Luminous Landscape Forum
Raw & Post Processing, Printing => Adobe Lightroom Q&A => Topic started by: rextilleon on March 31, 2017, 03:34:10 pm
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Just got back into photography and I'm having a great time. I have an old yet reliable 2008 Imac. It's good for most things and has never given me a problem. However, running Lightroom has severely taxed it and got me to thinking about how I can improve performance. I'm maxed out on memory (6gbs) and really don't want to open the machine to put in an SSD drive (according to OWS a possible upgrade). So what I am left with is a new Mac or perhaps an external SSD. I would go for a new Imac, but can't see spending a ton of money on a machine that hasn't been upgraded since 2014. So I am left with an SSD external and I have a couple of questions.
1. Considering that my Imac has USB 2.0 and Firewire ports, will the performance of an SSD show a marked improvement over the Internal 7200 rpm SATA drive I have now?
2. If yes, how would you configure the system in order to get the most out of Light Room CC?
Any advice would be appreciated and I look forward to learning a lot on this website. Thanks again.
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Honestly it's time for you to upgrade to a new iMac for a very long list of reasons. Don't bother trying to boost that 2008 iMac. That would be trying to put lipstick on a pig.
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I agree with Ron, in this instance I really don't see any possible solution to updating your current iMac that would be worthy of the time, effort and expense.
You are right when you state that there has not been much in the way of new hardware since 2014 ... which means you can save a significant amount of money by picking up a slightly used or refurb model. Not really necessary to order brand spanking new. Just keep in mind, for the past few iterations, the 27" model is the only one that still offers user upgradable RAM slots ... with the 21", your are stuck with whatever was offered from the factory.
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I have the same 2008 iMac with 6G Ram. It is still working and runs El Capitan. The hard drive failed a while back and I attached 256G Firewire drive. Slow but works. I would certainly attach an SSD drive and give it a go. No real loss if you need to upgrade later as you could use it on the next computer. I got a quote to replace the hard drive and will probably do that as I want the external Firewire drive back. The 6G Ram is still going to be a limitation as some programmes now require 8g or more.
I have a 2013 iMac which replaced the 2008 one. If you buy a new or second hand machine make sure it is the 27" and get 16G Ram, as then you get 2x 8G and two spare slots.
I also have a 2010 MBP that I use in the studio for tethering. It has 4G Ram. Now that is slow. I will upgrade that to 16G.
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Thanks to all for their thoughtful answers. Yes, its time for a new Imac--27" but I'm going to try holding out until they release the new ones. I suspect it will be sometime this summer (if Cook was being honest) and thus I don't have to survive long. Until then, I"m going to get myself an external SSD drive which I can port over to the new machine when I buy it.
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On a 2008 MacBook I switched the CD drive for a SSD. That made all the difference.
It runs Lightroom 5.9
/Eric
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I have a late 2009 iMac 27 inch. Similar issues. If you can replace the internal drive with an SSD you'll see a fair amount of improvement in the overall speediness of the computer, and some improvement in Lightroom, but anything involving processor power will still be very slow. Adding an external SSD through USB 2 will be glacial, with FW400 not much better.
I'm waiting to see what happens with new iMacs this year, but it's time to replace mine.
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It's time to update my iMac as well. I'm waiting and hoping that the next 27" iMac has Kaby Lake processors , top notch graphics and Thunderbolt 3 at least.
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It's time to update my iMac as well. I'm waiting and hoping that the next 27" iMac has Kaby Lake processors , top notch graphics and Thunderbolt 3 at least.
Well, there is some news on that topic today:
Apple promises pro iMacs later this year, says Mac mini is a consumer/pro mix (https://9to5mac.com/2017/04/04/imac-pro-mac-mini-update/)
and ... Apple seems to be revisiting their design schema for the MacPro:
Apple upgrades Mac Pro, promises radical modular models and new displays next year (https://9to5mac.com/2017/04/04/apple-upgrades-mac-pros-signals-radical-new-modular-mac-pros-next-year-with-apple-displays/)
Could be interesting to see what they come up with next ... many folks were not impressed with the recent iterations of the MacPro.
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@ sextillion,
Adding a SSD will make a major difference in booting up and a lot of other disk reading tasks (app launching).
Also add as much ram as you can, I know its expensive as its older and ECC.
Other than that it is what it is. I have a Mac Pro 8 core 2.8 2008 machine. I aded a USB3 card and a SSD on a pice card Apricorn (https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/887344-REG/Apricorn_vel_solo_x1_Velocity_Solo_x1_SSD.html).
Adding the SSD on a PCIE card is easy peasy. It literally drops in. just make sure its in one of the faster slots to get the most out of it.
It still works well, but it's no match for my iMac 4770k 4.0 ghz , 295x, 27" retina.
Good luck
mdr