We (the wife and I) are planning to purchase an iMac soon as I think it is finally time to replace this G4 iBook. I plan to buy a refurbished model since that seems to be by far the best price and my research indicates Apple's refurbished products can be well trusted.
My main question is regarding the Apple Magic Mouse vs. the Magic Trackpad. If I buy a non-refurbished model through the Apple Store I can pick one or the other. However, the refurbished listings I've looked at only ever list the Apple Magic Mouse. Has anyone ever seen a refurbished model that included the Magic Trackpad? Even with buying the Magic Trackpad separately the refurbished price still beats everything I've seen, but I'd rather not spend the extra $69 if I didn't have to.
While that's my main question, if anyone has any advice or can make sure I'm pointed in the right direction, here is my situation.
I'm upgrading from a G4 iBook running OS X 10.4. I had the laptop for college, but we don't need the portability now and thus the plan is to go back to the iMac. Just like our current computer, we plan to keep the new iMac as long as possible. Price isn't really an issue, but I still would rather not spend any more than I need to.
We do not do anything intensive on the computer (although part of that could be that our current iBook hasn't liked to do much anything intensive for quite awhile now). The most the iMac will be used for will be word processing, web browsing, iTunes, watching online video, any maybe some light photo/graphics editing (I don't know enough to do anything ambitious). We might try out some games as well.
While I presume I would be perfectly fine getting one of the previous generation iMacs, and saving some more money, I want to get something with the current Sandy Bridge chipset so as to better future proof it. Sandy Bridge seems to be a bit of a jump and having it could be helpful if Apple uses it as a cutoff point for support for a future version of OS X.
What I'm more unsure of is whether upgrading within the Sandy Bridge chipset will buy us much anything in terms of longevity of the computer. I want to avoid for as long as possible a situation like my current iBook where is still "works", but it is a lot slower than it used to be and it even has a lot of trouble playing YouTube videos.
My main thought is to just get the entry level 21.5" 2.5ghz i5. It seems to be hard to go wrong with, and it seems to compare a lot more favorably to the other current iMac models when compared to the entry level model of previous generations. And just the 21.5" screen is a huge step up from our current 12".
As far as the 21.5" models go, I'm not too concerned about the graphics since the 6770 doesn't seem to be that much of a step up from the 6750. What does intrigue me though is the upgrade to the i7 chip. It probably isn't necessary for what we would be doing with the computer, but it is tempting and seems like quite the boost. I don't know whether this would really future proof me though or if I am talking myself into something that seems cool, but that I don't really need.
The 27" model is also tempting, and I'm facing a similar dilemma if we go that route. If we decide to go with the 27" I'm think I might want to opt for the better graphics and/or processor. While I'm not really worried about this with the 21.5" model, with the size and the additional resolution of the 27" model, I want to make sure it can handle itself down the road, especially under future iterations of OS X. Thus, if we decide we want the 27", I'm heavily tempted to go with the 6970 and the 3.4ghz i7. I don't know about upping the graphics from 1GB of Ram to 2GB though, that may be overkill, even for the long run (perhaps the whole thing is overkill though).
Whatever I do, I'll probably max out the Ram. With the prices I've seen at the places mentioned on this forum its almost too inexpensive not to just go ahead and do it.
As for the other main option, the SSD, unless someone wants to try and talk me into it, I'm leaning heavily against it. The price is a pretty big jump and considering the planned usage of the computer, I don't think we'd get much benefit out of it.
Thanks for any thoughts you've had. I've learned quite a bit lurking on this forum!
My main question is regarding the Apple Magic Mouse vs. the Magic Trackpad. If I buy a non-refurbished model through the Apple Store I can pick one or the other. However, the refurbished listings I've looked at only ever list the Apple Magic Mouse. Has anyone ever seen a refurbished model that included the Magic Trackpad? Even with buying the Magic Trackpad separately the refurbished price still beats everything I've seen, but I'd rather not spend the extra $69 if I didn't have to.
While that's my main question, if anyone has any advice or can make sure I'm pointed in the right direction, here is my situation.
I'm upgrading from a G4 iBook running OS X 10.4. I had the laptop for college, but we don't need the portability now and thus the plan is to go back to the iMac. Just like our current computer, we plan to keep the new iMac as long as possible. Price isn't really an issue, but I still would rather not spend any more than I need to.
We do not do anything intensive on the computer (although part of that could be that our current iBook hasn't liked to do much anything intensive for quite awhile now). The most the iMac will be used for will be word processing, web browsing, iTunes, watching online video, any maybe some light photo/graphics editing (I don't know enough to do anything ambitious). We might try out some games as well.
While I presume I would be perfectly fine getting one of the previous generation iMacs, and saving some more money, I want to get something with the current Sandy Bridge chipset so as to better future proof it. Sandy Bridge seems to be a bit of a jump and having it could be helpful if Apple uses it as a cutoff point for support for a future version of OS X.
What I'm more unsure of is whether upgrading within the Sandy Bridge chipset will buy us much anything in terms of longevity of the computer. I want to avoid for as long as possible a situation like my current iBook where is still "works", but it is a lot slower than it used to be and it even has a lot of trouble playing YouTube videos.
My main thought is to just get the entry level 21.5" 2.5ghz i5. It seems to be hard to go wrong with, and it seems to compare a lot more favorably to the other current iMac models when compared to the entry level model of previous generations. And just the 21.5" screen is a huge step up from our current 12".
As far as the 21.5" models go, I'm not too concerned about the graphics since the 6770 doesn't seem to be that much of a step up from the 6750. What does intrigue me though is the upgrade to the i7 chip. It probably isn't necessary for what we would be doing with the computer, but it is tempting and seems like quite the boost. I don't know whether this would really future proof me though or if I am talking myself into something that seems cool, but that I don't really need.
The 27" model is also tempting, and I'm facing a similar dilemma if we go that route. If we decide to go with the 27" I'm think I might want to opt for the better graphics and/or processor. While I'm not really worried about this with the 21.5" model, with the size and the additional resolution of the 27" model, I want to make sure it can handle itself down the road, especially under future iterations of OS X. Thus, if we decide we want the 27", I'm heavily tempted to go with the 6970 and the 3.4ghz i7. I don't know about upping the graphics from 1GB of Ram to 2GB though, that may be overkill, even for the long run (perhaps the whole thing is overkill though).
Whatever I do, I'll probably max out the Ram. With the prices I've seen at the places mentioned on this forum its almost too inexpensive not to just go ahead and do it.
As for the other main option, the SSD, unless someone wants to try and talk me into it, I'm leaning heavily against it. The price is a pretty big jump and considering the planned usage of the computer, I don't think we'd get much benefit out of it.
Thanks for any thoughts you've had. I've learned quite a bit lurking on this forum!