Looking for a new iMac

[met985]

Hi everybody,

finally the new iMacs! After a long waiting I'm now looking for a new iMac to replace my death 24" 2009 whose graphic card got broken last year.
As many people I have a lot of doubts related to the new machine I'm gonna buy: basically I use the computer for the daily operations (office / mail / web) and for music (recording / some simple productions) and rarely for photo editing (maybe video). This morning I had a discussion with a friend who is an Apple reseller in order to value what could be worth: he adviced me to choose or the 27" entry level upgrading the hard disk with a 512 gb SSD or to go directly to the top end upgrading only the processor. For both solutions I will upgrade later the RAM buying a third part product (in case in the next months I could value also to buy an external SSD drive).

I'm quite uncertain: the final price is quite different (approximately € 400) but of course the two machines surely offer not comparable performances I assume.

My aim is to have a long lasting device which allows me to do what needed for many years (I'm quite convinced that my old 2009 iMac would run quite well still today).

What would you do?

Thank you in advance for any reply or advice.

 

[sunapple]

If we call the three configurations 1, 2 and 3 I'd go with option 1 because you don't really need extra performance. Option 2 could be configured with 64GB of RAM and an i7, option 3 had the GPU with 8GB VRAM which is quite absurd for your needs.

It's quite nice having a built-in SSD, I'd give that more priority than the CPU in your case.

Given that I could even edit a small video project on a entry level 12" MacBook I'd say the 27" model in any configuration is going to be just fine.

 

[Fishrrman]

OP wrote:
"This morning I had a discussion with a friend who is an Apple reseller in order to value what could be worth: he adviced me to choose or the 27" entry level upgrading the hard disk with a 512 gb SSD"

That would be a good choice. The 512gb SSD adds only $300 to the initial buy-in cost.
If you ever need more storage, just add a USB3 (or USB3.1 gen 2) SSD.

I think this would do fine considering your usage requirements as stated above.

 

[met985]

Thank you all for your replies.

If we call the three configurations 1, 2 and 3 I'd go with option 1 because you don't really need extra performance. Option 2 could be configured with 64GB of RAM and an i7, option 3 had the GPU with 8GB VRAM which is quite absurd for your needs.

It's quite nice having a built-in SSD, I'd give that more priority than the CPU in your case.

Given that I could even edit a small video project on a entry level 12" MacBook I'd say the 27" model in any configuration is going to be just fine.

OP wrote:
"This morning I had a discussion with a friend who is an Apple reseller in order to value what could be worth: he adviced me to choose or the 27" entry level upgrading the hard disk with a 512 gb SSD"

That would be a good choice. The 512gb SSD adds only $300 to the initial buy-in cost.
If you ever need more storage, just add a USB3 (or USB3.1 gen 2) SSD.

I think this would do fine considering your usage requirements as stated above.

Surely the top iMac 27 would have much more "extra power" than needed but I think it would be the same maybe even with the mid range 21.5" or the lowest. With my old iMac Core 2 Duo with 8 gb Ram I was able to do everything needed. Again my doubt is as soon as I can afford this purchase to spend some € more and have nearly the best device and not to have any regret in the future.