New iMac or Mac Mini

<p>Now that the new iMacs have been announced; I'm not as enthusiastic about the idea as of buying one. It seems to me that Apple have taken what was a good product in need of an upgrade to processor RAM and Hard drive and have let design get in the way of function.<br>

Apple now supply it with 8Gb Ram which is a big improvement but the standard 1TB Hard drive is not adequate for photo or Video. The Hybrid SSD with 3TB drive does look good but I have not seen a price for this special order upgrade yet.<br>

A reduced glare display is going to please most in the media; but I do not see the upgrade to the processor as being that much of a change.<br>

I'm not convinced of the need for a computer with an ultra thin display which no longer has provision of an integral DVD drive and more importantly for me, no dedicated Firewire 800 ports. its possible to get an adapter;but I understand that the TB to FW800 cable does not support drives without a separate power supply.<br>

I am concerned that the design with its non removable glass screen bonded to the aluminum case is going it make it even harder for maintenance. I am somewhat disappointed in this as I did not see anything wrong with the old style design.<br>

What has interested me now is the upgraded Mac mini server. I would choose the i7 2.6 Ghz quad core processor with hyperthreading, FW800, Thunderbolt USB3 ports and the choice of 2x 1TB drives or a combination of SSD and HDD.<br>

Its looks to me to be a good alternative to an iMac with the flexibility to choose a different monitor. The reduction in price of Thunderbolt drives seems to be a good way in the future of adding more fast storage and easier use of FW drives make it a good deal.</p>

 

I got a Mac Mini, put a second drive in it, upgraded the RAM and am very happy. iMac's make little sense for serious

photo orientated work.

<p>Apple wants the optical drive to die and go away. They want everyone to download their software from the App store. For the most part, when when was the last time we actually bought boxed software? DVD's are still being used by many, but many stream their movies straight to their devices. Phone, AppleTV, laptop, whatever. Apple also wants everyone to use the Thunderbolt port and not Firewire. There's a slew of port options available. <a href="http://the-gadgeteer.com/2012/01/10/belkins-thunderbolt-express-dock/">Like this one</a>, which provides "3 USB 2.0 ports, a Firewire 800 port, HDMI port, Gigabit Ethernet jack, 3.5mm audio jack, and a pair of Thunderbolt ports capable of daisy chaining." And you only need one port on your desktop/laptop to make it all function. As far as needing an external power supply for a separate raid or external drive. I don't find that much of a big deal if you're using a desktop and some smaller storage options are available that don't need an external power supply for a laptop. Like the Buffalo external drive. I am curious about the fusion drive Apple is pushing. In theory it seems like a good idea. Your comment with the screen being bonded piqued my curiosity as well. I'm waiting for iFixit.com to rip one apart and see how it's done, but the reduction in glare should really make this machine shine.</p>

My Mini, last model, doesn't have a CD/DVD drive, my laptop, that had one when I bought it, had it's taken out and I put a

second HDD in its place, far more productive. I haven't used a CD/DVD for several years.

<p>What's the question? </p>

<p>Apple has always placed a premium on design. A 1TB internal drive is too small? Media should be kept on a different drive anyway (especially if 1TB is considered too small). Can't use a bus powered drive... good. I see more issue with bus powered hard drives than drives with their own power supply. Lack of optical drive is unfortunate, but hardly unexpected for all the reasons given. Of course you can always add an external if it's truly needed. On the flip side, the new iMac is really cool! Which has always been one of the selling points to the iMac. Personally, I think this is a nod to the future. Imagine an "iMac" that you simply hang from... whatever. You can grab it, put it in a briefcase and go. Essentially the functionality of an iPad, with the power of a computer... you just need to plug it in. Kind of like a Wacom computer tablet for professionals. Now I want one....</p>

<p>Keep in mind that Apple thinks of the iMac as a "consumer" device, not a "Pro" device. The pro device is the (now long-in-the-tooth) Mac Pro... Most consumers get their music, software, etc, from downloads, so the need for an optical device that isn't getting any smaller is less and less in the consumer areas. Apple dropped the optical drive from the Mac Mini a couple refreshes ago.</p>

<p>As for drive space, you really should not be relying on internal storage for storing all of your valuable photos. External drives are the way to go.They make it very easy to add drives, capacity, and to do archiving. Just make a backup of the photos to an external, and take it to your in-laws place for safe keeping (well, maybe not there, but, you get the idea...). Also, the most likely parts of a drive to go bad are the system and application parts. If you keep those separate, should the disk fail, you only have to rebuild them, and not all of your photos too. </p>

<p>USB3 is the new, cheap "Fast Bus", with a theoretical top "speed" 4x higher than that of FW800 (good comparison chart <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Esata#Comparison_to_other_interfaces">H-E-R-E</a>). Many externals come with eSATA ports (slightly slower than USB3, but you won't have the chance to accidentally plug in an old, slow, mouse to the same bus...), and a $200 LaCie adapter gets you two eSATA ports from a Thunderbolt port. </p>

<p>I'm actually kicking myself now for not spending the extra $25, and buying my last external drive from OWC with USB3! I can't use it now, but with my next Mac... The drives I have support eSATA, FW800/400 & USB2, so I'm not lost yet...</p>

<p>I've been lamenting the loss of FW on Macs lately, but USB3 and Thunderbolt support much faster transfer rates. I might even consider a Retina MBP now, even though I had not before because of the lack of FW800 and a wired Ethernet connection (yes, I know I can buy the adapters, but...). </p>

<p>But Apple really needs to seriously wave the Thunderbolt flag and get the Belkins, etc. on the ball with their Thunderbolt devices.</p>

<p><strong>"iMac's make little sense for serious photo orientated work."</strong><br>

<br>

And now without a dvd drive, we can lump in those that do video work as well. Seems Apple is slowly pushing out their professional market of producers and creators.</p>

<p>I can see the point of maybe dropping the DVD/CD drive on a laptop to make it as lightweight as possible but a desktop computer such as an iMac doesn't need to be super slim or light weight and for the time being there are still a lot of people who will want this particular feature. It might not occur to Apple but lots of people use CD's and DVD's frequently and taking that option away from them isn't really going to encourage them to "upgrade" to a newer model which has an important component removed. If you use iTunes on your Mac it is currently easy to take tracks off of your CD collection. If you want to work with images on your Mac you will want at some point to burn some onto a CD or DVD to show clients, particularly if you are using it professionally. More stuff is being done wholly online but I for one don't want everything based in the clouds.</p>

<p>So, what you will end up with is a new cool looking iMac with a separate drive plugged into it so that you can use CD/DVD's...</p>

<p>I am sure that it will be faster and nicer than the existing models but that in itself isn't enough to make me go out and buy one any time soon. I'll stick with my current style iMac for a while longer all things considered, it still works well and does everything that I need it to do. I didn't upgrade to the newest OS X software either simply because I have a few Mac's and would simply have preferred the convenience of a DVD to upgrade the existing software on all of them, rather than doing it online by download from Apple. That and the fact that the new software didn't really give me anything new that I really needed. There comes a point where you can't justify buying something just because it is new, if what you already have is still working well.</p>

<p>The New Mac mini with ivy bridge i7 2.6ghz processor with hyperthreading, 8-16G RAM with the new Fusion drive linked to FW800, USB3 or Thunderbolt for expansion looks like the way to go for me. As I already have good monitor, keyboards and wireless mices! The portability could be very useful.<br>

Apple claim close to SSD performance, for the 1TB Fusion drive; which combines a 128GB SSD and Conventional HDD. I will be interested to find out how its performance lives up to in the real world.</p>

 

>>> Apple claim close to SSD performance, for the 1TB Fusion drive; which combines a 128GB SSD and

Conventional HDD.

 

I would put in an aftermarket Sata III 256 GB SSD (around $170 to $200) in the 2nd slot, and stay with the regular 1TB (or put in a 7200 rpm

model). Not sanctioned as a user upgrade by Apple, but there is plenty of information out there on the

subject and many who have done that with the previous model.

<p>Sorry, but iMac's are great for photo work, but I see you already have the other parts. That will work well. Check out what Brad was saying about the drives.</p>

<p>Sorry, but iMac's are great for photo work. The screen's are quite good. The new design looks weird, but 1tb is quite enough drive as you should keep your files on an external drive. Its got very fast connectors with tbold and usb 3.0. I have one now and its great, the new screen we'll have to wait and see, but its going to be glossy but with reduced glare, like the retina screen does. It's quite powerful. If you need a burner or dvd/cd reader, the super drive will work fine. I use it on my lap top all the time. I would go with the iMac over the mini because its more powerful, has a big lovely screen attached. Unless you have a good screen that you would want to use with a mini.</p>

<p>Barry Fisher,<em> "The screen's are quite good."</em><br>

<em> </em><br>

Scott Ferris,<em> "iMac's make little sense for serious photo orientated work."<br /></em></p>

<p>If the key feature for photo work, the screen, is only "<em>quite good</em>" we are talking about different kinds of tools. </p>

<p>My decision to go with the highest spec mac mini is based on the fact that I already have a Dell U2410 Monitor, keyboard and another 21'iMac + Macbook Pro and have ordered a 27" Thunderbolt display. It may be slightly technically inferior to the Dell; but in practice I prefer to use the 21" iMac screen as I like the look of it have had no issues with that for photo editing. The Apple displays are on instantly unlike the Dell which take an age to warm up.</p>

<p>Just something to consider but the Mac Mini is small enough to fit in most appropriate sized bank safe deposit boxes in case of emergencies like natural disasters and some compromised security situations as well as a safe place to keep for long term archiving after upgrading to newer systems.</p>

<p>IOW you don't have to get rid of it (donate to charity/recycle) because it's taking up space as most old computers do. Also safe deposit boxes only require an annual fee as opposed to monthly for regular long term storage facilities.</p>

<p>I have an old 2.4 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo/8 GB/320GB HD Mac Mini running 10.6.8 that works just fine for me. </p>