Trade up on iMac 27-inc

Apple discontinued 27" iMacs a few years ago. All the current models are 24." If you can live with a 24" display, almost any current iMac would be suitable for photo editing.

If you are using Photoshop, Lightroom, CaptureOne or similar advanced photo apps, I suggest configuring the Mac with 24GB RAM and a 1TB SSD for storage.

Note that the current 24" iMacs are all M4 models. While M4's are excellent, current Mac mini models sport a more advanced M6 or M5Pro processor. Personally, I would opt for an M6 mini for future longevity; still with at least 24GB RAM and 1TB SSD.

With a Mac mini you will need a display, keyboard & mouse. You can probably reuse the keyboard & mouse from your present iMac. If you want a 27" display then I urge you to consider at least a 5K 27" display or even a 6K 27" display in order to get best benefit from the Retina display capability of the mini. A couple of examples - Dell u4025qw or ASUS ProArt PA27JCV (both are 5K and are considerably less expensive than the Apple Studio Display).

If you absolutely have to have a 5K monitor the Studio Monitor starts at $1599. There are 3rd party monitors on Amazon at $550 (Samsung) and up. That with a Mac Mini M6 will be a powerful machine.

There's even a 34" 5K monitor for $530 (a lesser brand).

If you can live with a 4K monitor consider the following:  a 12‑core CPU, 12‑core GPU Dual 16‑core Neural Engine Mac Mini M6 with 16 GB RAM and 1 TB SSD ($1399 US) with a 32" LG 4k monitor ($331 US) from Amazon.com)  is $1716 which is $480 less than a similarly configured new 24" M4 iMac ($2199 US). Keep your keyboard and mouse from your current Mac for use with the Mini. If you recycle don't include the mouse an keyboard.

I got the previous Mini M4 with a 32" LG 4K monitor w/speakers for the same price as a 27" monitor (didn't know the Mini had a speaker).  There are many monitors available in 27" size for about $100 US to $500 US depending on what features you want.  I love the extra screen real estate of the 32" monitor.

I had an 2017 i7 iMac with an SSD boot drive and a new M4 Mini runs circles around it.  The new M6 will be even faster.   

You can use the keyboard and mouse from your current iMac. Don't include them with the iMac if you use Apple Trade In or recycle with the  iMac.

Just some food for thought.

Apple discontinued the last 27" 5K Retina iMac at the same time that they introduced the first Mac Studios and the first 27" 5K Studio Display.

Since then, Mac minis have gotten more powerful, so a modern replacement for a 27" iMac might be

• A M6 Mac mini, M5 Pro Mac mini, or M5 Max Mac Studio
• An Apple 27" 5K Studio Display
• An Apple Magic Keyboard
• An Apple Magic Mouse

The Studio Display is very nice, but it's also pretty expensive. By the time you pay for a Studio Display, an Apple Keyboard, and an Apple Magic Mouse, you've spent about as much as a nice 27" 5K Retina iMac used to cost – except that you still have to buy the computer!

So many people go with 27" – 32" third-party 4K displays, which aren't as sharp as the Apple 5K display, but are much cheaper. These days, there are also a few 27" 5K (5120x2880) pixel third-party displays that might offer a lower-cost alternative to the Apple 5K one.

And if the keyboard and mouse from your 27" iMac are in good working order, you can just take them with you to a new Mac mini or Mac Studio.

MartinR wrote:

If you want a 27" display then I urge you to consider at least a 5K 27" display or even a 6K 27" display in order to get best benefit from the Retina display capability of the mini. A couple of examples - Dell u4025qw or ASUS ProArt PA27JCV (both are 5K and are considerably less expensive than the Apple Studio Display).

The comparison between the Apple and Dell displays is not an apples-to-apples comparison.

The 27" Apple Studio Display has a resolution of 5120x2880 pixels, and a pixel density of 218 pixels per inch. It goes for $1599 USD, or $1999 USD if you want a height-adjustable stand.

The 40" Dell UltraSharp 40 Curved Thunderbolt™ Hub Monitor - U4025QW has a resolution of 5120x2160 pixels, and a diagonal of 40". With fewer pixels, spread over a larger area, its pixel density is 140 pixels per inch. That is lower than the pixel density of a 27" UHD 4K (3840x2160 pixel) display (163 pixels per inch), and getting close to the pixel density of a non-Retina 27" 2560x1440 display (109 pixels per inch).

BTW, at $2399.99 USD, the Dell U4025QW is more expensive than the Apple Studio Display!

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The Asus ASUS ProArt Display 5K PA27JCV Professional Monitor is a 27" 5120x2880 display with the same pixel density as the Apple Studio Display, and at $699 USD, it is much less expensive than either the Apple display, or the Dell display. Unlike most 5120x2880 displays, it does not support Thunderbolt. I do not know, offhand, if the USB-C (DisplayPort v1.4) input would be able to handle 5120x2880 @ 60 Hz, but the display also has HDMI v2.1. HDMI v2.1 has something like triple the bandwidth of HDMI v2.0, and so if you connected this display to the HDMI port on a M6 or M5 Pro Mac mini, I doubt if there would be any problem driving it at full 5K resolution.

I agree with what you said, except that I found the Dell u4025qw at only $1429 on Amazon but it's a 40" not a 27" display. I had actually intended to suggest a 27" Dell but then found that all of Dell's supposed 5K displays are only 2560x1440 (an even scaling of 5K but not actually 5K, I think it's actually called 5K/2K)