question regarding 21.5 imac

[dazed]

Hi,

My 2007 mac mini is basically dead now (usb ports fail randomly meaning all my external drives and keyboard get disconnected) so im thinking of replacing it with a base 21.5 imac (upping ram to 8 or 16gb and adding a ssd).

Since I like my existing monitor can I use the imac screen as the 2nd monitor ?

I use photoshop, lightroom so will I see much of an improvement with the base imac over my mini ?

Thanks

 

[panzer06]

Hi,

My 2007 mac mini is basically dead now (usb ports fail randomly meaning all my external drives and keyboard get disconnected) so im thinking of replacing it with a base 21.5 imac (upping ram to 8 or 16gb and adding a ssd).

Since I like my existing monitor can I use the imac screen as the 2nd monitor ?

I use photoshop, lightroom so will I see much of an improvement with the base imac over my mini ?

Thanks

Yes, you can use the external display as your primary display. Just make the necessary adjustments in display preferences.

And certainly the base 2010 iMac will be much faster than the circa 2007 dying mini. Get the refurb and save even more.

Cheers,

 

[Waragainstsleep]

Thats a really strange fault. I have never seen it happen to any Mac in 6 years of fixing them and a great deal more of using them. Have you tried booting from an external drive? I would suspect software or a dodgy USB peripheral.

Failing that, grab a bluetooth keyboard and use it as a media centre.

 

[dazed]

I swapped the hd a few months ago and did a fresh install and the problem persists. the hds are also directly plugged into the mac and the keyboard is plugged into a hub. Its a weird issue and very intermittent.

I will definitely continue using it as a media centre though as its a great little machine. I will be trying a firewire external drive to see if that has similar issues.

 

[dazed]

one other question...

How well does the i3 handle 64bit windows 7 ? either in bootcamp or vmware?

I will have 16gb ram so that should help somewhat.