Want to buy an imac, what extras do I need?

Question

Want to buy an imac, what extras do I need?

I want to buy myself an imac for home and I'm wondering if I need to get any extras like extra ram or anything. I'm hoping not, as I need to keep the costs down!

I'm looking at buying the 17" superdrive. I'm a graphic designer so I'll be looking at purchasing Adobe Photoshop and Indesign in the future, but for now I shall mostly be using it for the internet, email, sorting and storing my photos and music.

I don't think I need the extra fast processor, any extra ram or a larger hard drive. What I'm not sure about is a usb modem, do I need this to connect to the internet? I'm probably being thick but I would have thought it would have an internal modem? Also I heard that it's better to connect using an ethernet port, am I right?

Also I'm not sure what software it comes with, I thought iwork was standard, but it seems that's an extra.

Another thing, should I get the AppleCare protection plan? I'm thinking that if anything went wrong I'd probably be better off coming on here and talking to you guys!

Hope someone can advise, thanks
shell

Posted on Jan 17, 2007 4:12 AM

Reply

Answer 1

The Cat

Level 1

85 points

Jan 17, 2007 4:40 AM in response to shell dockley

Shell, I would have thought as a graphic designer you will need at least 1gig of RAM, although with OSX the more RAM you can throw at it the better (esp if you run lots of apps concurrently).

As for a modem, you would only need an external one if you want to connect to dial-up internet. If you've got broadband you can either use the iMac's wireless connection, ethernet port or a USB modem, depending on your needs.

As far as I know the iMac does not come with iWork, but iLife is bundled with it.

Hope this helps.

Reply

Answer 2

Jan 17, 2007 5:05 AM in response to The Cat

Thanks The Cat, that's helpful. It seems the Imac 17" superdrive comes with 1GB ram as standard, for 2gigs it's an extra £120. But I just looked at my mac pro that I have at work at it says it only has 768MB DDR SDRAM memory and a Dual 1.8GHz Processor. I'm happy with the speed that this runs using a few progammes concurrently so does that mean a new imac would be faster? All these numbers confuse me sorry!

I must've been getting confused between iLife and iWork, thanks.

Reply

Answer 3

Jan 17, 2007 9:02 AM in response to shell dockley

Photoshop and InDesign are not universal binaries and will need to be translated by Rosetta in order to run on your Intel iMac. This translation is rather RAM intensive and you will see a boost in performance if you have 2GB of RAM.

The iMacs do not have a built-in dialup modem, so umnless you plan on using broadband, you will need to purchase Apple's USB modem.

As far as AppleCare goes, I recommend it for any all in one type computer as they are expensive to fix. The proprietary parts cost more and the labor can add up quickly too.

Reply

Answer 4

neil_jo

Level 1

25 points

Jan 17, 2007 11:01 AM in response to shell dockley

If you can afford it I would uprade the ram , for me to upgrade from 1 gb to 2 gb now is 420.00 canadian, if i had ordered it with 2gb of ram it would have been 210.00 extra. [ half price]. As for applecare you get 3 years warranty and free tech support and I've phoned them at least 20 times the last 3 months.

Reply

Answer 5

Jan 18, 2007 1:02 AM in response to shell dockley

Shell, I don't think the dual 1.8 you described can be a Mac Pro as the smallest combo is 2.0.

If you are going to be working with photos, i would suggest you get the 2 gig ram. Its the signal thing you will miss the most if you don't. 1 gig, will run most stuff, but when you get photoshop going, you will want that ram or it could bog down.

Reply

Answer 6

mrtotes

Level 6

11,836 points

Jan 18, 2007 1:27 AM in response to Eric Kracinski

Given this, the best advice to Shell is to wait on the Photoshop and InDesign purchase until the Universal Binaries are released.

Shell, you have a PowerMac G5 at work which the current versions of Photoshop and InDesign is specially coded for so it works fast. If you buy them today this would not be the case on the Intel iMac. New versiosn will be out soon.

AppleWorks used to be bundled with all iMacs/iBooks but this stopped in about Jan 06. You must now pay for iWorks but be aware this is not a direct replacement for AppleWorks as the features are very different.

If I were you I'd give serious consideration to the 20" as the screen size will probably be really useful in design work but then you can always add a second display to the 17" later if required.

I would certainly advise paying the £50 for the 250Gb hard drive upgrade or you will be cluttering your desk with an external very soon on.

regards

mrtotes

Reply

Answer 7

Jan 18, 2007 7:07 PM in response to shell dockley

First off, "graphic designer" 17 inch screen??? Spend the money on a 20 to 24 inch screen!!!! 17 is a micro sized screen for design work!!

Reply

Answer 8

howwow

Level 4

3,538 points

Jan 18, 2007 7:14 PM in response to Tom Pfister1

Invest a bit more money and get a 20" iMac, get the better Graphics Card, and at least 1Gb of Ram.

The 17" if I am not wrong, has its Graphics integrated into the processor, meaning it draws from the same Ram modules, taxing more on your Ram, if you have only 1 Gb ram; And when you run non-universal apps like Photoshop, it is even going to be slower.

Minimumly, I would think the 20 inch is just nice for a Graphic Designer.

Cheers

Reply

Answer 9

Jan 19, 2007 8:17 AM in response to howwow

Invest a bit more money and get a 20" iMac,
get the better Graphics Card, and at least 1Gb of
Ram.

The 17" if I am not wrong, has its Graphics
integrated into the processor, meaning it draws from
the same Ram modules, taxing more on your Ram, if you
have only 1 Gb ram; And when you run non-universal
apps like Photoshop, it is even going to be slower.

Minimumly, I would think the 20 inch is just nice for
a Graphic Designer.

I couldn't agree more - the upgraded RAM and VRAM make a HUGE impact on video / photo processing. I sometimes edit RAW images that are 15MB+ and running Adobe PS CS2 on top of that is very processor and graphically intensive - my 20" handles the task without a problem and quickly, to boot.

Personally, I think the VRAM and RAM are the most important upgrades - both processors are extremely capable.

Reply

Answer 10

Jan 22, 2007 6:26 AM in response to mrtotes

mrtotes, thanks for explaining how photoshop and indesign run so well on my work computer, that makes sense. I think I will wait for the new versions of them, not least because I can't afford them yet!

You have all convinced me to spend a bit more and get the 20" with 2gb RAM, although I'm still not convinced I will need the applecare, but knowing my luck I'll get a duff one or something!

I'm planning on getting broadband so I should be alright to connect using the ethernet port and won't have to get the USB modem. Thanks, any other advice/thoughts welcome!

Reply