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Hi,, I am planning to upgrade my iMac (27 inch - mid2010) which is now 10 years old and running on El Capitan 10.11.6 OS. Since its having a good CPU (i7 2.93) I am considering replacing the stock HDD (1TB) to an SSD, and maximising the RAM from 8GB to 32GB. is this upgrade worth it? and will I notice a different when using it?for the RAM upgrade, I think this part is the best option (iMac Intel 27" (Core i5 or i7) EMC 2390 (Mid 2010) Memory Maxxer RAM Upgrade Kit)?for the SSD, I was reviewing this guide (Mac Intel 27" EMC 2390 Hard Drive Replacement), and I am confused about the parts options. the SSD Upgrade Bundle with Crucial MX500 SSD 1TB, or buying 2 TB SSD Segate Hybrid 3.5" Hard Drive with all the required tools separately which will almost cost the same. my concerns are:is the two SSD mentioned having the same performance?is the two SSD mentioned having the same certification with my iMac?is there any drawback for using Segate 2TB over Crucial 1TB? ** This is my first time upgrading my iMac, and I really appreciate if you can guide me in selecting the best parts to get the most performance out of it for the longest period. Regards,
Unless you are deep into video or music production 32 GB is overkill! Most apps can only use 16 GB at most. So lets stick with 16 GB. Also some folks have had issues loading up their 2010 with 32 GB getting crashes. OK as for storage I do recommend following the Installing iMac Intel 27" EMC 2390 Dual HDD or SSD Drive setup as being the best config! The cables and foam mounts (or what I prefer Velcro strips) can be gotten from other sources as iFixit is out of stock OWC DIY Internal SSD Add-On Kit for all 27" Apple iMac (Mid 2010) As far as the drive this is tricky! Your system only has a SATA II (3.0 Gb/s) interface as such you really need to stick with a SATA II capable drive. Many of the current drives are fixed at SATA III (6.0 Gb/s) and not able to run reliably at SATA II speeds. There are some drives which have the ability to sense the systems I/O speed and match it like a Samsung 860 EVO Note how the interface line states clearly it supports 3.0 Gb/s. What ever drive you install needs to list this if not don’t buy it! The Seagate drive is a hybrid a patter drive like a HD but with a SSD added within it to act as a cache drive to speed up boot up and commonly loaded elements. Its a good half step between a HDD and a SSD, here you gain the depth of the HDD and the speed of a small SSD. The SSD option is more costly per the MB! So a 1TB drive is a bit more than a 1TB HDD or SSHD. But its much faster! So… Where does that leave us? Instead of swapping out one for the other ADDING a SSD is a better option! Here we can use a smaller drive as your bulk data is still on the HDD you have and only the OS and your apps sit on the SSD. As an example my 27” iMac has a 512 GB SSD and a 1TB HDD (and this SSD is still overkill for what I use the system for now). I use it mostly for writing and drawing as well as watching vids while I’m working. I have a second Mac a 2013 Mac Pro which I do my work on which is large image photography which needs lots of RAM and storage! As I don’t know your use case I can’t tell you which sized drive makes sense for you. Maybe a 1 TB SSD will be all you need. If you give me some ideas on what you are doing I might be able to offer a bit more.
