Which OS you guys recommend???

[martinresi]

Hi, I'm new to this forum. I have an iMac with OS X Capitan. I think it's a 2015 model but i'm not sure. When I click on about this mac it doesn't say. and when I click on support > specifications it says Safari can't open the page. My thoughts are maybe it's time to upgrade the OS. I'm about to start a very big video editing project and I think it would be wise to decide this before I start. Right now I'm not sure whether to use the USB 3.0 or 3.1 cable for my project hard drive because I don't know how to find out what my mac supports. I also have no idea what OS to upgrade to (and if I should at all) because there seems to be a lot of mixed info and I'm not even really sure what year my mac is. Any advice or help is appreciated.

I switched from PC to Mac in 2011 and I've been so impressed since. I still use my Macbook Pro from 2011. I really can't believe it's lasted this long! I've done so many huge video projects on both my 2011 macbook and 2015 (maybe) iMac with Final Cut Pro and I've been so happy with the performance, reliability and what I can do. Neither apple machine has ever let me down while PCs and Microsoft have continued to frustrate me to no end.

Thanks!
Martin

 

[krs]

Werally need to know what the specific model of iMac is that you have to advise on the macOS.
Look under "About This Mac" and then click on "System Report"
The "Hardware Overview" should provide the required information.

 

[martinresi]

That got me a bunch of info thank you krs!

Model Name: iMac
Model Identifier: iMac17,1
Processor Name: Intel Core i7
Processor Speed: 4 GHz
Number of Processors: 1
Total Number of Cores: 4
L2 Cache (per Core): 256 KB
L3 Cache: 8 MB
Memory: 8 GB
Boot ROM Version: IM171.0151.B00
SMC Version (system): 2.34f2

 

[krs]

OK - You have a iMac (Retina 5K, 27-inch, Late 2015)

You could upgrade to the latest macOS, I will let others comment on that since I'm only on Mojave myself.
But I would at least upgrade the RAM

 

[chscag]

A lot depends on what type of drive is in your 2015 iMac. If it's a Fusion drive (combo HDD and small SSD) I would not upgrade past High Sierra. If your machine has a pure SSD, then you can go to the latest version of macOS Catalina.

The reason is that once you upgrade to Mojave, that will cause your drive to be reformatted to APFS from HFS+. APFS is designed for SSDs although it will work on any drive. A spinning HDD or combo drive (Fusion) will be stressed and likely run slower than if left at HFS+.

 

[martinresi]

Oh my gosh thank you so much!!!! I will upgrade RAM right away I did that to my old 2011 macbook and it made such a difference

Here's my HD info do you know if I have Full SSD or hybrid? I'm guessing I have the Hybrid version

Macintosh HD:
Available: 1.84 TB (1,841,702,481,920 bytes)
Capacity: 2.11 TB (2,114,672,656,384 bytes)
Mount Point: /
File System: Journaled HFS+
Writable: Yes
Ignore Ownership: No
BSD Name: disk2
Volume UUID: F5F46DEC-024F-3974-8167-86DBDB2EFDD2
Logical Volume:
Revertible: No
Encrypted: No
LV UUID: A4D2D4AA-FFEF-4B5E-9DDC-39B7122DF9BC
Logical Volume Group:
Name: Macintosh HD
Size: 2.12 TB (2,120,528,027,648 bytes)
Free Space: 115 KB (114,688 bytes)
LVG UUID: AFFEAE9B-F33C-4AD0-AD89-EFB1D4903F46


Physical Volumes:

disk1s2:
Device Name: APPLE SSD SM0128G
Media Name: APPLE SSD SM0128G Media
Size: 120.99 GB (120,988,852,224 bytes)
Medium Type: SSD
Protocol: PCI
Internal: Yes
Partition Map Type: GPT (GUID Partition Table)
Status: Online
S.M.A.R.T. Status: Verified
PV UUID: 2B97C3A4-6549-4F3B-9CA4-8E7D7935313C

disk0s2:
Device Name: APPLE HDD ST2000DM001
Media Name: APPLE HDD ST2000DM001 Media
Size: 2 TB (1,999,539,175,424 bytes)
Medium Type: Rotational
Protocol: SATA
Internal: Yes
Partition Map Type: GPT (GUID Partition Table)
Status: Online
S.M.A.R.T. Status: Verified
PV UUID: E0ADF7EA-D4AD-4F96-B3AB-93E9CCAA48C8

 

[chscag]

Yes, you have a Fusion drive. Combo 2TB HDD and a 128GB SSD. I recommend going to High Sierra and leave it there. As we stated, upgrading to Mojave will reformat the drive(s) to APFS and can cause slow downs and other problems for the drive.

 

[martinresi]

High Sierra it is thank you so much! One last thing are my USB ports 3.0 or 3.1? My new hard drive includes both cables

 

[chscag]

Your USB ports are 3.0. Your iMac also has two Thunderbolt 2 ports.

The 2107 iMacs and later came with Thunderbolt 3 ports which also take the USB-C connection.

 

[krs]

What struck me when reading through the hard drive information is:

Name: Macintosh HD
Size: 2.12 TB (2,120,528,027,648 bytes)
Free Space: 115 KB (114,688 bytes)

Only 115 KB of free space on a 2TB drive?
Am I reading this wrong because it's a Fusion drive?

Besides the RAM upgrade, that small amount of free disk space should be addressed.

 

[MacInWin]

Good catch, krs! That little space would definitely hammer performance overall. I'm surprised the system is not complaining already.

 

[martinresi]

I hope that's not true lol. when I right click on mac hd on the desktop is says Capacity 2.11 TB Available: 1.84 TB

 

[martinresi]

 

[martinresi]

Thanks again for taking the time to help! When using hard drives for video editing I've been paying extra for the LaCies because they've been very reliable for me so far, though people say WD or Seagate would probably be just as good as far as reliability. I don't care about having to format them. The LaCie drive I just bought is a 7200 8T usb. I don't believe it has thunderbolt. I decided against SSD externals because the size is more important than speed, but if Thunderbolt 2 is 4x the speed of USB 3.0 should I be buying drives with thunderbolt connections? Or is the 7200 HD speed a bottleneck. I know this post is about OS, maybe I should search the forum or start a new post but if anyone has recommendations for external HDs for video editing on a Late 2015 iMac I'd love to hear suggestions

 

[MacInWin]

Wonder why the other report was so low? Maybe it has something to do with the Fusion part of the drive? It could be it is reporting the partition size and there is a small space taken up for the fusion?

 

[martinresi]

Yea I suppose that's what it is. The SSD part is so small compared to the SATA part it probably fills up the SSD first

 

[chscag]

Wonder why the other report was so low? Maybe it has something to do with the Fusion part of the drive? It could be it is reporting the partition size and there is a small space taken up for the fusion?

Yeah, that is a strange way of reporting it. It appears that it's talking about the EFI partition where the Fusion takes place. Still, it's certainly confusing.

We know it's wrong because there would be no way that drive could function with that small a space left.

Or, it could be reporting the amount of space that remains on the SSD?

 

[patrickynz]

My recommendation is Mojave as I am using it on my MBP 2013 Late. For previous versions, you may found out some of the apps has to run on higher macOS version.

 

[Rod]

My recommendation is Mojave as I am using it on my MBP 2013 Late. For previous versions, you may found out some of the apps has to run on higher macOS version.

patrickynz, thank you for your well intended input but please read all of the preceding posts before making suggestions. If you read post #5 you will understand why martinresi has been advised to stay at High Sierra. I do agree that Mojave was a great macOS but the reformatting of the drive to APFS is problematic for fusion drives.

 

[Howard Brazee]

I bought an external SSD drive and installed Mojave on it so that I can boot to it and run one program that is not yet finished being converted to 64-bit. My iMac's main drive is running Catalina. You could try this out to have two different Mac-OS versions on your computer. My SSD came with a Thunderbolt 3 cable and a USB cable. As my late 2013 iMac has Thunderbolt 1, I use the SSD.

My goal is to switch to an Arm iMac, provided that program I need gets converted, but the writer has been working on it for over a year.