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rMBP 13' question & advice

9

931069

Cancelled
Original poster
Nov 1, 2014
50
0
I have an iMac 21.5 inch from 2010. It's the base model. It has an i3 3.06 GHz, 4GB RAM, and a 500GB HDD. And it's running Yosemite.

50% of my use is video editing. No, I'm not a pro who makes 2-hour films and uses After Effects. I am just a teenage youtuber who makes stop-motion animated videos. Ever since I downgraded to Yosemite, iMovie has gotten awful. With videos longer than about 3 minutes, I try to render it and it beachballs for 2-3 minutes then crashes(works the second time though). And whenever I start iMovie, it takes 2-5 minutes, it's painful, and it beachballs all the time.

My question is, (in the future, not now, (can't afford anything)) would an rMBP 13' be good for my use? I normally make short films that are 1-2 minutes long. Sometimes I make action films that are 3-4 minutes long. I normally have multiple sound effects, and sometimes in my action films, green screen footage. I only use iMovie, but it's still slow.

So.. should I try to get a new Mac later? Upgrade my current? I would really like to try a different form factor....and dat retina tho. (and I REALLY don't want a 15 inch btw)
 
Last edited:
931069 said:
I have an iMac 21.5 inch from 2010. It's the base model. It has an i3 3.06 GHz, 4GB RAM, and a 500GB HDD. And it's running Yosemite.

50% of my use is video editing. No, I'm not a pro who makes 2-hour films and uses After Effects. I am just a teenage youtuber who makes stop-motion animated videos. Ever since I downgraded to Yosemite, iMovie has gotten awful. With videos longer than about 3 minutes, I try to render it and it beachballs for 2-3 minutes then crashes(works the second time though). And whenever I start iMovie, it takes 2-5 minutes, it's painful, and it beachballs all the time.

My question is, (in the future, not now, (can't afford anything)) would an rMBP 13' be good for my use? I normally make short films that are 1-2 minutes long. Sometimes I make action films that are 3-4 minutes long. I normally have multiple sound effects, and sometimes in my action films, green screen footage. I only use iMovie, but it's still slow.

So.. should I try to get a new Mac later? Upgrade my current? I would really like to try a different form factor....and dat retina tho. (and I REALLY don't want a 15 inch btw)
Click to expand...

Yes you will be fine with a 13" rMBP.

Why do you said you downgraded your iMac? Also, you should look into doing a factory restore on your iMac if you had upgraded from Mountain Lion to Yosemite without a fresh install...
 
Which version of iMovie are you using? The latest isn't very good. The older version would still be on your drive.
 
931069 said:
How can I do that? When I had Mavericks, my mac was silky smooth and iMovie was awesome. I wish I could

----------



It's not the design or features, it's bugs and lag.
Click to expand...

Again, have you done a fresh install on your iMac?
 
Question for OP:
How full is your hard drive?

Some thoughts:
Both Yosemite AND Mavericks seem to require an SSD for decent performance.

Yosemite and Mavericks "run" on SSD's, but it's more like they're reduced to "walking" when operating from HDDs, in many cases.

It's my opinion (and mine only) that if you want to keep using the 2010 iMac, you'd probably do best to "drop back" to OS 10.8.5 "Mountain Lion" if that iMac will handle it.

I believe the performance improvements you'd notice from such a "downgrade" would be immediately noticeable and pleasing.

Other alternatives:
- Add an SSD internally. But opening an iMac and doing the replacement is not a job for the feint-at-heart.
- Add an SSD in a firewire800 external enclosure. Boot times may not improve noticeably, but I sense that once up-and-running, performance would be better.

Yes, a new retina MacBook -will- give you a noticeable upgrade in performance....
 
I would wonder what your RAM usage is when you see the beachballs. I would wager you are under memory pressure and paging during those times.

Upgrading to 8 or even 16GB of RAM should be between $50-$150. Even if you're just going to keep it as a second machine that is the easiest upgrade that would potentially give it some breathing room.
 
Fishrrman said:
Question for OP:
How full is your hard drive?

Some thoughts:
Both Yosemite AND Mavericks seem to require an SSD for decent performance.

Yosemite and Mavericks "run" on SSD's, but it's more like they're reduced to "walking" when operating from HDDs, in many cases.

It's my opinion (and mine only) that if you want to keep using the 2010 iMac, you'd probably do best to "drop back" to OS 10.8.5 "Mountain Lion" if that iMac will handle it.

I believe the performance improvements you'd notice from such a "downgrade" would be immediately noticeable and pleasing.

Other alternatives:
- Add an SSD internally. But opening an iMac and doing the replacement is not a job for the feint-at-heart.
- Add an SSD in a firewire800 external enclosure. Boot times may not improve noticeably, but I sense that once up-and-running, performance would be better.

Yes, a new retina MacBook -will- give you a noticeable upgrade in performance....
Click to expand...


I have 225GB left out of 500GB.
 
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