The new iMac would replace a mid-2007 24" iMac; so my needs are not that great relative to current abilities. I feel pretty set on the highest tier 27" iMac but am open to recommendations. Our current machine has been 100% reliable & bulletproof, it runs mostly 24/7 unless we head out of town. We would love the same reliability and longevity in our next machine. We toyed with getting a MBP or MBAir but i think we need a new anchor machine instead; we both have pc laptops for work anyway. I keep wanting to add a Mac laptop eventually but even when we vacation we end up taking our work laptops with us in case of fires erupting back at HQ, so it may not happen.
Current uses: General internet, Youtube, Netflix, etc. Serves as an iTunes music server, anchor machine for managing our iPhones & the kids iPads, TurboTax and tax retention records, Misc document retention (Adobe PDF). I still collect & rip CD's so i'll need to get an optical drive of some sort eventually. MS Office suite, Google Docs, to support work or school projects. We used to do iMovie family projects, but the old Mac cant keep up with that anymore, it would be nice to do that again. We also have a decade's worth of family photos in a Lightroom 2 catalogue; I rarely process photos. I like using Lightroom as a digital photo album for organization, and the occasional resizing, exporting, or adjusting of levels if a photo is important to me and I can fix an obvious defect. I don't do digital workflow of any sort.
CPU: i5 or i9?
GPU: 580X versus Vega?
Memory: I'll upgrade on my own
Storage: I need opinions here. My current internal drive is a 2TB 7200RPM drive that I installed 8 years ago . After cleaning out the cobwebs we are using 1.2TB of that space. We also have a 4TB external drive in an OWC Mercury Elite Pro enclosure used exclusively for Time Machine backups.
My initial preference was to get the 2TB SSD. Someone want to talk me out of that? It's crazy expensive however with a $1,100 upgrade cost over the base 2TB Fusion drive but there's something to be said for ditching the platter drive, on what is once a decade (hopefully) purchase for us; Alterbatively 2TB/3TB Fusion drives seem like very cost effective alternatives.
Many will recommend ordering the 500GB internal SSD from Apple. With that in mind, I priced out external SSD storage from OWC for a "media drive". The OWC Envoy Pro EX costs $599 for a 2TB SSD that is advertised as offering 2500MB/s sustained performance. Is it really worth doing that to save $400 in this scenario or are there better options?
Mouse vs Trackpad: I already have Magic Mouse 1. Is there a benefit to running both MM2 AND the Magic Trackpad? I'm curious about the trackpad but not sure I should experiment for $129 if I'll use it once and then throw it in storage.
Current uses: General internet, Youtube, Netflix, etc. Serves as an iTunes music server, anchor machine for managing our iPhones & the kids iPads, TurboTax and tax retention records, Misc document retention (Adobe PDF). I still collect & rip CD's so i'll need to get an optical drive of some sort eventually. MS Office suite, Google Docs, to support work or school projects. We used to do iMovie family projects, but the old Mac cant keep up with that anymore, it would be nice to do that again. We also have a decade's worth of family photos in a Lightroom 2 catalogue; I rarely process photos. I like using Lightroom as a digital photo album for organization, and the occasional resizing, exporting, or adjusting of levels if a photo is important to me and I can fix an obvious defect. I don't do digital workflow of any sort.
CPU: i5 or i9?
GPU: 580X versus Vega?
Memory: I'll upgrade on my own
Storage: I need opinions here. My current internal drive is a 2TB 7200RPM drive that I installed 8 years ago . After cleaning out the cobwebs we are using 1.2TB of that space. We also have a 4TB external drive in an OWC Mercury Elite Pro enclosure used exclusively for Time Machine backups.
My initial preference was to get the 2TB SSD. Someone want to talk me out of that? It's crazy expensive however with a $1,100 upgrade cost over the base 2TB Fusion drive but there's something to be said for ditching the platter drive, on what is once a decade (hopefully) purchase for us; Alterbatively 2TB/3TB Fusion drives seem like very cost effective alternatives.
Many will recommend ordering the 500GB internal SSD from Apple. With that in mind, I priced out external SSD storage from OWC for a "media drive". The OWC Envoy Pro EX costs $599 for a 2TB SSD that is advertised as offering 2500MB/s sustained performance. Is it really worth doing that to save $400 in this scenario or are there better options?
Mouse vs Trackpad: I already have Magic Mouse 1. Is there a benefit to running both MM2 AND the Magic Trackpad? I'm curious about the trackpad but not sure I should experiment for $129 if I'll use it once and then throw it in storage.
