Is an iMac 2011 good enough for music production?

[StillAwake]

Hello! I'm looking for some advice, please!

I bought a 2016 MacBook Pro today for $1099, with a $199 protection plan that covers pretty much everything, without any extra Apple Care fees for repairs. I bought it on impulse while buying a mic and audio interface, bc the sales employee kept trying to upsell me (she succeeded, lol). Also because a coupon worked as a fluke, and took the price down a little. According to the employee, Apple products rarely go on sale, and coupons usually don't apply to them. After going home and doing research, I'm not pleased with the limited number of ports/need for dongles, and the fact that I can't upgrade the RAM from 8GB to 16GB. Most importantly, buying the computer took me 100% over the budget I had set for myself. >.<

I have an old 2011 iMac that works great. It's my best friend in the kitchen for recipes, Facebooking and online shopping while ruining the recipes, and playing music on YouTube non-stop. I learned that I can add more RAM to my iMac, and started wondering if it would be capable of handling music production software if I upgraded the RAM. It runs without a hiccup on just 4GB of RAM right now. I could upgrade it to 20GB of RAM for about $100.

Sorry for the essay. Here's the question(s):

1) With a memory upgrade, would the iMac have the ability to run the kind of software that it takes to produce music?
- I have not had much experience with the software (Logic, FruityLoops, Ableton, etc), and doubt that I could put it through the kind of testing that would answer my question, within the timeframe I have for a return of the MBP.
- This includes recording and processing live music.

2) Is the MacBook Pro at this price ($1300, fully warrantied with no extra fees for repairs), so good, and the MacBook Pro good enough, that I should just keep it and use it despite the anxiety induced by going over budget by $1000?


~ SPECS FOR COMPARISON ~


13.3-inch MacBook Pro
Processor - 2.3GHz dual-core Intel Core i5 with 64MB eDRAM
Memory - 8GB of 2133MHz LPDDR3 SDRAM
128GB PCle-based SSD
Graphics - Intel Iris Plus Graphics 640
Runs - no idea, it doesn't say on the box and I have to keep it factory sealed for possible return.

PRICE = $1300 w/ 3-yr warranty

Specs:

iMac 21.5-inch, Mid 2011
Processor - 2.7 GHz Intel Core i5
Memory - 4 GB 1333 MHz DDR3
Graphics - AMD Radeon HD 6770M 512 MB
Runs - OS X El Capitan

PRICE = $100 for RAM upgrade to 20GB



Thank you for your time and input.

 

[slu]

Your iMac will do what you want, just fine. I'd return the MacBook unless you need portability.

 

[vkd]

Take the laptop back and get your money back. The iMac will do everything you want no problem. I have the same model as you and use it every day, its more than powerful enough and with 20GB RAM, nothing to worry about.

 

[Fishrrman]

I use an old 2006-vintage iMac for music production, but I only record a single stereo track at a time, and use only one (or at the most two) plugins at once.

That's with a firewire interface, I will assume the one you have is USB?

A 2011 iMac should work fine for music, SO LONG AS you don't overload it with lots and lots of plugins and loops.

I doubt you'd need 20gb of RAM. 8gb or 16gb would be fine. Even 8gb is probably "enough".

If the drive is slowing you down, you could get an external SSD in a thunderbolt enclosure and use that as an "external booter". Keep the loops and your projects on the internal HDD.

Are you going to be producing "electronic" music (i.e., created from loops and plugins), or, "naturally-recorded" music (from miss)?

Do you already have Logic?
I'm in the minority, but I think Cubase is a better choice.

 

[TheGenerous]

Upgrade the Hard Disk to an SSD. Use the SSD to run the operating system and programs. Use external hard drives for storage and backups.

OWC SSD Flash Storage Upgrades (iMac 27" Mid 2011)

• Up to 8x the capacity of the original drive
• Up to 92x faster than the original drive

https://eshop.macsales.com/shop/ssd/owc/imac-27-inch/2011

 

[StillAwake]

I use an old 2006-vintage iMac for music production, but I only record a single stereo track at a time, and use only one (or at the most two) plugins at once.

That's with a firewire interface, I will assume the one you have is USB?

A 2011 iMac should work fine for music, SO LONG AS you don't overload it with lots and lots of plugins and loops.

I doubt you'd need 20gb of RAM. 8gb or 16gb would be fine. Even 8gb is probably "enough".

If the drive is slowing you down, you could get an external SSD in a thunderbolt enclosure and use that as an "external booter". Keep the loops and your projects on the internal HDD.

Are you going to be producing "electronic" music (i.e., created from loops and plugins), or, "naturally-recorded" music (from miss)?

Do you already have Logic?
I'm in the minority, but I think Cubase is a better choice.

Thanks for the tips! I will be producing "naturally-recorded" music. I don't have any full-size software yet, just trial versions. I will definitely try Cubase, thank you!
[doublepost=1504546525][/doublepost]Yay, I don't need portability, so THANK YOU all!!

 

[StillAwake]

Upgrade the Hard Disk to an SSD. Use the SSD to run the operating system and programs. Use external hard drives for storage and backups.

OWC SSD Flash Storage Upgrades (iMac 27" Mid 2011)

• Up to 8x the capacity of the original drive
• Up to 92x faster than the original drive

https://eshop.macsales.com/shop/ssd/owc/imac-27-inch/2011

I hadn't looked at the storage, but it looks like I've got a TB on the iMac. What is the minimum SSD that I would need, if any, to get a "faster" computer? Or is the TB of storage enough? Thank you!

 

[TheGenerous]

I have 120 GB Samsung SSD with MacOS (El Capitan) and heavy programs like; InDesign, Photoshop, Capture One, Lightroom, Fireworks, Bridge, Dolphin and OpenEmu, Office, iWorks, Parallels Desktop, LaTeX, Matlab.

(My configuration is MacMini Late 2012, 16 GB RAM, MacOS El Capitan, 120 GB SSD, 500 GB mechanical Hard Disk).

 

[vkd]

I hadn't looked at the storage, but it looks like I've got a TB on the iMac. What is the minimum SSD that I would need, if any, to get a "faster" computer? Or is the TB of storage enough? Thank you!

If you get a 120GB SSD you can add it alongside your present HDD and then using the Apple OS, create a so-called Fusion Drive, which sort of "glues" the SSD to the HDD as a super-fast cache and ultimately gives you all your storage space at SSD speed, in other words, 1TB + 120GB all at SSD speed, which for this machine is SATA3, you get about 450MB/s read and write. It is a good deal, I have done it and fully recommend it. Only thing is, you have to procure a special connection cable; it is included in the "SSD Bay Add in Kit" on this link, https://eshop.macsales.com/shop/ssd/owc/imac-27-inch/2011. You can get it at other places too and save a few centavos, but you'll need the suction cups in that kit as well so its a simple solution.

 

[BrettApple]

I say It'll be fine as is with say, 8GB of RAM or so. We have a base 21" 2011 iMac that runs Ableton Live and others with no issues and lots of tracks, plugins, and loops in a drum cage. It replaced a 2014 13" MBA that was crippled by it's 4GB RAM and dual core CPU. The quad i5 even if it is an older Sandy Bridge one still runs very well these days. Add in an SSD and that iMac will fly. We still have the stock 500GB HDD in it but we have somewhere around 10-15 2011 iMacs and many have been upgraded to SSD with OWC's temp sensor and mounting bracket. But it wouldn't be a necessity, it's mostly for quicker boot up times when needed on stage.

 

[ApfelKuchen]

Everyone is recommending their favorite upgrades, and they all have merit. However, you can't upgrade the CPU, or the I/O ports. Whatever you do invest in the older machine will have a limited lifespan.

For now, you're just getting your feet wet in audio production, so it doesn't necessarily hurt to have an under-powered machine. What you do, production-wise, will determine whether this particular machine will suit your needs, and you won't know that until you do some actual production. I'd defer the purchase of a new Mac for a while, but do expect that, regardless of what you put into the older Mac, you'll be spending again sometime in the next year or so. At least by then, you'll have a much better idea of what you'll want/need in the new machine.

 

[jimmirehman]

I bought my daughter the very same iMac you have. I dropped 20GB of RAM into it and her machine blows my 2009 iMac i7 2.8Ghz with 12GB of RAM out of the water! She uses her iMac for Video production and Garageband and it handles anything we throw at it with ease.

 

[TheTruth101]

Get the ram but if you really want to see a difference get an internal ssd drive. I always upgrade to 1TB ssd but 512 would do. The iMac will fly, hard drives are such bottle neck. I just sold my 2008 Mac Pro I was suing for music production. You iMac would work just fine but get the hard drive and you will have a fast machine for at least 3 more years easy.