iMac upgrade Mid 2010

[Greg55]

Hey everyone been a long time since I’ve been, looking for a little help and advice. I have a iMac 21.5” mid 2010 model that I bought new myself and it has been flawless every step of the way, actually it still looks mint condition as I take really good care of it. It still runs fine but I’m wanting to upgrade it to a solid state drive and more ram. Currently it has the i3 processor and 4gb ram and I’m thinking a 250 or 500 drive, not sure but will have to check that one. Like I say I would like to upgrade it and run the latest OS as possible, so any advice on a drive and would like to get as much ram upgrade as possible also. Thanks in advance.

[chscag]

The maximum memory your machine can take is 16GB and the highest version of macOS you can install is High Sierra 10.13.6.

If you replace the drive in that machine with a SSD or another hard drive, you'll need a thermal bypass cable to bypass the hard drive heat sensor. Without that cable, the fans in the iMac will go full RPM. You can get a complete update kit from OWC (Mac Sales) Apple Mac Upgrades - RAM, SSD Flash, External Drives and More.

[Greg55]

The maximum memory your machine can take is 16GB and the highest version of macOS you can install is High Sierra 10.13.6.

If you replace the drive in that machine with a SSD or another hard drive, you'll need a thermal bypass cable to bypass the hard drive heat sensor. Without that cable, the fans in the iMac will go full RPM. You can get a complete update kit from OWC (Mac Sales) Apple Mac Upgrades - RAM, SSD Flash, External Drives and More.

Thanks, so is something that I could do on my own or is it too complicated? Should I plan on taking it to a service center?


Sent from my iPhone using Mac-Forums

[chscag]

Judge for yourself if it's something you can do. The memory is easy, however, replacing the drive requires disassembling the machine. The folks at iFixit have instructions. Take a look at them: iFixit: The Free Repair Manual

Remember, you will also need that thermal sensor bypass cable we mentioned above.