I debated making that comment because I expected responses like yours. Waking from sleep is about 5X slower. I use screen sharing from my iOS devices a lot, it's mega-annoying. Like I say, I'll never recommend Fusion. Sometimes if I wake from sleep and immediately open Safari it'll say "you're not connected to the internet" etc. It's so annoying that it takes that time to connect. Slow. Considering my previous iMac was 5.5 years old I didn't expect things like this to be much slower, I thought they'd be faster. Anyway, that's my story.
So, let's see: 95% of all Fusion users say it is great and works very well and only for some tasks (like importing >10 GB in one go) it slows down to HDD speeds. Then there is your personal experience.
And for some reason, you don't think that your experience is the outlier, but that the experiences of 100 other people are the outliers. I think your disappointment is preventing you from rational thought on this topic and you just want to lash out to 'punish' Apple for your bad experience.
Not that you'd be able to use one in a 21.5" iMac.
You can of course put that and any other 2.5" SSD into a 21.5" iMac since it has a 2.5" drive bay. Just that opening the iMac is not for the faint of heart.
Surely the 256 gb SSD is cheaper than the 1 TB HDD!!! At 1/4 of the memory for about3* the speed.
What? I think you have a false idea of where the prices are, they haven't gotten there yet. Laptop hard drives 1TB $80, $200 for 256GB SSD, using Newegg for prices. There are 2TB laptop HDDs for $200 if you really need the space.
This has been far far too long coming. Pull your finger out Apple. We needed these options when the machine was released. It was no good removing the old iMac that could be shipped with 256GB and replacing it with 768GB. Poor.
Apple's generally been good about BTO upgrade costs for the last couple of years (within $50 of the components), so I generally don't bother going the DIY route anymore.
Though BTO prices have improved somewhat in the last couple years, I don't think they've found their way into the realm of "reasonable" just yet. There's also some variability between models.
On the non-retina 15" it's $150 to upgrade the 500/5400 drive to a 750/7200. Aside from the upgraded drive costing only $75 on the shelf of any computer store anywhere, you don't get any credit for the stock drive. If you figure the stock drive is worth ~$50, the premium for having Apple do the upgrade is about $125 or 167%. That may be an improvement over a couple years ago but it's still pretty steep.
SSD for the same machine is running around $1.50 a GB, again with no credit for the stock drive, so that's still up there too.
They also want $100 for an extra 4GB of RAM. For $125 I got QUADRUPLE that.
Go to the Retina model which has no DIY option -- it's BTO or nothing -- and the prices are slightly more reasonable. Not a LOT better, but still, better. Go figure.
mmmm... problem is when you need 1 TB of storage though ...
I have found my 3.4Ghz i7 - 27" mid 2011 iMac with 1 TB HD and 256 GB SSD (BTO) to be a nice solution for me.
I put all apps, System, streamed stuff (movies/video) on my SSD and put all docs, photos, and iTunes Library, mail, other large chunks of data on my HD. I have to manage it manually like this because it was pre-Fusion but once setup it has given me incredible performance.
I keep another 1 TB drive available on the net and 2 TB connected via USB strictly for backup and Time Machine usage (one is for manual backups the other for the auto T M backup) and find that meets my needs wonderfully. That initial Time Machine backup was slow but now does the backups often and quickly enough. The CCC backups also take a while but the happen late night when I am away from my Mac anyway.
Probably Thunderbolt Display. I'm very interested in getting an updated Thunderbolt Display.
I'm also very interested in a slim, retina Thunderbolt display… is what I would say if Thunderbolt could be put on PCIe GPUs instead of right on the motherboard.
It'll be… I don't think I'll ever be able to justify the purchases required for a Thunderbolt display.
I'm also very interested in a slim, retina Thunderbolt display… is what I would say if Thunderbolt could be put on PCIe GPUs instead of right on the motherboard.
It'll be… I don't think I'll ever be able to justify the purchases required for a Thunderbolt display. :\
You probably would have to replace your computer, right? I can see that being an issue.
I woke up today just in time for the FedEx guy to deliver my new 27" i5 iMac w/ 3TB FD and 8GB RAM (I plan on expanding that soon). I've been playing around with it all day, getting used to the differences from my Late 2009 iMac. Some conclusions I have reached follow.
Migration was amazingly quick (to me, anyways). That was nice. But I've noticed two major differences so far: 1) The screen "pops" more. I wish I could put it in more technical terms, but it really does. Believe me, I loved the screen on my old iMac. But everything is a bit "better" on this screen. 2) The Fusion Drive definitely makes a difference in certain situations. Commonly used applications (I'm assuming it figured out things about my patterns from the migration?) open nearly instantaneously. XCode opened quicker than I could blink.
Also, I was having some weird Bluetooth issue with the keyboard, and having too many devices show up in the Bluetooth menu, yadda yadda yadda. Suffice to say, I decided to restart hoping to fix it. I couldn't believe how quickly it restarted.
So, I would say that this an incredible improvement over my last version of the iMac, as cool as that was. Plus, I get a new keyboard that has a little "grit" left on the keys.
Comments
Originally Posted by Winter
Tim Cook will not do to Apple what Ron Johnson did at JC Penney, he has far more sense than he is given credit for.
What, succeed at creating a better business model?
Wow, no I hadn't. Sweet ... Another year or so we should see really good prices. Problem is on Macs that are not upgradable in the meantime.
mmmm... problem is when you need 1 TB of storage though ...
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ireland
I debated making that comment because I expected responses like yours. Waking from sleep is about 5X slower. I use screen sharing from my iOS devices a lot, it's mega-annoying. Like I say, I'll never recommend Fusion. Sometimes if I wake from sleep and immediately open Safari it'll say "you're not connected to the internet" etc. It's so annoying that it takes that time to connect. Slow. Considering my previous iMac was 5.5 years old I didn't expect things like this to be much slower, I thought they'd be faster. Anyway, that's my story.
So, let's see: 95% of all Fusion users say it is great and works very well and only for some tasks (like importing >10 GB in one go) it slows down to HDD speeds. Then there is your personal experience.
And for some reason, you don't think that your experience is the outlier, but that the experiences of 100 other people are the outliers. I think your disappointment is preventing you from rational thought on this topic and you just want to lash out to 'punish' Apple for your bad experience.
Quote:
Originally Posted by John.B
Have you seen the Crucial M500 960GB SSDs?
Not that you'd be able to use one in a 21.5" iMac.
You can of course put that and any other 2.5" SSD into a 21.5" iMac since it has a 2.5" drive bay. Just that opening the iMac is not for the faint of heart.
What? I think you have a false idea of where the prices are, they haven't gotten there yet. Laptop hard drives 1TB $80, $200 for 256GB SSD, using Newegg for prices. There are 2TB laptop HDDs for $200 if you really need the space.
This has been far far too long coming. Pull your finger out Apple. We needed these options when the machine was released. It was no good removing the old iMac that could be shipped with 256GB and replacing it with 768GB. Poor.
Glad it's fixed.
Quote:
Originally Posted by auxio
Apple's generally been good about BTO upgrade costs for the last couple of years (within $50 of the components), so I generally don't bother going the DIY route anymore.
Though BTO prices have improved somewhat in the last couple years, I don't think they've found their way into the realm of "reasonable" just yet. There's also some variability between models.
On the non-retina 15" it's $150 to upgrade the 500/5400 drive to a 750/7200. Aside from the upgraded drive costing only $75 on the shelf of any computer store anywhere, you don't get any credit for the stock drive. If you figure the stock drive is worth ~$50, the premium for having Apple do the upgrade is about $125 or 167%. That may be an improvement over a couple years ago but it's still pretty steep.
SSD for the same machine is running around $1.50 a GB, again with no credit for the stock drive, so that's still up there too.
They also want $100 for an extra 4GB of RAM. For $125 I got QUADRUPLE that.
Go to the Retina model which has no DIY option -- it's BTO or nothing -- and the prices are slightly more reasonable. Not a LOT better, but still, better. Go figure.
Quote:
Originally Posted by John.B
Still waiting for an updated TBD with that new screen lamination process...
Maybe I am showing my ignorance but what is an "updated TBD"?
Quote:
Originally Posted by digitalclips
mmmm... problem is when you need 1 TB of storage though ...
I have found my 3.4Ghz i7 - 27" mid 2011 iMac with 1 TB HD and 256 GB SSD (BTO) to be a nice solution for me.
I put all apps, System, streamed stuff (movies/video) on my SSD and put all docs, photos, and iTunes Library, mail, other large chunks of data on my HD. I have to manage it manually like this because it was pre-Fusion but once setup it has given me incredible performance.
I keep another 1 TB drive available on the net and 2 TB connected via USB strictly for backup and Time Machine usage (one is for manual backups the other for the auto T M backup) and find that meets my needs wonderfully. That initial Time Machine backup was slow but now does the backups often and quickly enough. The CCC backups also take a while but the happen late night when I am away from my Mac anyway.
Your mileage will vary…
Probably Thunderbolt Display. I'm very interested in getting an updated Thunderbolt Display.
Originally Posted by JeffDM
Probably Thunderbolt Display. I'm very interested in getting an updated Thunderbolt Display.
I'm also very interested in a slim, retina Thunderbolt display… is what I would say if Thunderbolt could be put on PCIe GPUs instead of right on the motherboard.
It'll be… I don't think I'll ever be able to justify the purchases required for a Thunderbolt display.
You probably would have to replace your computer, right? I can see that being an issue.
Well, somewhat off-topic, but ...
I woke up today just in time for the FedEx guy to deliver my new 27" i5 iMac w/ 3TB FD and 8GB RAM (I plan on expanding that soon). I've been playing around with it all day, getting used to the differences from my Late 2009 iMac. Some conclusions I have reached follow.
Migration was amazingly quick (to me, anyways). That was nice. But I've noticed two major differences so far: 1) The screen "pops" more. I wish I could put it in more technical terms, but it really does. Believe me, I loved the screen on my old iMac. But everything is a bit "better" on this screen. 2) The Fusion Drive definitely makes a difference in certain situations. Commonly used applications (I'm assuming it figured out things about my patterns from the migration?) open nearly instantaneously. XCode opened quicker than I could blink.
Also, I was having some weird Bluetooth issue with the keyboard, and having too many devices show up in the Bluetooth menu, yadda yadda yadda. Suffice to say, I decided to restart hoping to fix it. I couldn't believe how quickly it restarted.
So, I would say that this an incredible improvement over my last version of the iMac, as cool as that was. Plus, I get a new keyboard that has a little "grit" left on the keys.