Should I return my 2019 Top tier 27inch IMac and get The Base Model with SSD instead?

[Benz63amg]

Don't let these Fusion haters get to you. I have a Late 2013 iMac and the Fusion drive is still fast and going strong. I have had 0 problems with it for almost 6 years. I am going to be purchasing a 2019 iMac shortly and will be getting the 2TB Fusion Drive as well. From my own experience I can recommend it without hesitation. Good luck!

Thanks , i did decide to keep this configuration as opposed to returning it. if Apple stocked SSD Models in stores i might have gone ahead and exchanged it but i can't be without a computer for 2-3 weeks as thats the wait time for a built to order iMac model so im going to enjoy this 2TB of storage which is excellent. Great overall machine highly recommended. i just upgraded the RAM to 24GB as well. i could have upgraded to a total 40GB of RAM by getting 2 x 16GB sticks but that was twice the price of 2 x 8GB so i just did a total of 24GB by adding 2 x 8GB Sticks.

 

[throAU]

Don't let these Fusion haters get to you. I have a Late 2013 iMac and the Fusion drive is still fast and going strong. I have had 0 problems with it for almost 6 years. I am going to be purchasing a 2019 iMac shortly and will be getting the 2TB Fusion Drive as well. From my own experience I can recommend it without hesitation. Good luck!

Point is, for the money charged, apple should be giving you a 2T SSD. It wouldn't even cost them much more, as it is a single SSD vs. an SSD and a spinning drive.

 

[ssledoux]

The Fusion Drive is not silent, but then neither is the fan in an iMac. In my Late 2015 27-inch iMac, the Fusion Drive is much quieter than the fan, even when the fan is idling (and the fan when idling is very quiet).

If you require a silent computer, then you should get an iPad Pro, not a Mac.



Benz63amg, based on what you’ve written here, then the 2 or 3 TB Fusion Drive is certainly the right choice for you. For how you’re using your computer, you are not likely to notice any difference in speed.

I’ve been using a 3 TB Fusion Drive for the past three and a half years and have been very happy with it. I had absolutely no hesitation of any kind whatsoever in configuring my 2019 iMac with another 3 TB Fusion Drive.

Be aware that there is a lot of knee-jerk ideological dogmatizing about Fusion Drives on these forums from people who have never used them. There are use cases for which Fusion Drives are not well suited, but yours are not among them.

See this post, this post, and this post, written by persons who have actually used Fusion Drives.

Buy AppleCare for peace of mind for the next three years, and save the US $1,100 that it would cost you to get the same storage in an internal SSD. You can always buy an external SSD later on if your usage changes and you find you need the speed (by which time the prices on SSDs will have dropped even further), or in three or four years you can take that US $1,100 and buy an even more powerful Mac.

I know this is from a couple weeks ago, but I’m hijacking here to ask a question;

In what way would a person need to be using their computer to notice a difference between SSD and Fusion? I’m ordering a refurb and trying to decide between a 2017 with 1 TB fusion or a 2017 with 256 SSD.

I haven’t had an iMac in a few years - I’ve been all in with iPad Pro - but I need to have a desktop again for a few reasons. My uses will be digital scrapbooking and making photo books on Shutterfly, accessing websites for my travel agent business that I have trouble accessing with the iPad (ie can’t get the full sites), and typing documents.

Sure I’ll surf the web and stuff like that, but I don’t game or anything like that.

Just wondering if I could save the couple hundred bucks and be happy having more storage and slower speeds, or if I should go for the SSD and add external storage down the road if I have issues with space.

 

[Colonel Blimp]

In what way would a person need to be using their computer to notice a difference between SSD and Fusion?

Editing or exporting large, uncompressed video files (on the order of 20 GB or larger), or doing heavy-duty database access (lots of small reads and writes) in a virtual machine (again, on the order of 20 GB or larger, where the entire virtual machine disk image won't fit within the SSD portion of your Fusion Drive) would be cases where you’d notice a difference in speed.

(The ~20 GB sizes I mention above are based on the fact that you’re considering a 1 TB Fusion Drive, which has a 32 GB SSD. The 2 and 3 TB Fusion Drives have 128 GB SSDs.)

I’m ordering a refurb and trying to decide between a 2017 with 1 TB fusion or a 2017 with 256 SSD.

I haven’t had an iMac in a few years - I’ve been all in with iPad Pro - but I need to have a desktop again for a few reasons. My uses will be digital scrapbooking and making photo books on Shutterfly, accessing websites for my travel agent business that I have trouble accessing with the iPad (ie can’t get the full sites), and typing documents.

Sure I’ll surf the web and stuff like that, but I don’t game or anything like that.

Despite the fact that you’re considering the 1 TB Fusion, which ordinarily I would not recommend as a configure-to-order option (the extra US $200 is probably worth it for most folks, not only for the doubled storage capacity, but especially for the fourfold increase in SSD size), I would guess that you’re not likely to find the speed of your storage to be much of an issue, based on how you say you’ll use your iMac. If you store lots of photos, you’re more likely to want the extra storage space.

However, I’ve never used a 1 TB Fusion Drive with its smaller SSD, and I’ve seen at least one user in these forums report experiencing beachballs while waiting for websites to load on in-store demonstration iMacs equipped with 1 TB Fusion Drives. (I confess to being somewhat skeptical: I can’t imagine Apple selling a configuration if the typical user experience were truly as terrible as that user described.) You might want to hear from actual users of 1 TB Fusion Drives, or try one out in an Apple Store for yourself, before making a decision.