2011 imac 27 w/ SSD & LION

I (finally) ordered last saturday a 27" imac BTO with the SSD. MY FIRST MAC.
ETC 23rd of July (*gasp*)
Should I cancel the order and place it again to get Lion?
What is Apple's practice in this case? I don't want to be punished twice 1) waiting 6 weeks for SSD option and 2) having to pay $29.99 for Lion.
Any chance it will be uploaded already with Lion? (release date "July" is vague) - or can I get a free upgrade?

Many thanks!

I'm in the same boat you are. I have heard that its not just the SSD forcing the delay, but its waiting on Lion. I hope thats true.

xahhax said:

Should I cancel the order and place it again to get Lion?

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Come on dude. You're probably paying around $1800+ for this computer...and you're concerned about not getting a super cheap $29 OS upgrade for free!

In reality...since your ship date & the date for the release of Lion are very very close...if Apple follows what they've done historically...the computer will either ship with Lion already installed, or you will get a free upgrade.

AND look at it this way. If there's currently a 6-week shipping delay for iMac's with your configuration...if you cancel your current order...and wait until July to place your iMac order again after Lion is released....what if there's still a 6 week shipping delay. Then you won't get your new iMac until possibly September!

I say just stick with your current order...and see what happens. And if you end up having to pay $29 for Lion...so what...$29 bucks is nothing compared what you paid for the computer!

Food for thought,

- Nick

well, yes, i am paying $3000 for this computer, but this is not the reason to throw away $30 for something in principle i would be entitled to.
- if indeed the wait is Lion related and not SSD related, it will be shipped with it.
- if the wait is purely SSD related, you would think that the supply chain for those items (although how can they have shortages on those?) will be fixed by then and therefore, a BTO order placed end of july would not be another 6 weeks.

xahhax said:

well, yes, i am paying $3000 for this computer, but this is not the reason to throw away $30 for something in principle i would be entitled to.

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Do what you gotta do! But "stressing" over a very very inexpensive $29 OS upgrade is really being petty. Which by the way you're not entitled to, since as of your order date of early June...(when you ordered the computer)...OS 10.6 is/was the latest OS version.

If Apple was charging it's historical OS upgrade price of $129...then I would be more in agreement with delaying your purchase to get the OS upgrade for free. But when the OS upgrade ONLY costs $29...I wouldn't worry about it.

But as I mentioned...Apple is a really good company...and will probably ship your computer with Lion already installed or a free upgrade (if Lion is released in July).

xahhax said:

- if the wait is purely SSD related, you would think that the supply chain for those items (although how can they have shortages on those?) will be fixed by then and therefore, a BTO order placed end of july would not be another 6 weeks.

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If the delay in shipping is SSD related...you/we have absolutely no idea when that will be solved. Could be before the release of Lion...or it could be after. In any case...there will be a backlog of orders to fill.

That backlog could be 6 weeks or more by mid-July (your original shipping date)...so if you cancel your current order just to insure that you get a $29 OS upgrade for free...you're going to DEFINITELY delay getting your computer well past mid-July (just to save $29 bucks).

And trust me...Apple is NOT delaying the shipping of your iMac due to the release of Lion. If this was the case...then Apple would be delaying the shipping of ALL Macintosh computers. Believe me...this is certainly not the first time there has been a Mac OS upgrade...Apple DOES NOT delay the shipping of computers due to a pending OS upgrade release.

- Nick

Thank you. Let's see. I'd much prefer them moving the delivery date earlier and paying $29 indeed.
In any case, I was hoping for Lion to come with a 'SSD related' feature.
This is enabled in the new intel chipset and for instance you could imagine to have OS X manage automatically 'system & application->SSD' & 'data->HDD'. There were few rumors on this, but nothing on this?

xahhax said:

Thank you. Let's see. I'd much prefer them moving the delivery date earlier and paying $29 indeed.

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This is basically my main discussion point. If you could get your new iMac tomorrow (without Lion)...you would accept that deal in a heartbeat!

If you cancel your current order (just to insure getting the $29 Lion upgrade for free)...you're most definitely going to delay receiving your iMac even longer (probably at least 1-2 weeks). Instead of getting your iMac in mid-July (as it seems to be at the moment)...that would make it early August or later (especially if the SSD issue is not fully resolved).

So canceling your current order just to save $29 bucks (and delaying receiving your iMac till at least early August)...is not a good trade-off if you would prefer to get your new iMac as soon as possible.

And to be totally honest...there's no way I would wait 4-6 weeks just because of the SSD drive BTO option. Right now your iMac would ship in 1-2 days if you got a traditional HD. SSD drives are just wayyyy too expensive at the moment. In very little time SSD drives will most likely be half the price or lower.

So you're going to pay a ton of money for that SSD drive...AND you're going to have to wait a lot longer to get your new iMac. Personally I would cancel the order (or modify it) and get a traditional HD. Then you would have the computer by early next week. Then upgrade the iMac later on when SSD drives get less expensive.

Just my humble opinions,

- Nick

Hum, no, a little wait now for less wait later when booting etc
I have already a powerful PC (i7, 12gb/SSD), so I really do not need it NOW.
And SSD makes a big difference. Maybe not worth the price (I wish Apple had a 128gb only version)...but well worth the wait for sure
but please don't tempt me!!!

if only you could just buy a 3.4 i7 from the macstore (they have it here) and stuff the SSD inside yourself...

xahhax said:

...but please don't tempt me!!!

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Just trying to throw some ideas your way! I just wouldn't wait 4-6 weeks for a BTO SSD...when the same computer with a traditional HD would ship in 1-2 days.

Look at it this way:

- get the iMac by next week (if you ordered it with a traditional HD)
- or even get the iMac TOMORROW from your local Apple Store...if you have one near by (with a traditional HD)
- order yourself a 128gig SSD drive from OWC (macsales.com)...at a lower cost as well.
- upgrade the HD (SSD) yourself

Or do the SSD upgrade whenever you feel like it.

- Nick

from what I have seen it is quite an exercise to swap disks on iMac. I built my own PCs, but opening and iMac, nahhh...
...I do not want to spoil my 'Mac' experience from day one
come to think about it, yes, there are few products for which I would wait for a BTO for so long. Only did once before. For a german car..
anyway, I also ordered the 2gb video (well basically i maxed out the imac specs on my BTO)...and this they don't have in stock @ retail.

So will wait, hoping they are giving pessimistic/worst case dates

A very short comment, made many times before by the UK members — count yourself luck in the US.

As a general rule, what you pay for anything from Apple in USD, we get charged nearly the same in GBP.

Ian

IWT said:

A very short comment, made many times before by the UK members — count yourself luck in the US.

As a general rule, what you pay for anything from Apple in USD, we get charged nearly the same in GBP.

Ian

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Sorry mate, but I am not in the USA, living in Tokyo/Japan. I feel your pain.
It's always been like this in UK no?
1GBP=1EUR=1USD...

IWT said:

A very short comment, made many times before by the UK members — count yourself luck in the US.

As a general rule, what you pay for anything from Apple in USD, we get charged nearly the same in GBP.

Ian

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Hey - Apple is an American company (sort of) we should get some sort of break - after all - I pay here in the US about twice what I'd pay in the UK for a bottle of GlenLivet 25

we should be paying our apple in Chinese Yuan...

xahhax said:

we should be paying our apple in Chinese Yuan...

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If you take that logic - you'd be paying for about 75%* of products with Chinese currency. May as well make it the world currency - perhaps then China wouldn't work so hard to keep it undervalued.

*I made that percentage up

xahhax said:

from what I have seen it is quite an exercise to swap disks on iMac.

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Yes...it is not the easiest thing to swap a hard drive in one of the iMacs...but it certainly can be done...and many folks have done it. Plenty of DIY instructions & videos on the internet...especially You-Tube.

The most difficult part is removing the glass. But for someone who has built computers before...it would be no problem.

If you're ok with waiting...all's good.

- Nick

p.s. Here's some links regarding an SSD upgrade in a 27" iMac.

1st link...how to upgrade the HD in a newer Intel iMac (of course you would be upgrading with an SSD drive instead of a larger traditional HD):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3w6E2_XqaBw&feature=related

2nd link...boot-up time comparison (traditional HD vs. SSD) with some SSD install info:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CuEmPbixZTY