Novice coming in for some advice

[Joesgirl97]

*waving hello* Hi there Mac Rumor Guru's!

I've been a member for years and lurk quite often but am coming out of lurkdom to ask for some help.

I just ordered my first iMac, here are the specs:
Configuration
NVIDIA GeForceGT750M 1GB GDDR5
2.9GHz Quad-core Intel Core i5
16GB 1600MHz DDR3 SDRAM-2X8GB
1TB Serial ATA @ 5400 rpm
MAGIC TRACKPAD

I'm going from a Mac Mini that I bought about 8 years ago. Quite the upgrade as you can see. I'm hoping this one will last another 8-10 years.

We are light users. Kids will do school reports. Husband is just now discovering Guitar Band, my teenagers like to play with iMovie and I edit my iPhone pics in iPhoto. That's the extent of our use so I'm hoping I picked the right specs.

What I'm coming to you for is some guidance on what external hard drive to purchase. I need to get my mini transferred over to 'big mamma' if you will when she arrives. And from what I gather Time Machine will take care of this?

So if you can steer me to the right external hard drive and forgive my ignorance but just thinking here, if I back up to Time Machine (which I have NO IDEA how to do.) will it put Lion instead of Maverick on Big Mamma?

Thanks for any guidance you can provide.

 

[yjchua95]

*waving hello* Hi there Mac Rumor Guru's!

I've been a member for years and lurk quite often but am coming out of lurkdom to ask for some help.

I just ordered my first iMac, here are the specs:
Configuration
NVIDIA GeForceGT750M 1GB GDDR5
2.9GHz Quad-core Intel Core i5
16GB 1600MHz DDR3 SDRAM-2X8GB
1TB Serial ATA @ 5400 rpm
MAGIC TRACKPAD

I'm going from a Mac Mini that I bought about 8 years ago. Quite the upgrade as you can see. I'm hoping this one will last another 8-10 years.

We are light users. Kids will do school reports. Husband is just now discovering Guitar Band, my teenagers like to play with iMovie and I edit my iPhone pics in iPhoto. That's the extent of our use so I'm hoping I picked the right specs.

What I'm coming to you for is some guidance on what external hard drive to purchase. I need to get my mini transferred over to 'big mamma' if you will when she arrives. And from what I gather Time Machine will take care of this?

So if you can steer me to the right external hard drive and forgive my ignorance but just thinking here, if I back up to Time Machine (which I have NO IDEA how to do.) will it put Lion instead of Maverick on Big Mamma?

Thanks for any guidance you can provide.

Time Machine will back up whichever OS that's installed in your Mac.

If money's not a problem, go for a Thunderbolt drive like the Buffalo HD-PA1.0TU3 Thunderbolt drive. It's around US$220 in my country for 1TB.

 

[Ecoh]

I just set up my new iMac, very simple. You don't need to worry about the initial setup program putting older OS files on your new iMac, it knows not to do that. Just use the initial setup program and follow instructions. You won't need to make a Time Machine backup of your old mini, just connect your mini to your iMac with an Ethernet cable. It will not put on any of the old mini system files , only your apps and data.

If you want to do the time machine method, look for an external drive that says Mac compatible and you will be safe. If you are buying a drive for your new iMac get one with a thunderbolt connection, if it is for your old mini it will have to have USB port also.

You can always call Apple Care and they will walk you through the setup.

 

[jrlcopy]

*waving hello* Hi there Mac Rumor Guru's!

I've been a member for years and lurk quite often but am coming out of lurkdom to ask for some help.

I just ordered my first iMac, here are the specs:
Configuration
NVIDIA GeForceGT750M 1GB GDDR5
2.9GHz Quad-core Intel Core i5
16GB 1600MHz DDR3 SDRAM-2X8GB
1TB Serial ATA @ 5400 rpm
MAGIC TRACKPAD

I'm going from a Mac Mini that I bought about 8 years ago. Quite the upgrade as you can see. I'm hoping this one will last another 8-10 years.

We are light users. Kids will do school reports. Husband is just now discovering Guitar Band, my teenagers like to play with iMovie and I edit my iPhone pics in iPhoto. That's the extent of our use so I'm hoping I picked the right specs.

What I'm coming to you for is some guidance on what external hard drive to purchase. I need to get my mini transferred over to 'big mamma' if you will when she arrives. And from what I gather Time Machine will take care of this?

So if you can steer me to the right external hard drive and forgive my ignorance but just thinking here, if I back up to Time Machine (which I have NO IDEA how to do.) will it put Lion instead of Maverick on Big Mamma?

Thanks for any guidance you can provide.

This is the worst:
1TB Serial ATA @ 5400 rpm

You're computer won't be that noticeably faster because of the 5400 rpm drive. You're missing out on a lot of potential, an SSD or Fusion Drive over the ram upgrade would have been better. Change the order.

 

[Tumbleweed666]

I agree, change it to a fusion drive

 

[Nyy8]

That 5400 RPM will be THE KILLER. Fusion Drive would be amazing if you had the money, easily the best price/performance thing you can do.

When you grab that external hard drive, you can use it with your iMac for extra storage.

 

[Tanax]

Change it to an SSD instead which is better than Fusion Drive and get a cheaper (and upgradeable) external drive for your media (movies/music/documents/images/etc) files.