Alright so Apple’s 2020 iMac is here, which I fully believe is the very last Intel iMac
ever, and it’s going out with a bang. It’s an absolute powerhouse of a machine, but it
also now has more upgrade options than ever before, making it tough to figure out which
model and which upgrades to buy for your specific use-case.
And since you guys appreciate the Buyer’s guides that I’ve made in the past, I’m
gonna do it again, and in this video, I’m gonna talk about 8 mistakes you should avoid
when buying a 2020 iMac, and then I’m gonna break down which upgrades you should buy for
different use cases like for casual users, photo editors, programmers, Logic Pro users,
gamers, video editors and more.
And before we begin, I want to mention that we’ve already ordered two of these 2020
5K iMacs, so if you want to see us do a bunch of testing, subscribe right now and be sure
to check out our New Apple Product Pattern Mask down below.
The first mistake you should avoid is buying the nano-texture glass option for $500. Yes,
it’s probably the best way to get a matte display without using a film that ruins colors
and contrast, but for $500, unless you sit right next to a huge window, it’s definitely
NOT worth it.
The nano-texture glass actually does reduce display sharpness, not as much as other matte
displays, but it still does, and the iMac is already so bright that for most reflections
aren’t really an issue, so keep that $500 for something else.
Onto mistake #2, absolutely DO NOT BUY the 21.5” iMac for three reasons. First off,
it hasn’t been upgraded at all except for coming with an SSD at the base price. Second,
you can’t upgrade the RAM yourself like you can in the 5K model, and third, we’re
expecting this smaller iMac to get replaced with a new 24” Apple Silicon iMac either
at the end of the year or in the first quarter of 2021.
For Mistake #3, DO NOT PAY for Apple’s Memory upgrades! Simply leave it at the 8GB option,
even if you get a fully-specced out iMac. And that’s because Apple greatly overcharges
for RAM, and you can actually buy RAM yourself from Amazon using our links down below in
the description, so you can save up to $2,100 on 128GB of RAM and it doesn’t void your
warranty.
And if you’re not sure about how to do it, it’s actually incredibly easy and we already
created a 3 minute long RAM upgrade tutorial video that I’ll link to after this video
is over, so definitely check that out.
For Mistake #4, you need to realize that on Apple’s 5K iMac listing page, they have
3 different option pages, and not all of the available upgrades are visible on each page.
For example, if you click on the $1800 model, you won’t have the option to upgrade to
CPU or the graphics, but on the $2300 model, you can even configure the brand new 10-core
CPU and you have access to 3 graphics options that are only available from this page, so
be sure to check them all out.
And that actually brings us into Mistake #5, if you really want the new 10-core CPU and
you don’t care about graphics, you need to realize that you can actually select the
middle $2000 model and pay $500 for that CPU upgrade, for a total price of $2500.
If you would’ve chosen the highest end model and upgraded to that same 10-core CPU, your
total would be at $2700, so you need to realize that you can save money this way because you’re
not forced into getting better graphics if you don’t need it.
Now Mistake #6 is actually the complete opposite, this mistake is overspending on upgrades you
don’t really need. We believe that there is only a small number of people who the 10-core
CPU is actually worth it for, and I’ll talk about it in just a minute in the Buyer’s
Guide portion.
So in reality, most people should be fine with either the 6-core or the 8-core CPU,
and the same thing goes for graphics, there are some people who really won’t benefit
from upgrading the graphics.
For Mistake #7, don’t accidentally miss out on the 10 gigabit ethernet upgrade option
for only $100 model. This one could be very important because if you don’t get it right
away, you won’t be able to upgrade it yourself in the future.
And because this new 5K iMac DOES NOT have WiFi 6, anybody who has or might potentially
get Fiber internet in the future, should definitely pay for this 10gb ethernet upgrade.
And the same thing goes for anyone who wants to use a NAS server in the future, since you
need 10gb ethernet for the fastest transfer speeds.
And even if you don’t fit into one of those categories, it might make sense to still pay
the extra $100 for this because it’ll help the resale value in the future when you decide
to sell this iMac, since there may be people who really want that 10gb ethernet port.
And finally, if you want to avoid mistake #8, then be wise about how much storage you
buy, because it’s NOT user upgradable.
With the base model, you’re stuck with only 256GB of storage, so you’ll have to choose
the $2000 model which gives you 512GB of storage and some extra options.
I think the 1TB SSD option makes a TON of sense if you want to be safe, especially since
it’s only $200 more.
But on the other hand, if you’re getting the best $2300 model, don’t go out and upgrade
to 8TB of storage because that’s simply insane and way more than most people will
need, and you’re literally paying more for that upgrade than the entire iMac itself.
So now that we’ve dealt with all of those purchasing mistakes, let’s get into the
buyer’s guide portion.
If you’re more of a casual user who wants a 27” iMac for things like web browsing
or using web-based apps like Microsoft office and things like that, then the base $1800
model could actually be a great choice for you, but keep in mind that it’s limited
to a 256GB SSD, so you may want to go for the $2000 model for more storage and the small
boost in processor performance.
Now if you’re wanting to do some Photo Editing, but it’s more of a hobby instead of professional
work, the $2000 model should honestly be a great choice for you, and we recommend getting
a 1TB SSD and then buying a 32GB kit from Amazon using the link below and adding it
to the existing RAM that comes with the iMac for a total of 40GB, which is more than enough
for you.
Now if you’re a high-end photo editor that takes your work very seriously, then you should
definitely get the $2300 model with the 8-core CPU. Absolutely do not upgrade the graphics
from the standard 5500 XT because it really doesn’t help photo editing, and it’s definitely
not worth the extra cash to upgrade unless you also do graphics-intensive work or gaming.
And honestly, we don’t think the 10-core CPU is worth it for 99% of photo editors because
it’s pretty expensive at $400, and we don’t think it’ll make a big enough performance
difference to justify the price.
Now RAM, on the other hand, is very important for photo editing, so we’d recommend getting
at least 64GB from Amazon.
Moving onto programmers, a beginner or casual programmer should probably be fine with the
$2000 5K iMac, just be sure to get at least a 32GB Kit of RAM.
Now for a high-end professional programmer, the 10-core CPU might actually make sense
if you’re dealing with very large projects that take a long time to compile, and we’d
recommend at least 64GB of RAM. And absolutely don’t upgrade the graphics.
For a Logic Pro X user, I honestly think the 8-core CPU will be good enough for 99% of
users, so only the people doing massive audio projects should go for the 10-core, and for
that, it might actually make sense to go all the way up to 128GB of RAM. And also, keep
in mind that graphics won’t do anything for music production at all.
Now if you’re a gamer, especially if you want to use boot camp, the very first upgrade
you NEED to make is go for the 5700 XT graphics card upgrade, before anything else, because
this is currently our favorite AMD card available and the one we use for our eGPU setups.
We don’t recommend the $300 5700 upgrade because it has quite a bit less performance
than the 5700XT, so I would honestly recommend just paying the extra $200 for the 5700 XT,
even if you have to stick with the base 8GB of RAM for a while before you can save up
some money for some more RAM from Amazon.
And as far as how much RAM to buy, a 32gig kit should be more than good enough for gaming.
And since recent games like Call of Duty Warzone take a massive amount of storage, I’d recommend
boot camp users to get at least 1TB of storage, or maybe even 2TB so you can split it and
give 1TB for Mac and 1TB for Windows in boot camp.
Now if you’re wanting to do virtual machine work, we recommend as much RAM as possible
so you can split it up into the different VMs, and then the 10-core CPU might actually
make sense as well, and definitely be sure to get as much storage as you think you’ll
need.
Now moving onto video editing, if you’re working with basic 1080P clips, or fairly
simple 4K editing without using a lot of extra effects or LUTz, then the $2000 iMac will
actually get the job done decently well with its 6-core CPU and Radeon Pro 5300 graphics
card.
For you, get a 32GB of RAM kit below and add it to the existing 8gigs for a total of 40,
which is more than good enough, and be sure to get at least a 1TB SSD if you’re not
planning to use external drives.
And since every 2020 5K iMac comes with the T2 chip, you should be able to edit HEVC footage
pretty well!
But if you’re planning on taking video editing more seriously in the future, you might want
to future-proof your iMac by going for the $2300 model.
Now for high-end video editing, the most important thing is the graphics, so we recommend going
straight for the 5700 XT, which will be a great match for the 8-core CPU on the $2300
model.
We honestly believe that the 10-core CPU isn’t worth it for video editing, since it only
gives you around a 17% raw performance boost in terms of Geekbench 5 multi-core scores,
and that’s without factoring in cooling limitations.
We think the ONLY people who should upgrade to the 10-core CPU are those constantly working
with RAW footage, like 4K or 8K RAW.
And as for the RAM, 64GB should be more than good enough for video editing, and you should
probably get at least a 1TB SSD. And don’t forget about that 10 gigabit ethernet upgrade
if you think you might be connecting to a RAID storage server in the future.
So there you go guys, that’s my Buyer’s Guide for the 2020 5K iMac, so be sure to
use those RAM Kit links down below to save a bunch of money on RAM, and you can find
the 3-minute RAM upgrade Guide right over there, and click the circle above to subscribe.
And if this video helped you out, considering buying our merch down below as a way of saying
thank you! Thanks for watching, and we’ll see you in the next one!