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User profile for user: fgfdgfdgd
fgfdgfdgd Author
User level: Level 1
4 points

Small hard drives iMac 24

A beginners questions I would really appreciate help with. I'd like to buy the new iMac24 but note the largest storage is 512GB unless you pay up to $900 for a 2TB drive.


My current iMac has a 2TB fusion drive of which 1.5TB is used (mainly photos, video, music files and some documents).


Should I just bite the bullet and pay the Apple Tax or are there better solutions which would allow a smaller drive on the iMac itself and my data elsewhere? I would also need an additional drive to do a local backup to.

iMac Line (2012 and Later)

Posted on Apr 26, 2021 9:32 PM

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User profile for user: babowa
babowa
User level: Level 9
78,429 points

Posted on Apr 26, 2021 9:59 PM

Of course; you can safely store all of those files on an external drive - here is a link explaining how to move your Photos library:


https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201517


So all of the space hogging files can be elsewhere and you can keep your internal drive with plenty of empty space to keep it running efficiently (SSDs should always have a minimum of 10% of the total capacity).


And I prefer buying all my externals at OWC, a recommended vendor here:


www.macsales.com


If the external is just for backups (Time Machine), etc., a regular 7200 rpm drive is fine (and less expensive); if you intend to use one as a boot disk (with an OS it), then you definitely want an SSD.

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User profile for user: babowa
babowa
User level: Level 9
78,429 points

Apr 26, 2021 9:59 PM in response to fgfdgfdgd

Of course; you can safely store all of those files on an external drive - here is a link explaining how to move your Photos library:


https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201517


So all of the space hogging files can be elsewhere and you can keep your internal drive with plenty of empty space to keep it running efficiently (SSDs should always have a minimum of 10% of the total capacity).


And I prefer buying all my externals at OWC, a recommended vendor here:


www.macsales.com


If the external is just for backups (Time Machine), etc., a regular 7200 rpm drive is fine (and less expensive); if you intend to use one as a boot disk (with an OS it), then you definitely want an SSD.

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Small hard drives iMac 24

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