Retiring the old 2011 27″ for the new 24″ M1 iMac
I bought my first Apple Macintosh, I think in 1985, and was amazed at how easy it was to use compared to other offerings.
I moved through updates and models, along the way being offered a position at an art school because of the adoption by designers and photographers of the Mac platform and my knowledge of them.
Later in my development, I bought an E (education) Mac and 3 iMacs as well as 5 Mac laptops. And a Mac Mini.
In 2011 I bought a 27” iMac with 1Tb hard disc and 16 GB/RAM. That machine has worked hard for me throughout its life and is still going strong, but since 2019 I have not been able to download the latest Adobe PS and LR plus, of course, the OS, so time for an upgrade.
I decided to buy a new 24″ iMac and did lots of Googling about how much RAM was needed to run Adobe and also spoke to Apple.
I jumped in and bought the base 24″ with some trepidation.
Well, I have now had the machine for three weeks. To give you an idea, I thought I would push it to see what happened and… Opened at the same time:
• 5 Safari pages all very heavy content
• Mail open
• Preview open with several images
• Lightroom with two screens
• Adobe Photoshop with 6 images ranging from 25 to 78 MB
• On the 78 MB, I added layer after layer building up to 500 MB and was still able to work fast
• With everything open, I uploaded an SD card full of images to Lightroom, did a bit of editing and then exported a few, plus emailed a few images
With all that going on the 24″ iMac, it performed far quicker than my old 27″.
The 24″ has 8GB RAM and a 256GB SSD, I have a USB-C 1TB hard disc attached for LR catalogues, and as a scratch disc for Photoshop.
I have two Drobo hard discs with 24 TB of storage, one is USB 2, and one is Firewire 800, plus 12 TB of USB working storage in 3 Seagate USB hard disc hubs.
There is also a 1TB Seagate connected for time machine.
It all works very well, and the connections are through a series of hubs and adapters.
Obviously, the older HDD’s are limited by their own architecture and connections.
The Drobos are only connected when I need access to older items.
I have another 28TB of discs, each duplicated for different work, which are connected as needed through the Seagate USB hard disc hubs. There is approximately another 30TB of commercial work from years ago.
I have been scanning film and shooting digital since my first Fuji digital camera in, I think, 1997/98.
Do I miss the 3” loss of real estate? NO. In fact the 24″ is a better match for my second screen which is an old Dell 24″ and connects via USB-C hub.
All in, I am very happy with the 24″, and next year will retire my old MacBook Pro and go for an M1 MacBook.
I live alone with three animals since my girlfriend died, in a tiny house on three floors, so space is limited, and the computer set up is in a room that is ‘like a loft’ used for relaxing, listen to music, watching TV, reading and next to it is an open terrace which has the most amazing views which never fail to inspire me.
The very large cat 1.6 meters is sat on a very expensive bed, an Epson A2 printer, and next to it is a Pelli case with Fuji stuff in.
Snaps of office taken with iPhone.
“I was born in the UK and worked as a graphic designer and photographer for most of my life and I feel privileged to have been doing what I love throughout my life and been paid for the pleasure.
I started to take photographs with a Box Brownie at the age of 7 or 8 years old, but the big revelation came when I was 10 and I watched my cousin develop a black and white print using a home made enlarger, ‘that was it, I was hooked’.
The next momentous photographic event came on top of a mountain in Switzerland at the age of 13 when I suddenly thought how do I capture the whole scene. ‘I suddenly knew!’ if I took a series of photographs with my Kodak 127 then join the prints later that should work. It did! 50 years later I am still making panoramic photographs but now digitally though I do occasionally miss the Xpan panoramic camera which stands out among the mass of 5 x 4, roll film, 35mm cameras I have used over the years.
I have shot fashion, cars, musicians, products, hung out of helicopters, photographed air to air and covered the Silver jubilee of the British Queen, but I now work solely on my personal projects.”
