iMovie 10 on a Macbook Air

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Level 2

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iMovie 10 on a Macbook Air

I have a friend that wants to learn iMovie and do some basic editing.

She has an early 2014 Macbook Air (6,2) with 4 GB Ram and a 128 GB SSD, running Yosemite. RAM can't be upgraded, but I can help her add a larger SSD, either internally, or externally via USB3.

I realize this hardly a powerhouse for video editing. But I'm wondering if she can use it to get started, or whether it'll drive her so crazy that she should opt for a new laptop.

Many thanks for any light anybody can shed --

Steve

MacBook Air

Posted on Feb 23, 2020 8:24 AM

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Answer 1

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Rich839

Level 8

48,168 points

Feb 23, 2020 12:23 PM in response to Steve Cohen4

Your friend’s 2014 MacBook Air should be fine for video editing. It might be a little slower than the more powerful Macs, but shouldn’t crash or freeze. 4GB of ram is sufficient. She might consider updating iMovie to most current her Mac will run, and upgrade her operating system, as she is about 6 upgrades behind with her OS. An external drive formatted Max OS Extended (Journaled) would be essential for video work. Put the iMovie library on it. I would get at least a 1TB drive. External drives are relatively cheap.

— Rich

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Answer 2

Steve Cohen4 Author

Level 2

157 points

Feb 23, 2020 1:15 PM in response to Rich839

Thanks, Rich. I should have mentioned that we are planning to upgrade the OS. I was thinking Mojave, so as to avoid any issues with the fact that Quicktime is now denigrated (or whatever the right term is). Or should we go to Catalina?

Can I assume that when iMovie is installed, I'll have the option of putting the library on an external drive or is there some trick to that? I'm thinking that she should go with an SSD, but are you implying that a larger, but slower, spinning drive would be better?

Thanks again,

Steve

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Answer 3

Rich839

Level 8

48,168 points

Feb 24, 2020 12:48 PM in response to Steve Cohen4

If you want to check out SSD drives, here's a link for you:

https://www.amazon.com/OWC-1-0TB-Mercury-Electra-Serial-ATA/dp/B075DHN6BZ?th=1

The knowledgeable folks on the Photos app forum use the OWC SSD to store their photos.

-- Rich

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Answer 4

Steve Cohen4 Author

Level 2

157 points

Feb 24, 2020 6:33 AM in response to Rich839

Okay, great. Thanks very much, Rich.

Steve

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Answer 5

Rich839

Level 8

48,168 points

Feb 23, 2020 4:27 PM in response to Steve Cohen4

I would upgrade to Mojave for now. You can always upgrade later to Catalina. I myself run Mojave.

I use WD My Passport eternal Hard Drives to store my iMovie libraries. I have read that the OWC Mercury Elite Pro 7200 RPM drive is good, too, but have never tried it myself. As for SSD drives, it is unclear to me as to whether they are suitable for storage of an iMovie library. Apple recommends against storing an iMovie library on an SD card or a USB Thumb flash drive. So not sure whether an SSD external drive that is not a Thumb drive would work. I wasn't able to fine anything on Google about it. Since to my knowledge Apple has not explicitly approved external SSD drives for iMovie library storage, for safety I don't want to recommend it to you. However, I believe that OWC has an SSD external drive that you can check out. They are pretty pricey compared to Hard Drives.

External drives can, and eventually will, fail. For that reason I have two WD My Passport HD 2 TB drives and store double copies of my iMovie libraries on them. I have an additional 1TB drive dedicated to my Time Machine backups. So I am triple backed up.

-- Rich

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