Anybody with a 2012 iMac 21.5 with 5400 RPM Drive?

[Pasha]

I'd like to know how it performs in the real world with Live, having a 5400RPM Hard Drive bugs me. Looked for refurbished 2011 Imacs but none avail in my country.
I'd go for a stock Mac-Mini i7Quad but that won't change the HDD speed and I am skeptical to have an external monitor hooked via HDMI or HDMI-DVI (better keep the TB port free..)

Any comment, suggestion, very appreciated,
Thank you,

Best
Pasha

[Guillermo Barrancos]

Doesn't the 2012 iMac's come With USB3.0 ports?

Buy an external USB3.0 7200rpm drive.

It's one of the reasons I starting to hate Apple. It's pure greed and idiocy for them to still put old 5400rpm drives in their iMac's these days.
Convential harddrive prices have dropped so ridiculously low due to the coming SSD drives. /shrug

Today you can buy All In One Windows 8 PC's With 27inch touchscreens, Core i7 CPU's, at least 8GB RAM, fast HDD, good GFX for almost half the price of an 27inch iMac.
That's why I will never buy a Mac anymore! It's ridiculously overpriced for what you get.
And don't tell me about quality. Go look up on the lawsuit against Apple going right now regarding the controversy With Retina displays in their MacBook Pro line.

I like the iPhone and the iPad. But that's where it ends for me with Apple these days.

I have an ASUS G75VW Laptop and it blows all Apple Mac's out of the water spec and performance wise! (both iMac's and MacBook Pro's)! And it costed me a lot less!

[Pasha]

Doesn't the 2012 iMac's come With USB3.0 ports?

Buy an external USB3.0 7200rpm drive.

It's one of the reasons I starting to hate Apple. It's pure greed and idiocy for them to still put old 5400rpm drives in their iMac's these days.
Convential harddrive prices have dropped so ridiculously low due to the coming SSD drives. /shrug

Today you can buy All In One Windows 8 PC's With 27inch touchscreens, Core i7 CPU's, at least 8GB RAM, fast HDD, good GFX for almost half the price of an 27inch iMac.
That's why I will never buy a Mac anymore! It's ridiculously overpriced for what you get.
And don't tell me about quality. Go look up on the lawsuit against Apple going right now regarding the controversy With Retina displays in their MacBook Pro line.

I like the iPhone and the iPad. But that's where it ends for me with Apple these days.

I have an ASUS G75VW Laptop and it blows all Apple Mac's out of the water spec and performance wise! (both iMac's and MacBook Pro's)! And it costed me a lot less!

I won't start any flame war... I like Apple but the latest generation has pushed aside function for design and that is even contrary to Bauhaus principles which was said were inspiring their design. There are other options of course.
Thanks for reply.
I wait for someone with new iMac just to comment.

Best
Pasha

[Guillermo Barrancos]

Doesn't the 2012 iMac's come With USB3.0 ports?

Buy an external USB3.0 7200rpm drive.

It's one of the reasons I starting to hate Apple. It's pure greed and idiocy for them to still put old 5400rpm drives in their iMac's these days.
Convential harddrive prices have dropped so ridiculously low due to the coming SSD drives. /shrug

Today you can buy All In One Windows 8 PC's With 27inch touchscreens, Core i7 CPU's, at least 8GB RAM, fast HDD, good GFX for almost half the price of an 27inch iMac.
That's why I will never buy a Mac anymore! It's ridiculously overpriced for what you get.
And don't tell me about quality. Go look up on the lawsuit against Apple going right now regarding the controversy With Retina displays in their MacBook Pro line.

I like the iPhone and the iPad. But that's where it ends for me with Apple these days.

I have an ASUS G75VW Laptop and it blows all Apple Mac's out of the water spec and performance wise! (both iMac's and MacBook Pro's)! And it costed me a lot less!

I won't start any flame war... I like Apple but the latest generation has pushed aside function for design and that is even contrary to Bauhaus principles which was said were inspiring their design. There are other options of course.
Thanks for reply.
I wait for someone with new iMac just to comment.

Best
Pasha

I just don't understand why they still put that old crap in it. It's like they still have a huge oversupply of 5400rpm drives at the factory or something and try get rid of it by still using it in the New iMac's. /shrug
Just for Your Reference. My old MacBook Pro from 2006 (dusting away now) has the same 5400rpm drive in it as today's 21inch iMac's. /facepalm

Performance depends on everything. That includes the harddrive and not just a fancy CPU and fast RAM.
5400rpm just won't cut it anymore these days. Unless all you care about is browswing the internet and play around in iWork.

The speed and overall performance of the OS greatly depends on HDD. There is a notable difference between a 5400rpm and a 7200rpm drive. Even more so even between a 7200rpm and a SSD disk.

[CancerRidden]

My main OS runs on an SSD

but my secondary drive is a 5400rpm which holds my samples and my samples seem to be booting in just fine.


this is a macbook pro - 2.7ghz, non retina 16gb ram

[Guillermo Barrancos]

My main OS runs on an SSD

but my secondary drive is a 5400rpm which holds my samples and my samples seem to be booting in just fine.


this is a macbook pro - 2.7ghz, non retina 16gb ram

He is talking about the new 21inch iMacs, which come only with 5400rpm drives.
Or they ridiculously overcharge you for 250 bucks extra to swap it for a Fusion hybrid drive.

[Valiumdupeuple]

My main OS runs on an SSD

but my secondary drive is a 5400rpm which holds my samples and my samples seem to be booting in just fine.


this is a macbook pro - 2.7ghz, non retina 16gb ram

Don't have you any problem with disk overload when playing something like a grand piano in Sampler ?
(I find it strange to not use your ssd for what needs speed... like samples reading/writing.)

[Pasha]

So nobody uses an Imac 2012 to make music?
I can get one and have samples on an external SSD via USB 3 or THunderbolt, that will do isn't it?

[Pasha]

My main OS runs on an SSD

but my secondary drive is a 5400rpm which holds my samples and my samples seem to be booting in just fine.


this is a macbook pro - 2.7ghz, non retina 16gb ram

Do you have the quad core i7 from 2012?
Is the 5400 plugged with USB 3 or Thunderbolt?

[Pasha]

Doesn't the 2012 iMac's come With USB3.0 ports?

Buy an external USB3.0 7200rpm drive.

It's one of the reasons I starting to hate Apple. It's pure greed and idiocy for them to still put old 5400rpm drives in their iMac's these days.
Convential harddrive prices have dropped so ridiculously low due to the coming SSD drives. /shrug

Today you can buy All In One Windows 8 PC's With 27inch touchscreens, Core i7 CPU's, at least 8GB RAM, fast HDD, good GFX for almost half the price of an 27inch iMac.
That's why I will never buy a Mac anymore! It's ridiculously overpriced for what you get.
And don't tell me about quality. Go look up on the lawsuit against Apple going right now regarding the controversy With Retina displays in their MacBook Pro line.

I like the iPhone and the iPad. But that's where it ends for me with Apple these days.

I have an ASUS G75VW Laptop and it blows all Apple Mac's out of the water spec and performance wise! (both iMac's and MacBook Pro's)! And it costed me a lot less!

I won't start any flame war... I like Apple but the latest generation has pushed aside function for design and that is even contrary to Bauhaus principles which was said were inspiring their design. There are other options of course.
Thanks for reply.
I wait for someone with new iMac just to comment.

Best
Pasha

I just don't understand why they still put that old crap in it. It's like they still have a huge oversupply of 5400rpm drives at the factory or something and try get rid of it by still using it in the New iMac's. /shrug
Just for Your Reference. My old MacBook Pro from 2006 (dusting away now) has the same 5400rpm drive in it as today's 21inch iMac's. /facepalm

Performance depends on everything. That includes the harddrive and not just a fancy CPU and fast RAM.
5400rpm just won't cut it anymore these days. Unless all you care about is browswing the internet and play around in iWork.

The speed and overall performance of the OS greatly depends on HDD. There is a notable difference between a 5400rpm and a 7200rpm drive. Even more so even between a 7200rpm and a SSD disk.

In theory a 5400 RPM Drive Sata III on a 6 GBit/sec Bus can perform very well. However they ship 5400 RPM SATA II drive that get half the bus speed. What companies do for some margin bucks is incredible to me.

[CancerRidden]

My main OS runs on an SSD

but my secondary drive is a 5400rpm which holds my samples and my samples seem to be booting in just fine.


this is a macbook pro - 2.7ghz, non retina 16gb ram

Do you have the quad core i7 from 2012?
Is the 5400 plugged with USB 3 or Thunderbolt?

yeah its the quad core i7 from 2012

the 5400 is where the Optical drive use to be, so it is connected via SATA (its internal)

[schullermusik]

My 2010 iMac has a 5400 RPM boot drive and the external FireWire drive holding my samples is also 5400 RPM, and holds my Live Packs and also my libraries for Kontakt 5. It's not an issue provided the machine has enough RAM, especially if you can run 64 bit Live - I have 16GB in the iMac and have never had an issue browsing packs or opening up huge patches in Kontakt.

[Pasha]

My 2010 iMac has a 5400 RPM boot drive and the external FireWire drive holding my samples is also 5400 RPM, and holds my Live Packs and also my libraries for Kontakt 5. It's not an issue provided the machine has enough RAM, especially if you can run 64 bit Live - I have 16GB in the iMac and have never had an issue browsing packs or opening up huge patches in Kontakt.

Are you sure your internal is 5400 RPM? My 2008 iMac has 7200 RPM inside.
However thank you for reply, what I have in mind is to get a faster drive via USB 3 or Thunderbolt
for samples if I get the entry level iMac.
I do not care if the boot time is not as fast as an SSD but the Fusion Drive costs too much
for what you get. The external drive for samples seems a good idea to me. If it worked in 2010
it should work in 2013 as well.

Best
Pasha

[Pasha]

Bump

[schullermusik]

I needed to double check, and mine is a 7200 RPM drive. Irrelevant as the samples are kept on the 5400 RPM drive in any case. Put enough RAM in your Mac and it won't matter what the spin speed of your hard drive is, as Kontakt will play the samples from RAM. I have 16 GB in my iMac.