Mini to imac upgrade

I have a late 2012 mini, with dual core i5. I am in need of more computing power. My dad has offered me to trade my mini for his 27" late 2013 iMac with a quad core i5.
I have two 128 GB Samsung 840 Pro SSDs in my mac mini. One for the system drive, the other for Logic Pro X projects. I would very much like to continue using these SSDs. However, I do *not* want to go through the hassle of installing them inside the iMac if possible. Rather, I would prefer to mount them in a Thunderbolt enclosure (such as the Akitio Neutrino Thunder Duo) and run them externally. I understand I will likely not get the full potential of the drives with this configuration. I am okay with that. I have read that it is possible to have your system drive in an external configuration.
I am just unsure of what the best process is for making this happen. What do I need to do with the system drive in my Mac mini? Do I need to start from scratch with it, in order to make it the system drive for the iMac? Or can I just install it in the Thunderbolt enclosure and tell the iMac to use it as the system drive?

can I just install it in the Thunderbolt enclosure and tell the iMac to use it as the system drive?
That should work, although you may have to start/restart holding down the option/alt key to select it. Some people have posted external drives don't show up in System Preferences/Startup Disk.

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Mac mini or imac

I have G5 PPC & Apple 20" screen what I want to do is to upgrade to an Intel processor mac.
I do not want secondhand.
Programs I will use most = Photoshop 5.5, LR 4
I can spend £1300, no more. preferably less
I need:
- the fastest processor &Fusion drive for the money - I can't work out which is best
- backwards compatibility (somehow) with my 3 USB external HDs and preferably access to the HDs currently in my G5 for storing my images
- compatibility my Wacom Intuous 3 tablet and my Epson 3880 printer
I want:
- min 1 TB HD fusion drive
Am I right in thinking the Mac Book Air and MB Pro only have dual core whereas the Mini and iMac have quad core and that the quad core ones are faster?
If that's right then is the Mac mini with the 2.6GHz Quad-Core Intel Core i7 faster or slower than the iMac with 2.9GHz Quad-core Intel Core i5, Turbo Boost up to 3.6GHz?
If I got an iMac, would I be able to use it with my current screen as dual screen system?
Which mac should I get? Mac Mini, iMac, macBook Air, macbook pro?
thanks
(I'll get more memory from Crucial)

Hello, a rough guage...
iMac "Core i5" 2.7 21.5-Inch (Late 2012)... Geekbench: 8068/9145
iMac "Core i5" 2.9 21.5-Inch (Late 2012)... Geekbench: 9202/10756
Mac mini "Core i7" 2.3 (Late 2012)... Geekbench: 10626/11825
Mac mini "Core i7" 2.6 (Late 2012)... Geekbench: 11367/12807
iMac "Core i7" 3.1 21.5-Inch (Late 2012)... Geekbench: 12490/14143
If I got an iMac, would I be able to use it with my current screen as dual screen system?
Which Monitor is it, what Port does it have? ADC, DVI, or VGA?

How reliable is the Mac Mini or iMac (2009) models?

Greetings to you all. I have a question directed at anyone who owns the 2009 Mac Mini or has recently bought a Mac Mini either last year 2009 or this year, 2010. My Acer Aspire L-100 finally died on 29th Dec 2009 as a result of USB failure caused by a windows auto update. Fed up with Microsoft, I am thinking about switching over to Mac and thought the Mac Mini or iMac would be a good start. I am however troubled by the numerous complaints I am reading on the Apple website posts regarding the 2009 model Mac Mini loosing sound after a month or two of use and some posts claim that the sound on their Mac Mini is distorted, crackling and some had broken systems out of the box. How many of you have had similar sound issues with the Mac Mini? Also, is it better to get the iMac 21.5 inch instead? Has anyone had hardware issues with the Mac Mini and or the 21.5 inch iMac in less than 2-6 months of use? If so please let me know so that I can make up my mind, whether to purchase Mac computer platform or just build my own customized machine. What I need to know is, how reliable or durable is the mac mini computer, especially the 2009 model and how does the mac mini, especially with its small size, handle temperatures? Does the mac mini overheat? Please help. All information will be highly appreciated.

Remember, Apple offers a 1 year hardware warranty and 90 days free software support, both of which can be extended to three years from date of computer's purchase. This means if you appear to have what is a technical issue with your machine off the bat, Apple will cover the lemon issue, if it is obvious it is not an issue you the user could have caused. Mind you, if issues appear much later during the ownership, it gets harder to justify that it is a manufacturer issue. As long as you don't upgrade the internal hardware, the hardware test CD that comes with the machine will be able to tell if there is a manufacturer issue with the machine. All bets are off, if you change the RAM, or hard drive beyond the specs of the machine. Apple publishes the specs of the machine on http://support.apple.com/
Your machine shouldn't overheat unless you excede the published specs.
The advantage of the Mac is that malware and viruses are practically a nonissue, and everything you usually could desire is already built-in to the machine. So while you could build your own machine, you can't really get the integrated hardware and software as you do with the Mac.
Yes, the 27" iMac has been hit hard with issues, more around the display than anything else. I for one, if were forced to get an iMac, would get the 21.5".
I've not seen any specific Mac Mini issues really come to the fore.
If sound is lost on a Mac Mini, it usually is due to the fact that minijack connectors themselves are fragile to begin with, and endusers tend to jiggle them a lot in the connector, causing the connectivity to get lost. If you are careful to follow these directions about cables*:
http://www.macmaps.com/frayguide.html
You should avoid most of those issues. Thankfully there are 5 USB ports on Mac Minis, and USB audio is frequently better than the built-in audio, except when adding your own 5.1 speaker system with mini-Toslink connector speakers.
Don't forget the number of posters to this board, don't even amount to 1 tenth of a percent of all purchasers of iMacs, Mac Minis, or MacBooks any one quarter. Thus the remark you said was "rude" is not. It is factual. You are basing your information on what amounts to less odds of happening than a space program disaster with NASA. Mostly people who have problems are posting, and those who don't rarely do post.
I recently had a hard drive die after the three year warranty was spent, but hard drives I've seen die on Acers and Dells on the first day of ownership too, so that's nothing new. Backing up your data is the best way to deal with data loss*:
http://www.macmaps.com/backup.html
- * Links to my pages may give me compensation.

New mac mini and imac vs powermac G5 running FCP studio

I want to compare running the FCP suite on the new max minis and imacs that came out today vs what I am currently using:
Currently I am running FCP Studio on a Powermac G5 dual 2GHz with one gig of ram. I believe the frontside bus is 1GHz. I believe the stock video card isan ATI Radeon 9600 Pro (AGP 8X Pro) video card with 64 MB of DDR SDRAM.
With this being said, is it safe to assume that the new entry level mac mini would surpass my G5 in terms of performnce in both video (NVIDIA GeForce 9400M with128MB or 256MB of shared DDR3) memory processing (intel core2 duo 2GHz)?
If not would the two low end Imacs (using NVIDIA GeForce 9400M with 256MB of shared DDR3 memory) and processing power handle FCP studio better than my current powermac G5 setup listed above?
I am wondering because I spoke to a apple sales person who transfered me to a system engineer that said I'd have a slow time rendering video on FCP with the mac minis as well as the 2 low end imacs. This may be but Im wondering if it is still better than what I am using
I appreciate your opinions, but please only answer if you really know,
Thanks!

For FCP/FCS I would not save on anything but will get the max what my budget allow. You will be always doing more and the workflow in FCS will entice you to open almost all apps in FCS concurrently to make use of the advanced features. I think that the new iMac are powerful enough to handle FCS, but once again, the extra dollars will save you alot of pain. FCS is a pro app and is not to be underestimated. Good luck.

Intel iMac; upgraded adobe flash; bluetooth keyboard no longer pairs but magic mouse still OK. With Bluetooth switched on the screen splits into 4 areas and open windows seperate and shrink. Switch off Bluetooth and problem disappears and iMac works OK

Intel iMac; upgraded adobe flash; bluetooth keyboard no longer pairs but magic mouse still OK. With Bluetooth switched on the screen splits into 4 areas and open windows seperate and shrink. Switch off Bluetooth and problem disappears and iMac works OK with plug-in keyboard and mouse

Hi, Derek -
...the screen splits into 4 areas and open windows seperate and shrink.
Sounds like Spaces is being activated somehow. With the wired keyboard and mouse in use, select the Exposé & Spaces control pane in System Preferences, click the choice in that pane for Spaces. See what the settings are. There are some activation settings in that pane - by default, F8 activates it.
It could be that the bluetooth keyboard has some stuck keys and is activating Spaces; or that the activation command has somehow been reset to something that the bluetooth mouse, or bluetooth itself, is triggering.

Please help:Midipipe no longer works after Garageband/iMac upgrades

Hi. I was wondering if anyone could help. I use my Yamaha Dtxplorer electronic drums to record drums on my iMac's Garageband program. I use a program called "midipipe" to assign the correct midi drum pad sounds before the signal goes into Garageband, and then I use the "EZdrummer" plug-in to get more realistic drums sounds. Here's the problem. In June 2011, I upgraded my iMac to "Snow Leopard" (Mac OS 10.6.7), and at the same time, I upgraded Garageband to Garageband '11 (ie Garageband 2011). Now that I did those 2 upgrades, I can no longer get midipipe to work in any way. There are NO drums sounds coming out through midipipe now, and when trying to tweak the settings, there is no longer any way to click the "hijack" checkbox on the midipipe "midi in" setting. The "hijack" button is now "greyed-out" and cannot be selected. Now I can no longer use my drums with Garageband, which is really, really disheartening. It seems like all I run into with my iMac and Garageband is nothing but problems and glitches that are making me considering recording my music on a Windows computer, and ditching my iMac altogether. I've already tried repeatedly to create new "pipes" with midipipe, but nothing will work since I cannot select the "hijack" button anymore. This problem occurred only after the Garageband and iMac upgrades, and midipipe used to work PERFECTLY with garageband and ezdrummer before. Nothing else in my set-up has changed.
If anyone has ANY possible solutions, please help. I've wasted so much time with this computer already. All I want is for it to work properly. Thank you very much in advance.
Rich

Hi JMX. No, I've had no luck trying to figure out the problem, which started ever since I upgraded my iMac and upgraded Garbageband. No replies except yours, and I googled a bunch of web pages trying to find an answer. The guy who programmed the Midipipe program didn't reply either. I'm thinking about getting a Windows computer to record music, along with Protools. Have horrible luck with Garageband since the day I bought my iMac, unfortunately. Nothing but glitches and problems.
But I wish you (and anyone else running into the same problem) the best of luck. I just don't have the patience for the contstant obstacles when trying to use an Apple Mac to record songs.

Is it possible to add a second monitor via mac mini with iMac

Hi
is it possible to add a second monitor via mac mini with iMac
or is there another solution?
all i want to know is if i can run a second monitor or link a mac mini for more speed like i heard you can with the G5 Towers.

The iMac will allow you to connect a second monitor but that monitor will show the same thing as the iMac's built-in screen.
You can network a Mac mini and iMac via Ethernet or Firewire.
Software load sharing like Xgrid can allow you to share work between the Macs.

HT204388 how do I switch between my mac mini and iMac using iMac screen?

how do I switch between my mac mini and i mac using i mac screen? I thought it was using F2 but that does not seem to work.

To switch between your Mac mini and iMac, you just have to turn on or off Target Display mode. To do it, press Command and F2 keys in your iMac, not only F2

File sharing between Mac Mini and iMac "breaks" after reboot of either device, and won't restore. Why? Running Maverick 10.9.1 on both. File sharing is setup on both. Help.

I'm a new user - recent convert from longtime Windows to Apple. Thought having desktops and computing aligned with phones and tablets would help. Not so far.
I have a MacMini running Mavericks 10.9.1, and an iMac running Mavericks 10.9.1. File Sharing is set up on both. If either device is rebooted for any reason, file sharing from the Mac Mini to the iMac "breaks" and will not easily restart. Various things eventually brings the connection back - usually having to do with checking and unchecking File Sharing, the AFP button, and/or the SMB button on the iMac - but never the same procedure twice in a row. File Sharing from the iMac to the Mac Mini is never disrupted - always comes back up without a problem. Screen Sharing also works between both without fail, and comes up after reboot of either. No problem there. Only difficulty is from Mac Mini to the iMac.
Why? Any ideas?

Should also clarify - usually takes multiple hours of checking/unchecking file sharing settings in order to restore the share between Mac Mini and iMac. NEVER happens automatically.
This is disruptive because I've got the Mac Mini pointing to several file locations on the iMac for various things - photos, music, etc. - and they all hang up unless the share is restored. Real bummer.

Getting error "The disk you inserted was not readable by this computer." on mac mini and imac but it works on old macbook pro

Please help! My hard drives work on all other computers except new imac and macmini.

Both the mac mini and imac do not have cd drives. The trouble is why should I repair the external HDs when they work fine on other computers? I'm running OS X 10.8.4. I feel like its an OS X problem but I cant say. I will try the suggestion but I absolutely cannot reformat these drives right now becuae it would be way too time consuming to recover all the files on them

Connect mac mini to imac

Hi,
I was wondering if I can connect an old mac mini to an imac so I can use the mac mini as an aditional hard drive to store all my music and pictures.
If so, how do I do it?
Thanks in advance.
Oscar

Welcome to Apple Support Communities
If the Mac mini and iMac have got FireWire or Thunderbolt (probably, FireWire 800), just buy a FireWire cable and start the Mac mini holding the T key while your Mac is starting. Doing this, your Mac mini's hard drive will show up as an external drive in the iMac, so you can store data in it. You may want to format the hard drive first.
This isn't the best way. If you aren't going to use the Mac mini, you can take the hard disk out of it, buy an enclosure, install the hard drive in it and connect it to your iMac. Then, format the hard drive > http://pondini.org/OSX/DU1.html Finally, open Finder and you will see the hard drive in the Finder sidebar, under "Devices"

Can I connect Mac mini to iMac monitor

Can I connect a Mac mini to iMac monitor ? To view Mac mini files

Hi Ricemail,
You *may* be able to do so, depending on the specific models of your iMac and Mac Mini, using a feature known as Target Display Mode. You may find the following article helpful:
Target Display Mode: Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
http://support.apple.com/kb/ht3924
Regards,
- Brenden

Mini or iMac

I would like to buy a new Mac but not sure if I should go with the Mac mini or iMac. I will use it to edit home videos and surf the web. I was going to either get a 1.66GHz Mac mini with 1GB ram and hook it up to my HDTV or the 17" iMac with 1GB ram.
I just don’t know if the mini will be fast enough for what I want to do. Also if I decide to go with the iMac will I be able to hook it up to my HDTV like I can with the mini.

iMovie runs very well on an Intel mini, and would of course run better (faster, less laggy, smoother operation) on an iMac. Which of the two systems you would best be buying is dependent on the level of work you're going to be doing (or may end up doing). If you are planning, or might become involved in, work at a professional level or involving working to deadline then there's no doubt that an iMac would function as a better hardware platform. The performance gap between the mini and iMac is likely not so great when based on Intel hardware as before, but even so, the iMac would provide a smoother workflow.
Final Cut will certainly run more smoothly on an iMac than a mini once in Universal binary - if your interest may extent to Final Cut, and you have a serious interest in video editing, then an iMac would be my recommendation if a suitable model is within your budget.

My iMac (upgraded to Lion) has been behaving super sluggishly.

My iMac (upgraded to Lion) has been behaving super sluggishly. slow to open my Word docs, Slow to close webtabs,.just so S L O W. Suggestions??
I have already tried restarting... I have very few programs..just the MSOffice App. I did look at a lot of websites (looking for vacation rentals).

Well - all of the above were ultimately caused by one thing, of course the one thing I didn't replace - my 5-port Netgear 1Gb switch. Got a replacement and everything is fine. Lion was simply installed at the time the switch failed.

I have a late 2006 iMac upgraded to lion, Quicktime doesn't work anymore. Preview won't show images, any ideas anyone?

I have a late 2006 iMac upgraded to lion, Quicktime doesn't work anymore. Preview won't show images, any ideas anyone?

You are correct....it will not work. Please carefully read Apple's Target Display Mode: Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

Mini to imac upgrade

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