Seeking advice on 24" iMac (Early 2009)

[Raging Dufus]

Hello friends, I could use some advice. Basically, I'm setting up a new workspace at my office, and have thought long and hard about what type and size of computer I want to use. Seems it's completely up to me, I can use anything that will access the office network - which is, well, anything. So I'm gonna use some of my favorite things, old "obsolete" Macs. Heck, I'd even go with Power Macs, but given that I need to do some relatively modern web stuff, and as they say time is money - best not to go below early Intel. So here I am.

I've decided that a 24" iMac with a second display is the ticket, as it's the optimum size for my space. But I've never owned one of these, thus my knowledge is limited. I plan to seek an early 2009 model because: (a) it's the latest of the Intel 24" models, (b) takes up to 8 gigs of memory, and (c) seems to run patched Mojave well. Mojave is as far as I'll likely go for a while, because it retains 32-bit capability.

My main uses for this machine will be document creation and handling, access to online databases, and other general web-related stuff. I just want something pleasant to use, it doesn't need to be some high-powered gaming setup. Any of the early 2009 iMacs will suffice for this. I intend to completely disassemble, clean, re-paste, and thoroughly upgrade whatever I get, and will maintain it myself for as long as I use it, so my chief concerns are reliability and repairability.

That said, I'd be interested in anyone's thoughts as to the different early 2009 24" iMac models. Since I'll be upgrading the CPU anyway, should I just get the low-end one with the 9400M onboard graphics? Or is the higher-end GT-series discrete graphics card worth having for Mojave? I already know about the tendency of displays in these units to yellow over time, and have looked into repairing that - seems doable. Anything else I need to be wary of? Which version would you recommend, or if you can't recommend any of them what alternative would you choose?

 

[Amethyst1]

Since I'll be upgrading the CPU anyway, should I just get the low-end one with the 9400M onboard graphics? Or is the higher-end GT-series discrete graphics card worth having for Mojave?

For me, the question would be whether the discrete GPU in those machines is known to be 100% reliable.

And I mean 100%.

If it’s not, I’d stick to the 9400M for noise and thermal reasons as well.

The GT 120 is just a rebadged 9500 GT, i.e. a low-end GPU. I used a 9500 GT in my Snow Leopard Hackintosh. It worked. But that’s it.

 

[Raging Dufus]

For me, the question would be whether the discrete GPU in those machines is known to be 100% reliable.

And I mean 100%.

If it’s not, I’d stick to the 9400M for noise and thermal reasons as well.

I see the 9400M became ubiquitous throughout Apple's lineup for a time, as it did with other manufacturers. There doesn't seem to be much in the way of problems with them, so, reliability, check. Seems fine for my uses, at least with a supported OS. But I am concerned about having enough graphical oomph for Mojave, because it's conceivable I'll need to use some graphic-intensive applications, drawing programs and such.

Any thoughts on the GT130 (standard in the fastest 3.06 GHz model) or the Radeon HD 4850 (BTO option)? If I come across one of these, is it worth the premium?

 

[ahurst]

I see the 9400M became ubiquitous throughout Apple's lineup for a time, as it did with other manufacturers. There doesn't seem to be much in the way of problems with them, so, reliability, check. Seems fine for my uses, at least with a supported OS. But I am concerned about having enough graphical oomph for Mojave, because it's conceivable I'll need to use some graphic-intensive applications, drawing programs and such.

Any thoughts on the GT130 (standard in the fastest 3.06 GHz model) or the Radeon HD 4850 (BTO option)? If I come across one of these, is it worth the premium?

I had one with the HD4850 and it was a pretty solid card, though you should check the Mojave patcher to make sure the old ATI drivers work as well as the NVidia ones for the cards in question. You can check out some old barefeats.com benchmarks for the era to get a sense of the practical differences for your workloads!

As long as the NVidia cards don’t stutter in the UI I’m sure they’re fine: unless you want to dual-boot Snow Leopard for some mid-to-late 2000’s Mac gaming nostalgia most of the benefit’s probably lost.

I loved my 24”, and I would have probably kept using it for years if the GPU heatsink hadn’t somehow developed a hole that prevented it from transferring heat off the GPU to the fan. The HD4850 has its own special heatsink and is super-hard to track down for a fair price, so for now it’s in a box waiting to be revived. ?

EDIT: These benchmarks might help answer your GPU question.

 

[Amethyst1]

Any thoughts on the GT130 (standard in the fastest 3.06 GHz model) or the Radeon HD 4850 (BTO option)?

The GT 130 is a rebadged GT 9600 GSO, i.e. a mid-range card. The HD 4850 is quite a bit more powerful. My 27” iMac has the 4850 so if you’d like me to test something on it I can do that.

Speaking of CPU upgrades, early 2008/2009 20" and 24" iMacs use custom mobile Core 2 Duos (Socket P) but their model numbers are very similar to desktop Core 2 Duos (don't let that confuse you), so when upgrading to a 3.06 GHz one, you can choose between an E8435 which has either a 44-watt (newer E0 stepping) or 55-watt (older C0 stepping) TDP rating, or a T9900 which has a 35-watt TDP rating. The lower the TDP rating, the cooler the chip runs and the less taxing it is on the cooling system, so if you can get your hands on a T9900 at a good price (they're sought after) I'd take that over an E8435 any day. If you can't, try to get the newer E0 stepping of the E8435.

 

[Raging Dufus]

I had one with the HD4850 and it was a pretty solid card, though you should check the Mojave patcher to make sure the old ATI drivers work as well as the NVidia ones for the cards in question. You can check out some old barefeats.com benchmarks for the era to get a sense of the practical differences for your workloads!

As long as the NVidia cards don’t stutter in the UI I’m sure they’re fine: unless you want to dual-boot Snow Leopard for some mid-to-late 2000’s Mac gaming nostalgia most of the benefit’s probably lost.

I loved my 24”, and I would have probably kept using it for years if the GPU heatsink hadn’t somehow developed a hole that prevented it from transferring heat off the GPU to the fan. The HD4850 has its own special heatsink and is super-hard to track down for a fair price, so for now it’s in a box waiting to be revived. ?

EDIT: These benchmarks might help answer your GPU question.

Thanks, that was useful info. I wish they'd thrown the GT 120 into that comparison, seems like it would have been natural to do so - but alas. Good to hear you loved your 24", but...

somehow developed a hole

? no wonder I'm seeing none of these! Looks like they didn't design the cooling system well for the HD 4850.

 

[Raging Dufus]

The GT 130 is a rebadged GT 9600 GSO, i.e. a mid-range card. The HD 4850 is quite a bit more powerful. My 27” iMac has the 4850 so if you’d like me to test something on it I can do that.

Speaking of CPU upgrades, early 2008/2009 20" and 24" iMacs use custom mobile Core 2 Duos (Socket P) but their model numbers are very similar to desktop Core 2 Duos (don't let that confuse you), so when upgrading to a 3.06 GHz one, you can choose between an E8435 which has either a 44-watt (newer E0 stepping) or 55-watt (older C0 stepping) TDP rating, or a T9900 which has a 35-watt TDP rating. The lower the TDP rating, the cooler the chip runs and the less taxing it is on the cooling system, so if you can get your hands on a T9900 at a good price (they're sought after) I'd take that over an E8435 any day. If you can't, try to get the newer E0 stepping of the E8435.

Thanks, I've seen what you're talking about in reference to the T9900. I will score one if I can for a reasonable price. But I'm not concerned about overheating with the E8435, I upgraded my 20" with one of those about 3 years ago and it's never been a problem. Can't remember even hearing the fan, and the machine runs like a top.

What I wish I could do is toss a Core 2 Extreme or even a quad-core in there - but I've yet to see a success story regarding one of these. Given the middling graphics, that's probably overkill anyway.

 

[Amethyst1]

What I wish I could do is toss a Core 2 Extreme or even a quad-core in there - but I've yet to see a success story regarding one of these.

The high-end 2007 24" iMac uses a Core 2 Extreme X7900. But the only meaningful difference between "normal" and Extreme CPUs is the unlocked multiplier for overclocking so... can you increase the multiplier in software on an iMac?

Given the middling graphics, that's probably overkill anyway.

It depends.There are many tasks which require lots of CPU power but no GPU power.

 

[MultiFinder17]

I'd definitely go for a 9400M-based iMac. They're dead reliable, consume far less power, and pump out far less heat than a discrete GPU. These days, the difference between the 9400M and a dedicated GPU of the era is middling in daily use. I've always been impressed at the performance for daily usage of that little thing, and I think you'd be pleased with it as well. It's solid, reliable, cool-running, and has enough power for most daily usage for a machine of the era

 

[Raging Dufus]

The high-end 2007 24" iMac uses a Core 2 Extreme X7900. But the only meaningful difference between "normal" and Extreme CPUs is the unlocked multiplier for overclocking so... can you increase the multiplier in software on an iMac?

Interesting, didn't know the ability to overclock was the difference. I wonder if anyone's actually overclocked that Extreme in the 2007 iMac... and if it can't be done, why did Apple put it in there in the first place?

And now I wonder, if I dropped an Extreme into my iMac... could it be overclocked in Windows, and would the changed multiplier stick when I rebooted into the Mac OS?

Even if I could do this, though, I probably wouldn't. Overclocking in most cases is overrated IMHO, and I've no desire to stress the cooling system in an already-compromised flat-panel iMac.

 

[Raging Dufus]

I'd definitely go for a 9400M-based iMac. They're dead reliable, consume far less power, and pump out far less heat than a discrete GPU. These days, the difference between the 9400M and a dedicated GPU of the era is middling in daily use. I've always been impressed at the performance for daily usage of that little thing, and I think you'd be pleased with it as well. It's solid, reliable, cool-running, and has enough power for most daily usage for a machine of the era

Hard to argue with that. It's in a lot of Macs of the era, and I don't see any widespread issues or complaints.

 

[Amethyst1]

Interesting, didn't know the ability to overclock was the difference. I wonder if anyone's actually overclocked that Extreme in the 2007 iMac... and if it can't be done, why did Apple put it in there in the first place?

It was the fastest mobile Core 2 Duo at the time of its release.

 

[bobesch]

The yellow-tinted display happened to be present more or less on all of my four 2008/9er 24" iMacs.
It's ok, if you have nothing to compare, but side-by-side with a 2nd monitor it might become disturbing!
I really do like those 2008/2009er iMacs and the size/resolution of the screen!
Came at an average price of about 120-130 bucks each - that's 2y ago now. I've spent them a full overhaul.

"... could it be overclocked in Windows" If you think about Win10Pro on the standard-configuration (my experience is based on the range of 2,6 to 3,0GHz models with 8GB of RAM):
Win10Pro itself ran decently. But after changing from a thin-client/terminal-client-server-system to full-client/file-server my Office-software (still 32bit ) became so unbearably slow and laggy when accessing central database information or JPEGs or PDFs off the Win10Pro server, that I came to retire 3 of 4 of those 24" iMacs (the 3GHz had a dead GPU anyway - maybe maintained to death?, one I've sold, one I gave away as a present ...), but one is still left in office and on duty for screenshots/printouts of forms, wherever my office-software fails.

Due to "requirements of the service" at the office the 2009er iMac were replaced by mid2012 15"MBPs (Win10pro) that do run great, but I currently think about getting either better glasses or a 2nd monitor of decent size.
To be honest, I'd recommend something like that rather than a 2009 c2d iMac now, if You're looking for a full-client.
For RDP / ScreenSharing a single 2008/09 24" iMac is great (and I'm really sorry, that I had to retire my most favorite white 2006 iMacs), but don't underestimate the annoyance of that yellow tinted monitor side-by-side with another bright and balanced display.

PS1: USB-3 on the mid2012 15"MBP is another great advantage.
PS2: Yep, and a new pair of glasses ...

 

[Raging Dufus]

The yellow-tinted display happened to be present more or less on all of my four 2008/9er 24" iMacs.
It's ok, if you have nothing to compare, but side-by-side with a 2nd monitor it might become disturbing!
I really do like those 2008/2009er iMacs and the size/resolution of the screen!
Came at an average price of about 120-130 bucks each - that's 2y ago now. I've spent them a full overhaul.

"... could it be overclocked in Windows" If you think about Win10Pro on the standard-configuration (my experience is based on the range of 2,6 to 3,0GHz models with 8GB of RAM):
Win10Pro itself ran decently. But after changing from a thin-client/terminal-client-server-system to full-client/file-server my Office-software (still 32bit ) became so unbearably slow and laggy when accessing central database information or JPEGs or PDFs off the Win10Pro server, that I came to retire 3 of 4 of those 24" iMacs (the 3GHz had a dead GPU anyway - maybe maintained to death?, one I've sold, one I gave away as a present ...), but one is still left in office and on duty for screenshots/printouts of forms, wherever my office-software fails.

Due to "requirements of the service" at the office the 2009er iMac were replaced by mid2012 15"MBPs (Win10pro) that do run great, but I currently think about getting either better glasses or a 2nd monitor of decent size.
To be honest, I'd recommend something like that rather than a 2009 c2d iMac now, if You're looking for a full-client.
For RDP / ScreenSharing a single 2008/09 24" iMac is great (and I'm really sorry, that I had to retire my most favorite white 2006 iMacs), but don't underestimate the annoyance of that yellow tinted monitor side-by-side with another bright and balanced display.

PS1: USB-3 on the mid2012 15"MBP is another great advantage.
PS2: Yep, and a new pair of glasses ...

Thanks for the advice, it's well taken. My iMac will be a full client, running its own OS on its own resources and only needing to view and copy files to/from the office server. My needs in that regard are pretty basic.

As for the yellowing, I'm aware of it and also aware that there are newer models I could choose that don't suffer that problem. But 24" is what I want - not 21.5, 27 or anything else. I may get lucky and get a good panel, as I understand that not all of them suffered this condition. If I do get a yellowy one, I plan to attempt something along the lines of what is discussed here. And that's ok, because the more I dig into the machine and upgrade/fix it, the more I'll feel like it's mine.

In any event, I won't be pairing it with a new external display, that too will be several years old. One way or another, by the time I'm done with it, the iMac shouldn't suffer much by comparison if at all.

On the CPU front, I've decided to go for the T9900 unless I happen to score an OEM 3.06 GHz model. The E8435 edges out the T9900 in a few performance areas, and I'm not worried about thermal issues because I've been running a 3.06 GHz E8435 in my 20" iMac for years now, without problems. So if I get an original 3.06 GHz, I'll just re-paste it and call it good. But if not, I'll replace the CPU and I might as well get a T9900. They go for about twice the price of an E8435, but even that is still less than $70. I don't mind spending that much on a computer I plan on using for a decade or so.

 

[Heindijs]

My parents have been using the 3,06ghz version of this machine for years. The gt130 seems reliable enough to have worked this far. It’s perfectly adequate for most of the tasks with its fusion drive. At the moment it’s running Catalina but it has run Mojave before at pretty much the same speed as El Capitan.

Although you should definitely keep in mind that the display yellows a lot over time. I doubt there are any models left with a non yellow display out in the wild. You can easily correct this with the colour calibration menu, but it will definitely be dimmer that way.

 

[Raging Dufus]

Although you should definitely keep in mind that the display yellows a lot over time. I doubt there are any models left with a non yellow display out in the wild. You can easily correct this with the colour calibration menu, but it will definitely be dimmer that way.

I wonder how much of an issue the yellowing will be if I'm using dark mode?

 

[Heindijs]

I wonder how much of an issue the yellowing will be if I'm using dark mode?

It turns the black into more of a brown colour in dark mode. Your eyes will adapt probably, but it definitely is a common problem among these iMacs.

 

[Raging Dufus]

I also wonder what the options would be for exchanging the yellowing panel with something newer? It seems there have been, and continue to be, plenty of standalone displays by various manufacturers with the same dimensions and resolution as these iMacs' LG panels. Could it be as simple as swapping them out?

 

[bobesch]

Tinkering with the display/colour-profiles (those 'others' not dedicated to the specific Apple-display) might improve performance, but probably won't fit results on any printouts too.

 

[Raging Dufus]

Tinkering with the display/colour-profiles (those 'others' not dedicated to the specific Apple-display) might improve performance, but probably won't fit results on any printouts too.

About 95% of my printing involves black-and-white text-only documents, so I don't think an altered color profile - if I do have to use one - will affect me much. But that's certainly something to keep in mind, thanks!

 

[Amethyst1]

It seems there have been, and continue to be, plenty of standalone displays by various manufacturers with the same dimensions and resolution as these iMacs' LG panels. Could it be as simple as swapping them out?

If the replacement LCD uses the exact same type of LVDS connector and pinout as the 24" iMac's panel (AFAICS it's an LG LM240WU2 which there are several revisions of with the SL-B*'s being the ones used in the aluminum iMacs), it might be possible.

Newer 24" WUXGA panels might use a different LVDS connector and/or pinout... or use embedded DisplayPort (eDP) rather than LVDS.

 

[Raging Dufus]

So, I've made my choice, and she's a beauty:



I paid what I'd consider a premium, $130 + shipping, but I got the pictured keyboard and mighty mouse, and it all came in the original box! The iMac itself is a nearly perfect specimen. I couldn't take any photos that do it justice, but it literally looks brand new. This was an important consideration, because it will be on prominent display in my office where staff and clients will see it every day. A beat-up old hoopdie just wouldn't do.

Upon further consideration I don't think I'm going to upgrade the CPU. Even the T9900 at 3.06 GHz adds less than a 5% performance boost and doesn't open up anything new in the way of instruction sets, security or other capabilities, and won't allow it to run any newer versions of any OS that the 2.93 GHz can't already handle. So I'm just going to get in there and repaste it when I add an SSD.

I have thought about replacing the graphics card though; I didn't realize these were upgradeable, but they are and rather easily. The Geforce GT 130 uses the same heatsink as the GT 120 that's inside this one, and it's more capable with twice the VRAM, certainly enough to justify the modest cost of obtaining one (they seem to be plentiful on eBay).

As for the screen yellowing issue we've discussed, I think it's ok... but perhaps I'm not the best judge, see what you think:



Just kidding. Really though, it looks fine to me. My photography skills suck, as does the lighting in my house, but here's as good a comparison shot as I could get with iMac side-by-side to my 2007 MBP (which, to me at least, has a nice screen):



It looks much, much better in real life; and the iMac clearly outshines the MBP, as it should.

I think I got lucky here! In any event, I'm happy