Hello!
I am fairly new to mac. In June I purchased an early 2015 macbook air 11inch with a 1.6ghz i5 processor, 4gb of ram and 256gb ssd. I love how light it is and how it enabled me to do my work pretty much anywhere instead of being tied down to my desk (before purchasing this computer I had an iPad and I had a netbook running a stripped down version of vista before that, otherwise only windows desktops). I bought it because I was going back to university and wanted a good portable computer. This has lead my to a new problem though: my tiny, ultra portable laptop is faster and easier to use than my current desktop computer (which is admittedly older and was cheap - it's an acer aspire with a 500gb hard drive, 3gb of ram, and AMD Athlon dual core processor, and Nvidia geforce 6150se graphics, running windows 7; nothing fancy). I teach online as my primary source of income, mostly from home, and so I appreciate having the larger screen of my desktop. But that windows PC feels SLOW in comparison with my macbook air. In addition to word processing, powerpoint, internet, email and Skype (which I use extensively), I play a few games (mostly the sims, civilization and simcity) and I was unable to run Civ 5 and the Sims 4 on my PC (although they do run on my macbook air with the graphics turned down to low). And so, with all of that in mind, I have decided I need a new computer. I think I want to go apple because I like OS X, I like how it sinks automatically with my iPad and iPhone, and my macbook air supported the Russian language natively without hunting down language packs (and apple's french Canadian keyboard layout is much better than the one for PC).
So, with all of that in mind, the computer I am looking at buying is a second hand iMac from late 2012 with the following specs: 21.5" screen, 2.7 ghz inter i5 core, 8 gb of ram, nvidia geforce 640 with a 1tb fusion drive. That will cost me $900 cad. Is that still a good buy in 2015 and will it work for my needs (be faster than my windows, closer to my air, run Skype well, and run civilization 5)?
The other option for a mac in my price range would be a new mac mini (I could get top of the line), the very cheapest iMac, or I could save up for the second cheapest current 21.5" iMac (here: http://www.apple.com/ca_edu_93120/shop/buy-mac/imac?product=MK442LL/A&step=config).
Opinions and suggestions are greatly appreciated.
Edit: the only other mac besides the air that I have owned was a 1.4 GHz G4 mac mini running OS X 10.5.8 with an 80gb hard drive and 512mb of ram, which is still functional but doesn't handle modern tasks well, such as playing a video on youtube).
Edit: or maybe this refurb would be better? http://www.apple.com/ca/shop/produc...d-215-inch-imac-29ghz-quad-core-Intel-Core-i5
I am fairly new to mac. In June I purchased an early 2015 macbook air 11inch with a 1.6ghz i5 processor, 4gb of ram and 256gb ssd. I love how light it is and how it enabled me to do my work pretty much anywhere instead of being tied down to my desk (before purchasing this computer I had an iPad and I had a netbook running a stripped down version of vista before that, otherwise only windows desktops). I bought it because I was going back to university and wanted a good portable computer. This has lead my to a new problem though: my tiny, ultra portable laptop is faster and easier to use than my current desktop computer (which is admittedly older and was cheap - it's an acer aspire with a 500gb hard drive, 3gb of ram, and AMD Athlon dual core processor, and Nvidia geforce 6150se graphics, running windows 7; nothing fancy). I teach online as my primary source of income, mostly from home, and so I appreciate having the larger screen of my desktop. But that windows PC feels SLOW in comparison with my macbook air. In addition to word processing, powerpoint, internet, email and Skype (which I use extensively), I play a few games (mostly the sims, civilization and simcity) and I was unable to run Civ 5 and the Sims 4 on my PC (although they do run on my macbook air with the graphics turned down to low). And so, with all of that in mind, I have decided I need a new computer. I think I want to go apple because I like OS X, I like how it sinks automatically with my iPad and iPhone, and my macbook air supported the Russian language natively without hunting down language packs (and apple's french Canadian keyboard layout is much better than the one for PC).
So, with all of that in mind, the computer I am looking at buying is a second hand iMac from late 2012 with the following specs: 21.5" screen, 2.7 ghz inter i5 core, 8 gb of ram, nvidia geforce 640 with a 1tb fusion drive. That will cost me $900 cad. Is that still a good buy in 2015 and will it work for my needs (be faster than my windows, closer to my air, run Skype well, and run civilization 5)?
The other option for a mac in my price range would be a new mac mini (I could get top of the line), the very cheapest iMac, or I could save up for the second cheapest current 21.5" iMac (here: http://www.apple.com/ca_edu_93120/shop/buy-mac/imac?product=MK442LL/A&step=config).
Opinions and suggestions are greatly appreciated.
Edit: the only other mac besides the air that I have owned was a 1.4 GHz G4 mac mini running OS X 10.5.8 with an 80gb hard drive and 512mb of ram, which is still functional but doesn't handle modern tasks well, such as playing a video on youtube).
Edit: or maybe this refurb would be better? http://www.apple.com/ca/shop/produc...d-215-inch-imac-29ghz-quad-core-Intel-Core-i5
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