montreal and they are quite expensive compared to US sites.

 

[EugW]

I have a 16 GB M1 mini and a 2014 iMac with 32 GB of RAM. I run my production on the M1 mini and my office stuff on the iMac. Basically combining the best of both worlds.

Selling Macs in rural areas is probably quite difficult. I see Macs for sale in Montreal and they are quite expensive compared to US sites.

Oh. So the 300 GB RAM you were talking about is over multiple machines? Or was that a typo?

For your Mac mini, what kind of stuff are you doing on it? Any issues with 16 GB?

For me I probably only need 16 GB at least in the near term for an M2 Mac mini but would strongly consider 24 GB for US$200 more. I probably wouldn’t pay $400 more than the 16 GB (M2 Pro?) model for 32 GB though.

 

[pshufd]

Oh. So the 300 GB RAM you were talking about is over multiple machines?

For your Mac mini, what kind of stuff are you doing on it? Any issues with 16 GB.

For me I know I probably only need 16 GB in the near term for an M2 Mac mini but would strongly consider 24 GB for US$200 more than the 16 GB model. I probably wouldn’t pay $400 more than the 16 GB model for 32 GB in an M2 Pro Mac mini though.

Yup. One system has 128 GB, another has 48 GB. These are Windows systems and one is a custom build. My other systems either have 16 or 32 GB of RAM unless they are ancient.

I do trading on my M1 mini. It typically uses about 13 GB of RAM (the remaining is used for cache). The iMac usually runs about 18 GB of RAM in use with the remaining used for cache. I sometimes run a Windows VM on it which brings the RAM usage up to 24 GB. I also do video production on the M1 mini but not at the same time that I run my trading programs. Video production doesn't use a lot of memory. I also do some development but not much lately but I usually use my M1 Pro MacBook Pro for that and it has 32 GB of RAM.

I think that the 24 GB option is a good one. If you need to run work stuff then 16 should be fine for now unless you have something that uses a lot of RAM. 24 allows you future proofing. One other nice thing about additional RAM is that Monterey had a lot of memory leaks issues early on and the ones that I ran into have been fixed by 12.5. I had to reboot my system every couple of days last year and then once a week and then once every two weeks. Having the extra RAM did help there. We could see the same thing again when Ventura ships.

I waited on upgrading my other systems with only 16 GB of RAM.

 

[mdgm]

You can run Big Sur or even Monterey using OCLP on the Mid 2011 21.5" iMac.

They shipped with an internal HDD and an SSD would be a great upgrade. Upgrading the RAM (up to 32GB - 4x8GB) is easier than upgrading the storage. This was the last 21.5" iMac models to have easily replaceable RAM.

One of the weaknesses of the 2011 iMac is that they have graphics cards known to fail prematurely.

A strength is that every iMac since has been less upgradeable. You can replace the CPU, RAM, graphics card, storage and optical drive. You can even replace the HDD and optical drive with SSDs and add a 3rd SSD.

I have four of these machines (I got 4x4GB RAM modules and upgraded each system to 8GB RAM many years ago, otherwise left in stock configuration) and although it could hardly be called premature at this point, three of the four iMacs have failing graphics cards.

The 2011 iMac whilst it doesn't have USB3, does have TB1, though how useful that is to you is another question. You could use a TB2 to TB3 adapter and a TB3 device with its own power supply. Though support for TB on 3rd party OS may vary.

 

[Marche90]

Depending on where you live that is very cheap. If you can check if they're all working correctly you can resell them, and as someone said before the keyboard/mouse combo can be sold very well.

 

[Corefile]

You can actually get Monterey running on this model of iMac now with help from Open Core Legacy Patcher. Another alternative is to run Linux Mint on it which runs excellently.