960GB SanDisk II Ultra SSD is available right now for $165.
Better buy one while you can.
I never said "most".
Better buy one while you can.
I never said "most".
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Ready to Buy - HDD Question
- Thread starter RedlegsFan
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Correct, you said more, but I'll say this. Given the volume of iMac sales that "more" would certainly have be a significant number of consumers, before apple saw a change in their sales, which brings it back to my main point. That's not really feasible, imo.
I am not sure how Apple would determine what this number would be.
We have about 60 Slim Unibody iMac 27". They all had the 1TB 7200 RPM hard drives.
That's because at the time of purchase, the department wanted to buy as many 27" iMac as possible and bought the cheapest configuration.
Anyway, these iMac had problems with constantly beachballing so it had us explored the possibly of upgrading.
We upgraded two of the iMac with SSD and the department loves it, so it had us upgraded the rest.
Obviously, we didn't call Apple to say that we upgraded the SSDs.
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I agree, which makes it harder to justify your initial statement:
Let me put it another way: If more people buy the cheapest storage configuration, I am sure Apple would respond.
My understanding is that consumers have already voted with their wallets: hence the slow Mac sales from last quarter overall, as well as dismal sales of the 21.5" iMac in particular. Instead of more people buying the cheapest configuration, they've just stopped buying Macs period. Certainly, Apple's MO is to milk higher specs for all they're worth, but it looks like the typical consumer isn't impressed enough anymore to throw down for the goods.
Exactly.
Take it from me who defused their 2tb fusion, it is sooo much faster, much noticeably faster than the fused fusion drive in every single task performed.
And if I were to compare myself to the 256 SSD folks, I may have half their flash storage but I have many times their size in terms of overall gb storage volume with my 2tb internal. Thanks to my internal, I don't need to rely on externals which bring with them, a whole host of potential problems and inconveniences.
In addition, the kicker is that I've only filled 60gb of my SSD. That's all my apps and system files took up. So it's not like I'm hurting for SSD space. >1tb of media data resides on the internal.
There is definitely a strong case that the 2tb fusion is just a superior purchase to the 256 if it is unfused. I would be curious to know the speed difference between the two but I bet in terms of read speed they're essentially equal. And I wouldn't care about write speed because I rarely write to it and when I do, it's never large amounts of data. That goes on the internal.
Hence going with the pure SSD option? Especially if you don't need the extra space?
Not sure about "whole host of potential problems and inconveniences"; if anything, the internal HD is the one with the problems when it goes bad. Not to mention the extra heat it's constantly generating anytime the machine is on. Other than aesthetics, there are plenty of good reasons to use externals, and those can be hidden behind the iMac anyway (like mine is; you can't see it unless you specifically look for it at the right angle).
If you don't need the extra space, of course go with pure SSD.
The 512 is the one I'd probably recommend people but the 256 is fine too.
The only reason I went with the 2tb fusion is that I do have a lot of data and I wanted to keep it internal.
Internals can create problems too, but in my experience externals have a tendency to disconnect randomly for no reason. They'll also disconnect if you merely bump into it by accident.
They also are usually very loud, and very slow if it is an HDD.
The internal feels much more as part of the system which I prefer. There's no chance it's going to disconnect or not be read by the computer. You may be able to put them behind the iMac but I still don't like them hanging out of the machine. I prefer to have none if I can. I used to have 2, now I have 0, I like it much better this way.
I see where you're coming from. I'm running an iMac with internal SSD and two external HDs, and it works great for me. To each his own though; it's a free country and all that.
lasted all of half an hour with a current base model 27" retina imac with internal HDD - disk access was tediously slow
Threw a spare Samsung 500GB SSD into an external bus-powered USB3 enclosure - lot better but must have had a dozen or more random disconnects in space of 48 hours - no nudging, no heavy load - we'd come back into an empty workshop having left the machine idling for just 20 mins or so and find it had disconnected (again)
If that had been my only try with external enclosures it would have sworn me off them for life, but had another bash with an Inatek one with the Jmicron ASM1153E chipset and its own external supply
Performance wise vast improvement over the internal HDD and, unlike the previous external enclosure, no disconnects in the three weeks since (machine is left on 24/7 with just display set to sleep after X amount of inactivity)
Threw a spare Samsung 500GB SSD into an external bus-powered USB3 enclosure - lot better but must have had a dozen or more random disconnects in space of 48 hours - no nudging, no heavy load - we'd come back into an empty workshop having left the machine idling for just 20 mins or so and find it had disconnected (again)
If that had been my only try with external enclosures it would have sworn me off them for life, but had another bash with an Inatek one with the Jmicron ASM1153E chipset and its own external supply
Performance wise vast improvement over the internal HDD and, unlike the previous external enclosure, no disconnects in the three weeks since (machine is left on 24/7 with just display set to sleep after X amount of inactivity)
I did a speed test with the unfused 2 TB FusionDrive and compared it to the 1 TB SSD. I think the 256 and 512 GB have the same speed as the 1 TB. I saw speed tests from the other sizes somewhere here.
Write speed is more than twice compared to the FusionDrive's SSD, read is just a little faster.
Here is my post with the results:
https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/imac-1tb-fusion-os-on-ssd-part.1950292/#post-22468951
I was wondering how they would compare, those tests are about on par with what I would have expected. You get a slightly slower SSD but at least you have 2 tb of internal storage that can somewhat make up for that.
But because it is a little slower that is why I would say go for the 512 SSD. I somewhat regret not having done so. But not having to use external drives is nice, I definitely do not miss them.
Fortunately, in my set up I never write to the SSD, so at least I am not affected by the slower write speed that much.