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Sell my 27" iMac?

Q

questioner76

macrumors member
Original poster
Apr 27, 2011
72
9
I wanted to check the site's collective wisdom on something. I just bought a 27" 3.2 ghz iMac in January and am considering selling it and upgrading to a a newer iMac next week. I paid $1732 including tax for it and have a potential buyer for $1400. Suppose I spent a comparable amount ($1700) for a new iMac coming out next week. Do you guys think it would be work the money? I'd basically be spending the $330 to upgrade, not counting the money I lost selling it.

My main uses are web surfing, doc editing, viewing and editing photos on iPhoto, and making and converting movies on iMovie. I'm thinking iMovie is where I'd see the biggest benefit of Sandy Bridge in the new machines. My current machine seems a little sluggish when rendering and encoding video and I wonder if the new ones will have a noticeable and usable better improvement?
 
That's tough to say since nobody knows the specs, it hasn't even been announced yet. Better question, is it worth $330 to you to have the latest and greatest?
 
It's like a new car, I tend to keep mine for as long as I can keep them running and they do what I bought them for however my close buddy must have a new one every couple of years. He makes a lot more money than I so he can afford it, but from my point of view it's a silly expense. From his point of view he enjoys it. Neither is right and neither is wrong. At the end of the day it's your money and your decision.
 
Anyone else have any insight? I can't seem to find anything on the relative performance games of video encoding and transcoding between the i3 3.2 ghz and the Sandy Bridge chips. I wonder if the performance increase would be work the $300 price difference.
 
I think you'll see a noticable improvment in video encoding speeds...I've seen some Handbrake tests of the mobile i7s/i5s that beat/compare to last years i7 desktop chips. The question is whether or not the extra time you will gain on encoding is worth $300 to you.
 
questioner76 said:
I wanted to check the site's collective wisdom on something. I just bought a 27" 3.2 ghz iMac in January and am considering selling it and upgrading to a a newer iMac next week. I paid $1732 including tax for it and have a potential buyer for $1400. Suppose I spent a comparable amount ($1700) for a new iMac coming out next week. Do you guys think it would be work the money? I'd basically be spending the $330 to upgrade, not counting the money I lost selling it.

My main uses are web surfing, doc editing, viewing and editing photos on iPhoto, and making and converting movies on iMovie. I'm thinking iMovie is where I'd see the biggest benefit of Sandy Bridge in the new machines. My current machine seems a little sluggish when rendering and encoding video and I wonder if the new ones will have a noticeable and usable better improvement?
Click to expand...

I think it is rather hard to predict what the lower end Imac 27 will have. If the low end has Sandy Bridge, I think it would easily be worth it. The CPU alone would clock 25-35% better than your current one. Add on the fact that the graphics will probably increase about the same amount, it will probably have thunderbolt... Makes it an easy choice for me. Anytime I can get a 25-40% performance improvement for $330, I would do it. It would also add a year to your machine expected life, so it would be like prepaying the depreciation you will be experiencing anyhow, plus you'll get the faster machine.
 
Cole JM said:
Basically you rented a computer for $300 Does that seem worth it to you?
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What? That's not how it is. It's not like he's going to stop owning an iMac after he sells it.

If anything, he'll be paying an additional 300+.
 
vincenz said:
What? That's not how it is. It's not like he's going to stop owning an iMac after he sells it.
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He isnt gonna stop owning it, but that one Computer he payed/lost $300 on. therefore he spent a total of $300 for that computer for 4 months. IE renting concept.
 
questioner76 said:
My current machine seems a little sluggish when rendering and encoding video and I wonder if the new ones will have a noticeable and usable better improvement?
Click to expand...

Your new 3.2GHz iMac is not sluggish, my iBook G4 is sluggish. What is a noticeable difference to you? 5 seconds faster? 10 seconds?

I say keep the computer you have and buy and install an SSD. It's a much better use of your money. Much much better.
 
In reality, it is hard to say if it is worth it because we dont know what the new one will be like.
 
With the significant increase in processor speed and THUNDERBOLT, it's say yes- it's a good deal to take the $300 hit. Just my opinion however...
 
BigBeast said:
With the significant increase in processor speed and THUNDERBOLT, it's say yes- it's a good deal to take the $300 hit. Just my opinion however...
Click to expand...

Would you say $300 every 12 months is worth the new technology?

BTW, I sell mine every refresh.
 
yes its worth it but no one will give u 1400 for a used 27 inch imac, doesnt matter if its one month old, its used and u have to bite the bullet and sell it, you will be lucky to get 1200 out of it, VERY Lucky that is.
 
lamonsas said:
yes its worth it but no one will give u 1400 for a used 27 inch imac, doesnt matter if its one month old, its used and u have to bite the bullet and sell it, you will be lucky to get 1200 out of it, VERY Lucky that is.
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He does say he has a potential buyer.
 
well that "potential buyer" is not very smart then if hes real. why would someone risk buying a used imac for 1400 lol, maybe a top of the line i7 maxed out but not the base imac 27 incher :p

selling a used imac whether or ebay or craigslist is really tough, i sold an imac before so i know, its really tough to sell it as everyone is scared it has some hidden defects and what not
 
lamonsas said:
well that "potential buyer" is not very smart then if hes real. why would someone risk buying a used imac for 1400 lol, maybe a top of the line i7 maxed out but not the base imac 27 incher :p

selling a used imac whether or ebay or craigslist is really tough, i sold an imac before so i know, its really tough to sell it as everyone is scared it has some hidden defects and what not
Click to expand...

I've sold 3 macs to date. All have been sold 50-100 dollars less than what I bought them for.
 
lamonsas said:
yes its worth it but no one will give u 1400 for a used 27 inch imac, doesnt matter if its one month old, its used and u have to bite the bullet and sell it, you will be lucky to get 1200 out of it, VERY Lucky that is.
Click to expand...

Not true at all. These things with the apple logo have a really high resale value. I had a 27" quad-core 2.8 i7 with 8GB of RAM and Applecare that I purchased for around 2800 from MacMall.

I used it for 9 months and sold it for $2500 a month before the new ones with the HDD/SSD combo came out. Granted, I sold it to a trauma surgeon, so that may have had a little to do with it.

I'm sure you can get $1400 out of it. Don't be discouraged.
 
lamonsas said:
yes its worth it but no one will give u 1400 for a used 27 inch imac, doesnt matter if its one month old, its used and u have to bite the bullet and sell it, you will be lucky to get 1200 out of it, VERY Lucky that is.
Click to expand...

I actually have two folks who want to buy it at $1400! Both are wondering why it's so cheap actually. I guess my part of the country values mac's a bit more than others.

I'm really torn now. Wish I new what was coming out next week.
 
Thunderbolt will be present in addition to better graphics and a spec bump. These are the most likely

Design wise, probably not.
 
lamonsas said:
yes its worth it but no one will give u 1400 for a used 27 inch imac, doesnt matter if its one month old, its used and u have to bite the bullet and sell it, you will be lucky to get 1200 out of it, VERY Lucky that is.
Click to expand...

I wonder why you wouldn't just do a little research before posting. The 27" Imac I3 goes for about $1400-$1550 on ebay, several times a day.

For the people who compared selling every year to renting, I'm wondering why you don't sit down and do the math.

4 years of selling and losing $300 per year, winds up with you spending ~1200. A 4 year old Imac is not going to be worth $1700, therefore the math works out better to upgrade every year (present value of money not factored).

So quite simply, he's going to pay less for his machines than you are by keeping it for 4 years, and he's not ever going to have a slow 4 year old dinosaur wasting his time. Seems pretty smart in my book.
 
questioner76 said:
I actually have two folks who want to buy it at $1400! Both are wondering why it's so cheap actually. I guess my part of the country values mac's a bit more than others.

I'm really torn now. Wish I new what was coming out next week.
Click to expand...

Your part of the country doesn't value it any more, the poster just didn't look up what they sell for.
 
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