The dreaded now or wait? Anxiety.

[imanidiot]

Thinking about ordering a new 21.5 iMac to replace my mid-2010 iMac. My current machine still performs well, but it is 4+ years old, and I anticipate problems with the HDD. After listening to opinions on the likelihood of a meaningful iMac refresh this year, I'm thinking just do it. I don't find the possibility of a Retna or 4k display to be a compelling reason to wait. And in the meantime, I don't think that a minor speed boost compelling either. The consensus of opinion seems to be that nothing major will happen before next year, so I'm thinking of going refurb with fusion drive now. I currently have 8g memory, and I'm hoping that's enough in the future (BTW, my needs are pretty basic, email, browsing, occasional messing around with iMove, creating documents in Pages; I'm a writer so most of my important usage is creating text documents). Am I gong to wake up tomorrow morning (next apple event) hating myself for not waiting? Again, my current machine seems to be doing all right, but it's 4 years old, and I get the spinning beach ball more that I used to, and the entire experience seems subjectively slower than one upon a time.

Thanks.

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I know that this topic has been beaten to death, and I apologize if I'm wasting your time. But I saw a likely candidate in the refurb store today....

 

[wannabepcuser]

The dreaded now or wait? Anxiety.

From my days running Windows, a reinstall of the operating system on a yearly basis was a necessity.

Perhaps you could think about a reinstall.

 

[mad3inch1na]

That sounds pretty typical of an HDD bottleneck. I would recommend upgrading the HDD to a 256GB SSD for about 100$. Buy a USB 3.0 external drive for your HDD.

In general, I am not a huge fan of the 21.5" iMac. It fills an awkward space in the price range, and the performance/dollar is pretty poor. There are two huge benefits of the 27" iMac, which are graphics power and user upgradeable RAM. It is also impossible to go back to a smaller display once you use it. If you are looking at a 21.5" model in the 1800$ price range, there are much better 27" options at the same price. Just something to consider.

Best,
Matt

 

[yukyuklee]

I'd say upgrade to an SSD for now if the machine still works 4 years old doesn't really mean anything if you still can use the computer the same way you are doing now. If you aren't comfortable of removing the screen to install the new drive than you can run it through an external like Matt said. Why waste the money now when you don't mind the current speed of your iMac. Save the money and wait for something you really want or need

 

[imanidiot]

When you say run it through an external drive, does that mean, basically, bi-passing the internal hard drive? I would assume that that means to copy/transfer the contents of the existing internal drive to the external SSD drive?

Sorry to sound so technically illiterate, but I am. All I have done in this area is add ram to my machine. I'm not sure I'm capable of doing something like this.

 

[yukyuklee]

When you say run it through an external drive, does that mean, basically, bi-passing the internal hard drive? I would assume that that means to copy/transfer the contents of the existing internal drive to the external SSD drive?

Sorry to sound so technically illiterate, but I am. All I have done in this area is add ram to my machine. I'm not sure I'm capable of doing something like this.

yup basically have the operating system on the external and letting the imac boot from that drive. it will show your current hard drive as a secondary but if you say its about to break than I wouldn't store any important files on there.

 

[mad3inch1na]

When you say run it through an external drive, does that mean, basically, bi-passing the internal hard drive? I would assume that that means to copy/transfer the contents of the existing internal drive to the external SSD drive?

Sorry to sound so technically illiterate, but I am. All I have done in this area is add ram to my machine. I'm not sure I'm capable of doing something like this.

I wouldn't recommend an SSD external drive on USB just because TRIM is not enabled, which will shorten the functional lifespan of the drive. The 2010 model also doesn't have USB 3.0, which slipped my mind, so transfer rates over 2.0 will be abysmal. You can still do an external SSD with a thunderbolt enclosure, but it will cost about 50$ extra for the convenience. I would recommend making the SSD your internal drive. I personally haven't worked with the 2010 iMac, but I do not think it is an extremely complicated task.

Matt