Probably my first post in this site, and I just needed some answers before I place an order. I’m an artist who does a lot of cartooning and basic 2D animations, and I’ve been needing to upgrade from my old 2013 Celeron-powered Windows laptop to a 21.5 inch Retina iMac, while also staying below my budget (90k or lower). Right now, however, I’m stuck between the two models of the 21.5 inch Retina 4k iMacs: The quad-core i3 model and the six-core i5 model. I don’t want a PC that’s too underpowered or too overpowered, so what do you guys think? And should I keep the rest of the configurations untouched (like the RAM, GPU, Fusion Drive, etc.)? Thanks in advance! Here’s the image for a better look at the products.
I'd personally wait for the 2020 iMac to come, buy it from the Amazon, Best Buy or other US retailer then have it shipped to a freight forwarder. You avoid paying 12% VAT. It will still come out cheaper than you'd buy from Apple PH or local resller. It will probably come months before NTC approves it for importation. Freight Forwarders will send it to your Malabon address.
If you need it for work and it's an investment, just go ahead and order now. The new iMac is still a rumor at this point. And when it gets announced, don't expect it to arrive this year anyway. The 2020 iPad Pro was announced last March 2020, and we still don't have it officially. iMacs are rather future-proof, so you will get many years of productivity. I was also contemplating getting a 21.5-inch iMac since my company transitioned to a work from home setup and there's no need to bring a MacBook to places. Get the top-spec model with the Fusion Drive. My office iMac was a 21.5-inch with the 5400rpm hard drive, and it was painfully slow to boot up.
Buy a second hand that still has warranty. To op; I recommend you first get a recommendation on which model will suit you by going to a reddit community of animators like in https://www.reddit.com/r/Animators/ They are an international group so telling them your budget in dollars is preferred. Once you get which mac and specs is best suited for your needs then you search the local stores on how much that would cost here in the Philippines. Compare that to how much a brand new one will cost if bought from the US and freight forwarded to the Philippines. Check if there are second hand options in tipidpc.com that still has warranty as you will be able to save more buying used.
incase you need 2nd hand imac 21.5 2017 retina with radeon 555 inbox sm baliuag is selling 1 demo unit complete package for 45k. Catch is there is a scratch sa screen sa side part lang
Thanks! Now you mentioned about Fusion Drives, are they able to last for more than 5 years? And is the performance much better than the 5400 rpm hard drive not just in the boot-up?
I've never had a Fusion drive iMac, so I don't know about their reliability. Invest in a UPS just the same. But I bet it's definitely better than the 5400rpm hard drive.
UPS doesnt protect hard drives alone. Natural wear and tear & heat will kill HDD. My Fusion Drive died on it's 6th year after 16 hour daily use.
...We need to know how much RAM to get. I read that the Catalina might be a RAM hog, but for older machines, and I was researching how much RAM was being used for typical use, but I've seen nothing but programmers and power users. Here's their list of how they'll use their new iMac: Rendering video for YouTube, so they might use AfterEffects or Adobe, or OBS/Open Broadcaster Software. While the video renders, my boss might be working on Dashnex websites and he might be on Facebook, so let's estimate Chrome tabs between 5 to 20. Picmonkey Canva Clickbank Facebook Regular MS Office use. Please let me know if 8GB RAM would be adequate, or if 16GB would be better. Thank you! This is the model they'll buy: https://www.apple.com/us-hed/shop/buy-mac/imac/21.5-inch-3.6ghz-quad-core-processor-1tb Thanks so much! Hope someone helps me.
21.5 iMac’s RAM can be upgraded but requires you to completely open it up. Unless you know what you are doing be prepared to take it to an official service center and pay for a technician to upgrade the ram for you.
The only reason I will recommend 16GB of RAM is because you will be using Adobe video editing software otherwise every app here will run at 8gb just fine. Your boss might as well consider investing in an SSD, it will significantly boost your iMac's responsiveness and performance.
2020 iMac is expected come out within 30 days. I'd get the model that allows for user upgradeable RAM like the 27" with SSD. 2 out of 4 ram slots are occupied by 2 4GB sticks of RAM. You can put in up to 256GB (4x64GB) DDR4-2933 RAM for the 2020 iMac.
After purchase you will need to crack open the iMac 21.5" case to get access to the 2 RAM slots that are not designed to be user upgraded. iMac Core i3 up to 64GB (2x32GB) DDR4-2400 RAM iMac Core i5 & i7 up to 64GB (2x32GB) DDR4-2666 RAM To avoid this headache I'd opt for the iMac 27" RAM from Apple is very expensive. That's the 1 selling point of the iMac 27"
