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iMac: C2D + SSD or i5

O

OatmealRocks

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Jul 30, 2009
626
3
I am trying to factor the substantial impact of installing a SSD. I plan on using this computer for the next 2.5 with no plans of upgrading. I mostly use PS and Lightroom where my RAW files are approx. 25mb. As of now my MBP is way under power as CS4 is sluggish.

Since CS5 is around the corner and the new features would take advantage of the mulitcore but how much of an improvement would there be when comparing SSD performance?

With my fixed budget I would like the best bang for my money.

Which would you suggest? an iMac 24 (2.8 or 3.06 mhz C2D + 128SSD HD) or iMac 27 i5?

The price difference of older iMac 24 would allow me to get a SSD which I don't mind. I just wonder if the i5 would perform better than the CD2.

thx for your help.
 
I would say neither of the above. Photoshop benefits from RAM more than CPU so you won't see difference between C2D and i5. 128GB is way too small to be used as storage so you end up getting an external HD which will make import times much longer giving you almost no benefit from SSD. Sure SSD makes PS launch fast but when importing and exporting, it's much slower.

I would get either 21.5" or 27" and buy 2x2GB of RAM to make the total amount of RAM 8GB because that, if something, will boost Photoshop, especially when the CS5 comes because it can support more than 3GB of RAM
 
Having just moved from a 4GHZ core i7, 128GB SSD, 6gb RAM, ATI 5870 Windows 7 machine to a iMac 27" Core i7 8GB. I would recommend that you got the core i5 and upgrade it to 8gb ram.

I am amazed at how fast this machine is compared to my uber windows PC.

The hdd is very quick and although its not as quick as my ssd i can hardly tell that much difference.

Go for it and just enjoy it!!
 
Thanks for the info. My question would be where does the SSD benefit other than bootup of OS and the application?

Are you saying SSD route, Lightroom and CS4 would not benefit as the data files still reside on a regular HD and NOT on the SSD?
 
Keep in mind, when a program runs out of available physical memory, it swaps data out into a page file which is normally located on a hard disk drive. The the normal scenario, this is where most computers would slow down.

In a SSD environment, while the computer would still page data out into a swap file, instead of being on a hard disk drive which is much slower, it would page out onto a hdd drive. While it may not be as fast as not having to page memory out of ram, it wouldn't be much slower imo.
 
Raima,

How is the performance of your iMac with regards of your data files being on an external? I notice a 64ssd and external HD via firewire. Do you only have one OS on your SSD? Windows?
 
i would go with the i5 since it's something you CANT upgrade with time..

by this time next year SSDs will be twice the size and half the price and u can upgrade yourself... it took me about 25 mins to swap my hdd and 10 of those minutes was cleaning the screen from dust after taking the glass off.

it's a very simple procedure, maybe right now you won't notice much difference in cpu's but i believe that with time more programs will learn to take advantage of multi cores
 
Definitely the i5. SSDs are great yeah, but they're still an adolescent technology. They're fast yes, but they also have limited lifetime in comparison to HDDs, and cost 10 times as much per unit of capacity.

Like bullettoothtony said, give it a year or two down the line, and you'll see greatly improved capacities/ lifetime/ less cost for SDDs.
 
TMRaven said:
Definitely the i5. SSDs are great yeah, but they're still an adolescent technology. They're fast yes, but they also have limited lifetime in comparison to HDDs, and cost 10 times as much per unit of capacity.

Like bullettoothtony said, give it a year or two down the line, and you'll see greatly improved capacities/ lifetime/ less cost for SDDs.
Click to expand...

Intel X25-V has MTBF of 1 200 000 hours, that's ~137 years! SSDs are way more reliable than regular HDs. Their only issue is that they may get fragmented but that's only if you write a lot data very often and new SSDs suffers from that less and less all the time
 
What a stunning number! May they eventually get cheaper and higher capacity then. I'd love to replace the current hdd in my new iMac, but I'd like to get an SSD that's at least 500gb for under 200 usd.
 
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