iMac late 2013 27" Fusion -> SSD Upgrade Advice

Karl

Karl

Karl

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Hello.

I've got a 3TB fusion drive in my late September 2013 iMac 27" which is still just about okay for my needs, but i've noticed that my work macbook (which has an ssd) boots up my VMs 3 or 4 times quicker. I'd like to upgrade my iMac now that I'm at home using it more often, and I have confirmed that this guide is for me:

https://www.ifixit.com/Guide/iMac+Intel+27-Inch+EMC+2639+Blade+SSD+Replacement/20256

The replacement SSD (2TB version) on the rain forest is a £384. Has anybody attempted this, and is it considered worthwhile compared to the existing fusion version? With tools it's going to be over £400 to do this upgrade, and part of me has considered selling the iMac and getting a PC or another iMac with a built-in SSD.

I've taken laptops apart and so on for upgrades and servicing, but it seems like to do a proper job on this I'd need quite a few additional tools and parts and wondered if anybody has considered such an upgrade a worthwhile solution.

The processor (i7 3.5ghz quad core) and memory (32gb) all seem well specced even given its age, it's just the fusion drive letting it down for what I want it for (large VM management)
 
Alpherah said:
I would look at the new 24” or possibly m1 Mac mini and a display if I were you, personally
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Thanks for the reply man.

I did spot the iMacs but they seem to be limited to 8GB ram and a little shy on my required SSD storage, and the Mac Mini spec would be around £1,600 before I buy a display, so I think that perhaps I'm not quite ready to throw the iMac baby out with the bank balance bathwater yet if you know what I mean.
 
The 'limited to 8Gb' thing seems to be just because they haven't opened the customiser yet to add options. When you look at the tech specs it shows this.

JPRK7Vl.png


They'll be available in 16Gb, just like the M1 MBA and MBP.
 
Feek said:
The 'limited to 8Gb' thing seems to be just because they haven't opened the customiser yet to add options. When you look at the tech specs it shows this.

JPRK7Vl.png


They'll be available in 16Gb, just like the M1 MBA and MBP.
Click to expand...
Oh that's good to know, cheers. :)
 
Karl said:
Thanks for the reply man.

I did spot the iMacs but they seem to be limited to 8GB ram and a little shy on my required SSD storage, and the Mac Mini spec would be around £1,600 before I buy a display, so I think that perhaps I'm not quite ready to throw the iMac baby out with the bank balance bathwater yet if you know what I mean.
Click to expand...

£1600 Mac mini?! I assume that’s a maxed ssd?
Just go for a reasonable size and add an external ssd for mass storage
512/16 is £1099 for reference
 
Alpherah said:
£1600 Mac mini?! I assume that’s a maxed ssd?
Just go for a reasonable size and add an external ssd for mass storage
512/16 is £1099 for reference
Click to expand...
That's a good point, thanks, and yes that's for a maxed out M1. 512gb wouldn't hit anywhere near my requirements, as I'm running at least 1 vm most of the time which takes a considerable amount of space, so 1tb would have to be my bare minimum :)
 
Karl said:
That's a good point, thanks, and yes that's for a maxed out M1. 512gb wouldn't hit anywhere near my requirements, as I'm running at least 1 vm most of the time which takes a considerable amount of space, so 1tb would have to be my bare minimum :)
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You can buy a USB-C NVMe drive for substantially less than it costs to upgrade the spec of the machine.
 
ChrisD. said:
You can buy a USB-C NVMe drive for substantially less than it costs to upgrade the spec of the machine.
Click to expand...
If that's the route I'm going down though, wouldn't it be an option to obtain a Thunderbolt enclosure with the fastest SSD I can find, and shove my Virtual Machine on that? The rest of the MacOS stuff could live on fusion I guess?
 
Karl said:
If that's the route I'm going down though, wouldn't it be an option to obtain a Thunderbolt enclosure with the fastest SSD I can find, and shove my Virtual Machine on that? The rest of the MacOS stuff could live on fusion I guess?
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Just get something like a Sabrent Rocket XTRM and plug it directly into the Mac, then run the VM off that. They do varying sizes.
 
From what I've read, those Rocket SSDs require Thunderbolt 3, which my 2013 iMac won't have, so that's not looking as good a solution as I'd originally hoped :( I'll keep looking.
 
Karl said:
From what I've read, those Rocket SSDs require Thunderbolt 3, which my 2013 iMac won't have, so that's not looking as good a solution as I'd originally hoped :( I'll keep looking.
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I think there was some confusion here, reading back my point was you can add one to a Mac Mini M1 for far less than Apple will charge you for the same amount of storage.
 
ChrisD. said:
I think there was some confusion here, reading back my point was you can add one to a Mac Mini M1 for far less than Apple will charge you for the same amount of storage.
Click to expand...
Ah - Yes I see your point here, I was seeing the Thunderbolt storage as a solution for hosting a VM externally and away from Fusion, which would speed up a lot of day-to-day stuff meaning I could keep the iMac.

Perhaps @shiver has the right idea with a USB3 SSD, I'll have a look in to what sort of speeds those drives can provide and what degree of improvement it would be.

I wonder if I got a Thunderbolt NVMe enclosure, if that would do the trick.
 
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Balls. Just realised my iMac is too old to upgrade to big sur, so that’s the icing on the cake I suppose.

looks like I’ll sell this iMac and get a new machine.
 
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