Last year's 27" discounted - a good deal??

[realmford]

Hey all,

I have the opportunity through a corporate discount to get:

Apple - 27" iMac® with Retina 5K display - Intel Core i5 (3.5GHz) - 8GB Memory - 1TB Hard Drive - White. It has the AMD Radeon 290x.

It would cost about $1680. Is this a good deal? The description says the 1TB hard drive is the fusion with the 128gb flash. A new 27'' with the 2TB fusion would run me $2100, so this is substantial savings over the late 2015 model.

For my needs I'm just doing light gaming, internet, photo storage, apps, etc. Nothing hardcore - I originally thought the 21.5'' late 2015 would be perfect for me but to add the fusion with 128GB flash would run me the same price as this one - so is this a no brainer??

 

[Fishrrman]

You should be aware that ANY 5k iMac with only a platter-based HDD inside isn't going to be that fast. See possible solution below.

Important:
The 1tb fusion drive in LAST year's iMac is an ok buy (it has a 128gb drive for the SSD portion), BUT, the 1tb fusion drive for THIS year's iMac IS NOT such a good buy, because the SSD in its fusion drive only yields 24gb of usable space...

A possible alternative that would make the deal above workable:
You can buy the iMac with only an internal HDD, but I sense you're going to be back here afterwards asking, "how can I make this thing go faster?"

A very easy and affordable workaround would be to buy a "bare" 2.5" SSD of your choice (I just saw a Sandisk 240gb today for $55 at dealnews.com), and put it into a USB3 enclosure that supports UASP (USB attached SCSI protocol). This would give you read speeds around 430mbps and writes around 330mbps.
Quite fast for day-to-day use, very workable.

Aside:
The speeds from the PCIe-mounted SSDs in the new iMacs are about 3 times as fast, however.

 

[dangerfish]

http://www.apple.com/shop/product/F...z-quad-core-intel-core-i5-with-retina-display
Seems to be a good deal. The same computer from the Apple Refurb store is $1869. I just bought the i7 version of this computer from the refurb store for $2079 and I LOVE it. Just be certain that it does have the fusion drive. I wouldn't buy an iMac without it.

 

[realmford]

Definitely looks like the fusion drive - description says
OS X YosemiteTechnical details: 4th Gen Intel® Core? i5 processor; 27" display; 8GB memory; 1TB Fusion DriveSpecial features: Built-in wireless networking; Bluetooth; webcamNote: DVD/CD drive not included


and Features state:

• 2-in-1 Fusion Drive provides both size and speed Incorporates a large-capacity 1TB hard drive for ample storage, with a 128GB flash module as a cache to speed up start times and accelerate frequently accessed data.

Might pull the trigger!

 

[desmond2046]

Definitely looks like the fusion drive - description says
OS X YosemiteTechnical details: 4th Gen Intel® Core? i5 processor; 27" display; 8GB memory; 1TB Fusion DriveSpecial features: Built-in wireless networking; Bluetooth; webcamNote: DVD/CD drive not included


and Features state:

• 2-in-1 Fusion Drive provides both size and speed Incorporates a large-capacity 1TB hard drive for ample storage, with a 128GB flash module as a cache to speed up start times and accelerate frequently accessed data.

Might pull the trigger!

Good deal if it is indeed 1TB Fusion drive with 128Gb flash

 

[maflynn]

You should be aware that ANY 5k iMac with only a platter-based HDD inside isn't going to be that fast

I'm happy with my 5k iMac and its 2TB fusion drive. Yes, normal drives can be slow, but thanks to the flash storage, I'm getting some nice performance out the computer

Do I wish that I upgraded to the SSD? Not really, the price premium for the 512GB SSD was more then I was willing to pay, and the 256GB SSD was too small for my needs. For the first time in many years, I have sufficient storage to hold all my data on the internal storage instead of using slower external drives.

 

[makrom]

Unless I'm wrong, there was no 2014 model without FD. The downsized mid 2015 had a HDD, but since it has a M290X GPU as well as a 3.5GHz CPU, it needs to be the 2014 model. Definitely a good price for a new one. Doesn't lack that much compared to this year's top tier non BTO model.

 

[jerwin]

It's a good computer for the price. It's quite a bit better than the m380/hard drive/3.2 Ghz mac, which is what Apple sells at that price point. Shopping on black friday weekend is always a bit tricky though.

I have one and I have no complaints--other than the fact that I could always use a faster graphics card (games!) The "what if I need more than 8GB" feeling is easily assuaged by the user accessible ram slots. The only disadvantage is the display, which apparently lacks the color gamut of the new ones.