27" late 2013 iMac - upgrade or recycle?

[jlabenberg]

MY late-2017 27" iMac - 3.4 GHz intel Core i5 with 8gb of RAM and 1Tb SATA HD has outlasted any computer I've ever owned - MAC or PC.

It is slowing down and cannot or will not upgrade to Catalina...and I "think" that the Mojave upgrade was a mistake.

I do not need the best and the brightest and fastest anymore - however shelling out a couple of grand for a new machine isn't something I want to do or even need to do.

I do not have any solid MAC hardware or software expertise so my thoughts may be sophomoric...so...I could use a little help.

I've talked to my local authorized MAC dealer/repair place and for about $300 I can upgrade my RAM to 16 or 32gb AND purchase an external SSD drive to boot from.

My thought is this...the ram and hd upgrades would speed things up and keep me and this older machine "current" and running for a good bit longer.

I've checked and to sell this iMac to any of the sell-you-mac vendors - it's only worth about 250-300 bucks.

Is it worth investing $300 more on RAM and a new HD considering that the CPU will remain the original?

Also, if you were going to upgrade this iMac - and wanted to do it with a low-end budget and wanted it to last a good long time - what would you do? Is there something else you would upgrade or would you simply sell it or give it to a family member who needs it or donate it for the tax right off and then buy a new machine?

Any and all thoughts and insights are much appreciated!

thanks.

Jimbo in PA

 

[Fishrrman]

Don't bother with Catalina. For an older iMac, I'd stick with Mojave, and "look no further" beyond that.

Upgrade the RAM to 16gb if you think you need it. But actually, 8gb may still be "fine for now" (depends on what you do with it).

Use an external USB3 SSD as a "new boot drive".
You don't have to buy a 1tb SSD... 512gb or even 256gb will do.
A Samsung t5 or Sandisk Extreme should work fine.

Keep your "large libraries" (movies, music, pictures) on the internal HDD -- they don't require speed, they're simply "sitting there in storage".

Upgrading to an SSD will make it feel MUCH faster.
I predict you will be very happy with the results whether the SSD is "externally" or internally-installed.

Here's a source I recommend for RAM:

Apple Late 2013 iMac Memory - Intel Core i5 Quad-Core 27" Late 2013 ME089LL/A - DMS

DMS offers DDR3-1600 (PC3-12800) Memory for your Late 2013 iMac Intel Core i5 Quad-Core 27" ME089LL/A. All RAM is 100% Apple Compatible and backed by a Lifetime Warranty.

www.datamemorysystems.com

 

[smbu2000]

I agree with Fishrrman about using an external ssd as your boot drive. It should speed up your system fairly well.
8GB might be a bit low, but your system should have 4 total SODIMM slots for RAM. The current 8GB should be taking up two of those slots (2 x 4GB) so adding an extra 2 x 4GB sticks of RAM should be easy to do on the 27” via the slot on the back on the iMac. Getting 8GB (2x4GB) more of RAM should also be much cheaper than buying 4 new 8GB sticks to move up to 32GB.
An 8GB (2x4GB) 1600mhz DDR SODIMM kit sells for $30-$40 on Amazon.

My late 2012 27” iMac still runs fairly well (using Mojave). 3.4GHz i7/32GB/1TB Fusion Drive. The small 128GB SSD portion of the Fusion Drive still makes it run relatively quickly although I will probably add an external SSD (500GB) later since I already have it.

You can always keep the external SSD for fast external storage if/when you decide to sell the iMac in the future.

 

[AustinIllini]

Yup, external SSD on an old iMac using Mojave is the way to go. RAM, too, obviously.

 

[passatgt]

Why not upgrade the internal drive with an SSD? Getting off the screen is a bit tricky, but its not that complicated. That will give a new life to your iMac for sure. You should also have a blade SSD slot on the motherboard, thats bit more tricky to install, but could give you nvme speed ssd's.

 

[Dahoffman85]

I have a late 2013 27" iMac and I am currently running Catalina off a bootable 1TB external SSD SanDisk drive with 16GB of ram with zero issues. I do not do any heavy editing or processing of any kind but for normal everyday "Joe" computer use this is well more than enough. My iMac also doubles as my Plex server with zero issues as well. I use an external 5GB WD Easystore HD partitioned at 1GB for TimeMachine and 4GB for the Plex Server. I then use the internal 1GB 7200rpm for a backup TimeMachine and whatever else I want to store on it. Not that it matters to performance but I run a 27" thunderbolt display with this setup as well. I already had the ram at 16GB so all it cost me was the $107.99 off Amazon for the SSD (I bought an internal one as I already had an external enclosure laying around) and it was worth every penny, I say go for it, this computer will last another 10 years depending on what kind of use you plan to put it through.

 

[dpfenninger]

My late 2013 27" iMac has been my daily workhorse for six years now, and it chugs along as well as it did the day I bought it. Better, actually...I purchased a Thunderbolt-SATA adapter a while back (https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B014VBF6FM/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o01_s01?ie=UTF8&psc=1) and created a homemade Fusion drive with the internal 1 TB HDD and a 250 GB Samsung SATA SSD, and the system hums...boot time is about 20 seconds, apps launch fast, and I regularly get read speeds of about 500 MB/s, not nearly what you'd get from an internal SSD on a modern iMac, but definitely way faster than the internal drive and speedy enough for my needs. I run Windows 10 off Boot Camp as well, and besides using the slow HDD, that runs really well too.

Just this week, I also got a mini-DP adapter and HDMI cable to hook up my 43" 4K TV, and I now run that as an external display at full 3840x2160 resolution @30Hz. It's fun to see my iMac as the "smaller" screen now.

Running Catalina with 16 GB of memory, and it doesn't seem any slower than Mojave, High Sierra, or anything before it. I don't do any heavy-duty computing, mostly day-to-day stuff, so unless Apple comes up with something really compelling in the next iMac (bezel-less design, all SSD storage), or my current setup decides to go on the fritz, I have no need or desire to change my system anytime soon. It runs like a champ!

 

[lowfreq]

Late 2014 27" iMac here running catalina with 8 gig of RAM..No issues and as a matter of fact it's working better than what was on there before (Mojave maybe?)..

 

[djc6]

I just upgraded internal 1TB hard drive in a 21.5" Late 2013 iMac with an SSD - its like an entirely new computer. I cannot overemphasize how much faster it is. I used internet recovery to install Catalina on the new SSD.

I kept the ram at 8GB because on the 21.5" its hard to access. NOTE - the URLs below are NOT for your machine, just an example of what I purchased to upgrade 21.5" iMac:

I spent $7 on the suction cups to remove screen:

https://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B07W7TJFJJ/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1

and $8 on tool to remove old adhesive and it included replacement adhesive:

XtremeAmazing New LCD Display Adhesive Strips Tape Opening Wheel Handle Tools Kit for iMac A1418 21.5" 076-1437 076-1416, 076-1422 2012 2013 2014 2015 Series

XtremeAmazing New LCD Display Adhesive Strips Tape Opening Wheel Handle Tools Kit for iMac A1418 21.5" 076-1437 076-1416, 076-1422 2012 2013 2014 2015 Series

smile.amazon.com

I imagine 27" process is similar.