where to buy a computer for basic recording / whats this mac worth, & can it still be upgraded?

sgosden

pretty sure I want a Mac as opposed to PC based, and looked into RAM requirements etc.

Is there somewhere good (other than the classifieds here) to get a second hand, or even refurbished computer ?

budget of around £500 - 600

guitarfishbay

If you want to go private eBay paid with PayPal, as then you have buyer protection if you buy something genuinely faulty.

spark240

How about a Mac mini?...get the late 2012 I think ...the are easiest to upgrade, but you can get some pretty loaded units for around £400 now, i7, 16G ram, 1TB HD or SSD.

wave100

I got a MBP a few months ago as a recording machine - late 2012 i5, 8 gig ram and a 250 meg flash drive. Cost about £550 and works pretty sweetly. One of the last (I believe) that you can update the memory or change the battery. 

darthed1981

I know you have already said Mac, but for that budget you could build yourself a kick ass windows or linux box that you could use for everything you want for at least five years, except hardcore gaming.

sgosden

spark240 said:

How about a Mac mini?...get the late 2012 I think ...the are easiest to upgrade, but you can get some pretty loaded units for around £400 now, i7, 16G ram, 1TB HD or SSD.

looking into them now, they seem pretty good bang for buck

sgosden

darthed1981 said:

I know you have already said Mac, but for that budget you could build yourself a kick ass windows or linux box that you could use for everything you want for at least five years, except hardcore gaming.

everything I want is just for recording, and maybe as a hub for music.

I use a computer 70% of my working day so don't have much of an urge to do much else at home, but recording has taken my fancy.

Main reason for mac is the guys in a few projects use macs and its just what I'm used to for this type of thing (all be it very limited "used to")

 

spark240

sgosden said:

spark240 said:

How about a Mac mini?...get the late 2012 I think ...the are easiest to upgrade, but you can get some pretty loaded units for around £400 now, i7, 16G ram, 1TB HD or SSD.

looking into them now, they seem pretty good bang for buck

Yeah, I may have slightly underestimated cost for i7, but even so still good value I think, mines been faultless though I do wish for the extra £££ I had SSD.

geetarguy85

I have a 2014 mac mini that's barely used up for sale, though contemplating removing it from sale actually... Let me know if you're interested though.

pintspiller

I got an i5 laptop for £130 via Ebay recently and it seems to handle the job ok.

sgosden

Girlfriends sister has said I can have her old iMac as she has no idea how to use it! I have no idea how much its worth (I'll buy it off her so don't want to mug her off).

With the current specs I'd want to upgrade the RAM, but not sure if parts are still available. Specs are;

iMac8.1

intel core 2 duo

1 processor @ 2.4 GHz

L2 cache: 6MB

Memory; 1 GB

Bus speed;  1.07 Ghz

Any guesses on its value, and if Ram upgrades are available? seems like there is space for them, its just how easy they are to get hold of!

spark240

£100 up They seem cheap on Ebay...£100 up...whats 1G the ram?.....that diddly squat?

sgosden

yeah ram is tiny, looks like there is 2 slots for it with capacity for 4gb each. question is if the upgrades are still available.

Danny1969

The RAM is still available it's not unique to an iMac .... Small door on very bottom of machine is where it normally is 

hard drive is also upgradable but not CPU or video