Upgrading mid 2010 iMac 11,3

[Alfilde]

I'm about to upgrade my mid-2010 iMac 11.3 to a slightly more modern version — with a humble desire to be able to install Monterey or Ventura on it.

But I get lost in the jungle of different chip options. What specs do I need for CPU, GPU, and SSD?

And since I'm now investing in a hardware upgrade anyway, what else would be worth upgrading at the same time --- maybe bluetooth, fan, or something else?

This iMac is my work use, meaning that I basically spend most of my working hours in front of its camera in various video meetings. In other words, it is not intended for gaming. But in these meetings, I would sometimes love to be able to use, for example, a whiteboard application or share a virtual desk with my clients. But with the current hardware specs on this iMac, its capacity for such use is not enough.

 

[Amethyst1]

CPU upgrade: The 2.93 GHz Core i7-870 was the most powerful CPU offered as a BTO. The 3.06 GHz Core i7-880 is the fastest that will fit. It’s still “just” a quad-core though.

RAM: 32 GB is the maximum. Four 8 GB modules.

SSD: Any 2.5” SATA SSD will work. Cheaper ones often lack a DRAM cache, which (mainly) affects random write speed.

 

[theMarble]

Do you already have an SSD in it? That would be the single best upgrade you can do, as modern macOS releases (since the introduction of APFS) are not optimized for spinners.

As @Amethyst1 said, the i7 870 and 32GB of DDR3 1066 is the best combo you can do, but I think that (given you already have a quad core and 16GB of RAM) the better upgrade is a Metal-capable graphics card.

While the 5750 can be run on modern macOS thanks to OpenCore, it will never be as stable and as fast as a Metal supported GPU. You will need an MXM card that has been flashed for use on this gen of iMac (2009-2011), as you will not get any bootscreen without it.

There is an entire wikipost over on the iMac forum here about upgrading the GPU, but a good cheaper option is the Quadro K1100M.

 

[Fishrrman]

You'd do much better to look for a newer Mac.
If budget is a consideration, I'd be looking for a late-model Mini.
At least 2018, or newer.

 

[Nguyen Duc Hieu]

I'm about to upgrade my mid-2010 iMac 11.3 to a slightly more modern version — with a humble desire to be able to install Monterey or Ventura on it.

But I get lost in the jungle of different chip options. What specs do I need for CPU, GPU, and SSD?

And since I'm now investing in a hardware upgrade anyway, what else would be worth upgrading at the same time --- maybe bluetooth, fan, or something else?

This iMac is my work use, meaning that I basically spend most of my working hours in front of its camera in various video meetings. In other words, it is not intended for gaming. But in these meetings, I would sometimes love to be able to use, for example, a whiteboard application or share a virtual desk with my clients. But with the current hardware specs on this iMac, its capacity for such use is not enough.

View attachment 2209719View attachment 2209720

You can buy a Mac Mini M1 or M2 and use this iMac as a monitor.
Upgrading Mac OS to Monterey or Ventura on this iMac means you are doing a Hackintosh.
Isight Camera will not work well on Monterey & Ventura.

 

[MultiFinder17]

Your best bang for the buck upgrades for that iMac are an SSD and repasting the CPU/GPU. I still use my 2010 27" (with the BTO 2.93GHz i7) daily in my classroom, and it runs like a champ under the latest version of Monterey using OpenCore Legacy Patcher.

You don't need a particularly stellar SSD for that machine, as it only supports SATA II so you'll be limited by that. Even so, an SSD will dramatically improve the snappiness and usability of your iMac.

Replacing the thermal paste in your iMac can go a good way to keeping temps down and performance high. If you're interested while you're digging that deep, the i7-870 (2.93GHz) is only around $20 on eBay these days. The i7-880 (3.06GHz) is around $50, so 0.13GHz faster for 2.5x the price. Sometimes staying one step below the absolute max is far more cost effective.

As @Amethyst1 mentioned, it will support up to 32GB of RAM but unless you're planning on doing fairly intensive tasks or a lot of tasks at once, you should be good with the 16GB you have in there.

You can certainly put a new GPU in there, there are plenty of guides in this forum and people that have successfully done so. The biggest limitation you'd have by NOT upgrading the GPU is not having Metal support, which can cripple a number of modern apps. Personally I'd put in an SSD, install Monterey, and try out the apps you need. If they work well enough, baller, I wouldn't bother with the GPU. If they have major issues that prevent them from working, swap your old drive back in so you can use your iMac for now and order yourself a new GPU.

These are still fantastic machines, and good on you for keeping it going and dragging it kicking and screaming into the 2020s! Whatever you choose to do, we're always happy to help you keep an old Mac alive

 

[Alfilde]

Thank you for all your replies so far. 🙏

As for the choice of SSDs, considering that I use this iMac for long video meetings, how significant is the difference in practice between an SSD with a thermal sensor and an SSD alone?

 

[Nguyen Duc Hieu]

Thank you for all your replies so far. 🙏

As for the choice of SSDs, considering that I use this iMac for long video meetings, how significant is the difference in practice between an SSD with a thermal sensor and an SSD alone?

Near to zero.

Worrying about the crazy HDD fan?
=> Just cut the far end and twitch the wires together. The iMac will detect a very low temperature and lower down the HDD fan spinning speed.

Wanting a real sensor?
=>Replace the HDD sensor with ODD sensor and tape it to the SSD. Meaningless anyway.

 

[MultiFinder17]

Thank you for all your replies so far. 🙏

As for the choice of SSDs, considering that I use this iMac for long video meetings, how significant is the difference in practice between an SSD with a thermal sensor and an SSD alone?

Nothing much. I'd just install Macs Fan Control to play with the fan speeds manually to find the good balance between temps and noise. Realize that those 2010 quad-core iMacs make delightful little space heaters, so be prepared for warmth!

 

[Alfilde]

Nothing much. I'd just install Macs Fan Control to play with the fan speeds manually to find the good balance between temps and noise. Realize that those 2010 quad-core iMacs make delightful little space heaters, so be prepared for warmth!

Well, would it be reason, and at all even possible, to install a more powerful fan?

 

[MultiFinder17]

Well, would it be reason, and at all even possible, to install a more powerful fan?

It may be possible to mod the fans with more powerful ones, but likely not really worth it. They’re good at exhausting the heat those iMacs generate, there’s just a lot to exhaust

 

[Ausdauersportler]

The iMac11,3 will run with any AMD card you can find on the list of the iMac GPU upgrade thread (link in my signature), use the cheapest MXM GPU you can acquire. If you already plan to open the iMac replace the HDD with a cheap SSD on your way.
Of course we all can move on, trash old Macs and buy new ones. How long, do you think, will this way of life sustain?

 

[Procrastinus]

If you are concerned about heat build up, perhaps my case modification here may help. It certainly made a big difference to my 11,1

 

[Shnite]

What did you do in the end?

 

[langking]

Since the 11,3 only got sata2. You can just replace odd with a new ssd, and keep the old hdd for storage.

 

[Alfilde]

I eventually ended up replacing the 2010 iMac with a somewhat newer model, the 21" Mac 2013. I upgraded it with a new SSD and 16GB of RAM, equipped with Sonoma and the OpenCore Legacy Patcher. This combination performs far better than my initial expectations.

 

[s3ae]

I'm about to upgrade my mid-2010 iMac 11.3 to a slightly more modern version — with a humble desire to be able to install Monterey or Ventura on it.

But I get lost in the jungle of different chip options. What specs do I need for CPU, GPU, and SSD?

And since I'm now investing in a hardware upgrade anyway, what else would be worth upgrading at the same time --- maybe bluetooth, fan, or something else?

This iMac is my work use, meaning that I basically spend most of my working hours in front of its camera in various video meetings. In other words, it is not intended for gaming. But in these meetings, I would sometimes love to be able to use, for example, a whiteboard application or share a virtual desk with my clients. But with the current hardware specs on this iMac, its capacity for such use is not enough.

View attachment 2209719View attachment 2209720

I upgraded the original i3 to a i7-870 (2.93 GHz), the memory from 2 to 16 GB, and the hard drive to a 1 TB SSD, re-using the original HDD thermal sensor. This made it quite snappy, enough to use as a day-to-day machine.

Because I wanted to run the newer MacOS versions on it (for app support), I used OpenCore Legacy Patcher. But because the OpenCore patcher doesn't overcome the shortcomings of the unsupported non-Metal Radeon HD 5670 it came with, doing so caused flickering and weird shadowing. I found a reasonably priced NVidia Quadro K2100M 2GB GPU and slapped it in. After a firmware update, the GPU worked and I have a great system that now runs Sonoma 14.5 like a champ.

Total cost for upgrade was around $250. Total upgrade time was a few hours. The only really difficult part (for me) was flashing of the GPU firmware/VBIOS.