Fusion drive or SSD for new iMac?
June 12, 2017 9:22 AM Subscribe
I am trying to decide whether I should get an SSD or Fusion drive for a new iMac.
Now that Apple has finally updated the iMac line, I’m ready to upgrade from a 2009 MacBook Pro. This has a non-Apple hybrid drive, bought around 2013 to upgrade the internal drive. I find it very slow when the machine is doing any heavy disk access, and if Dropbox or Backblaze start reading a lot of files, it becomes unusable. Although most of what I do is word-processing, I often have a number of apps open as I am looking up references, reading PDFs, and so on.
I want the new machine to be responsive and not to need to upgrade it for quite some time. (I’ve got 8 years out of the MBP, which I am pleased with; I expect the iMac to be in service at least as long.) I’d like to know from those with experience with Apple’s SSD and Fusion drives whether the former deliver enough of a speed boost to justify the high price premium?
(In case it matters, the choice is between a 1TB SSD and a 2TB Fusion drive.)
Now that Apple has finally updated the iMac line, I’m ready to upgrade from a 2009 MacBook Pro. This has a non-Apple hybrid drive, bought around 2013 to upgrade the internal drive. I find it very slow when the machine is doing any heavy disk access, and if Dropbox or Backblaze start reading a lot of files, it becomes unusable. Although most of what I do is word-processing, I often have a number of apps open as I am looking up references, reading PDFs, and so on.
I want the new machine to be responsive and not to need to upgrade it for quite some time. (I’ve got 8 years out of the MBP, which I am pleased with; I expect the iMac to be in service at least as long.) I’d like to know from those with experience with Apple’s SSD and Fusion drives whether the former deliver enough of a speed boost to justify the high price premium?
(In case it matters, the choice is between a 1TB SSD and a 2TB Fusion drive.)
A while ago I had a Mac with a DIY Fusion Drive and it actually worked very well, but that was with a relatively big 128GB SSD portion. The SSD part that Apple includes with their Fusion drives is a measly 24GB. Unless they've increased the size of the SSD in the new iMac Fusion Drives, I wouldn't recommend them. Agree that if 1TB is all you need, get the SSD.
posted by zsazsa at 9:34 AM on June 12, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by zsazsa at 9:34 AM on June 12, 2017 [1 favorite]
I have a ~4 year old fusion drive in a Mac mini as my home computer and my experience is that unless the disk gets really full, it's not particularly distinguishable from a ssd (I have a ssd-only mac laptop from around then that I use a fair amount, and a slightly older mac in my office with only spinning disks, so I use all the combos regularly). No direct experience with this question on current gen macs but I'm not sure it would have changed. If I replace my office iMac soon (and I might!) I'd probably pick a bigger fusion drive over a smaller & more expensive ssd.
posted by advil at 9:40 AM on June 12, 2017
posted by advil at 9:40 AM on June 12, 2017
The SSD part that Apple includes with their Fusion drives is a measly 24GB.
Pretty sure this isn't generally true, my 4 year old fusion drive (1TB) already has a 128GB ssd.
posted by advil at 9:43 AM on June 12, 2017
Pretty sure this isn't generally true, my 4 year old fusion drive (1TB) already has a 128GB ssd.
posted by advil at 9:43 AM on June 12, 2017
Pretty sure this isn't generally true, my 4 year old fusion drive (1TB) already has a 128GB ssd.
They switched from 128GB to 24GB in late 2015.
posted by zsazsa at 10:24 AM on June 12, 2017 [1 favorite]
They switched from 128GB to 24GB in late 2015.
posted by zsazsa at 10:24 AM on June 12, 2017 [1 favorite]
From Apple:
posted by adamrice at 10:25 AM on June 12, 2017 [2 favorites]
The 1TB Fusion Drive pairs a 1TB hard drive with 32GB of fast SSD — enough to store important macOS files and applications to ensure fast startup, near instant wake from sleep, and quick application launching, with room left over for your most frequently used files and apps. The 2TB and 3TB Fusion Drives pair a larger hard drive with 128GB of fast SSD storage, providing even more space for your most frequently used files.I've never used a Mac with a Fusion drive, but from what I've read, they give most of the performance benefit of an SSD. If I thought I'd realistically run out of space on the SSD and need to split my files between an internal and external drive, I'd go for the fusion drive from the start, because managing files split between two devices can be annoying.
posted by adamrice at 10:25 AM on June 12, 2017 [2 favorites]
I'd go SSD if you want to get eight years out of the computer. I've got the fusion drive in my iMac, and it's fine but it's not as good, and the amount of stuff that you are going to want in the SSD part of your storage is going to get bigger over time.
posted by wotsac at 11:28 AM on June 12, 2017 [2 favorites]
posted by wotsac at 11:28 AM on June 12, 2017 [2 favorites]
Best answer: Full disclosure, I'm a full time Mac IT person. I have also worked on projects for drive manufacturers.
The fusion drive was a good idea, but like a lot of Apple plays lately, it feels like a foot drag to the inevitable to keep their margins high while still offering lots of storage. A couple of PC manufacturers like Lenovo have gone another direction and have added an fast SSD slot with an M2 SSD and a separate 7200rpm Hard drive.
I have been dropping off the shelf 2.5" Samsung SSDs into our design studio 2010 27" iMacs since 2010. If you work on graphics heavy stuff, consider an external SSD as as a scratch disk. There will be 3rd party Thunderbolt 3 cases.
In my opinion, Apple generally sources excellent high quality and low failure memory and storage, but it's never on the bleeding edge and it's always overpriced, so generally with their builds of good better and best... better is generally better than best.
posted by bobdow at 6:07 PM on June 12, 2017
The fusion drive was a good idea, but like a lot of Apple plays lately, it feels like a foot drag to the inevitable to keep their margins high while still offering lots of storage. A couple of PC manufacturers like Lenovo have gone another direction and have added an fast SSD slot with an M2 SSD and a separate 7200rpm Hard drive.
I have been dropping off the shelf 2.5" Samsung SSDs into our design studio 2010 27" iMacs since 2010. If you work on graphics heavy stuff, consider an external SSD as as a scratch disk. There will be 3rd party Thunderbolt 3 cases.
In my opinion, Apple generally sources excellent high quality and low failure memory and storage, but it's never on the bleeding edge and it's always overpriced, so generally with their builds of good better and best... better is generally better than best.
posted by bobdow at 6:07 PM on June 12, 2017
Earlier this year I upgraded my two Macs mini to SSD + HD but didn't configure them as Fusion drives. My big concern here is that I'd rather compartmentalize failure (so, if either component fails, I don't have restore both from backups; I just have to restore the one that failed). They both have 128GB SSDs as boot drives, and I put my big files on the 1TB HDs I installed (one computer has photos, one has music and video). Knowing that's been fine for me, I didn't bother to pay for the upgrade to SSD for my new iMac. I'm planning to split up the Fusion drive and use the SSD and HD as separate drives in my new iMac, just like my two Macs mini work now. Once the AppleCare expires on it, I'll be comfortable opening it up to replace components if it'll extend the useful life of the iMac.
So: are you like me? Will you be fine ordering a kit from iFixit or OWC, or do you just want to pay more now and be done with it? If the idea of opening it up gives you the heebie-jeebies, then pay for the upgrade.
posted by fedward at 9:19 PM on June 12, 2017
So: are you like me? Will you be fine ordering a kit from iFixit or OWC, or do you just want to pay more now and be done with it? If the idea of opening it up gives you the heebie-jeebies, then pay for the upgrade.
posted by fedward at 9:19 PM on June 12, 2017
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If you need it, later upgrade your storage with external drives. Especially since you're doing word processing, you don't need gobs of storage (as opposed to video editing, say), and the speed boost is worth it.
posted by suedehead at 9:27 AM on June 12, 2017