Im feeling snarky so forgive me. Doesn’t everyone like to pay big bucks for lg raw file cameras and then upgrade to a new mac with high end graphics card and 16 gb ram with SSD Hd. Gee I’m glad to hear Im not alone. You already know the answer. The standard is 8gb ram and as fast a processor with as may cores as possible. Don’t get a windows box and lightroom, misery would miss your company.

One secret Ive learned is to drink a glass of wine while editing, the mac seems to get faster and finally waits for me. Don’t worry be happy. On to glass three.

Big RAW files take a certain amount of computer horsepower to process and external USB drives are very slow. I think Lightroom would be slow with your hardware, too.

That said, Aperture likes computer resources - processor, RAM and video card. So get the best of those that you can afford. Stay with internal (or now Thunderbolt) drives. SSD is nice, but probably not affordable in sizes that will really help.

Many get along well on a reasonably modern iMac. I’m happy with my 3 year old 8 core Mac Pro.

Bob

Roberts right about LR having the same problems on an older machine. All image programs have their issues to deal with. I like AP workflow and mine doesn’t crash anymore (going from 2 to 3 was bad). Ok I have had issues but always fixed after reading this web site and repairing the database. We Photograhers tax a cpu heavily.

Just getting a new processor is a big help and get at least 8gb Ram. Im on an older MBP and considering getting an SSD for a temp speed boost. A temp fix to put off the inevitable, I have to buy new.
Cheers

I am using a 3 year old MBP. One thing I do is use Automator to shut down all extra Apps that use resources. I have it on the dock next to Aperture. I also maxed out the RAM. The biggest help was replacing my optical drive with a SSD. I use the SSD for all my apps and store my libraries on the internal HD. That really sped things up. A lot cheaper than buying a new Mac.

It’s all about getting the data to the system so it can be processed … anything that slows that flow or creates a bottle neck, will have an adverse outcome on performance. Regardless of the software or OS used.

You can purchase the latest and greatest work station with the fastest, most efficient multi-core processors with a blazing fast graphics processor and as much RAM as you can throw at the unit … and still experience sluggish performance if the data you are accessing is coming from a slow throughput device … such as external USB …

Even FW800 (or USB3) can still bog down the flow with larger files. OTOH, if you can pick up a unit that has Thunderbolt capability and can either purchase Thunderbolt capable external drives … or … even use the new LaCie eSATA hub with eSATA externals … will go a long way to adding much more responsive performance … this of course in lieu of internal drives for the RAW files to reside …

Joseph,

What CPU (type, cores and speed) does your iMac run? Which video card?

Bob

I have been looking to upgrade my current MacBook Pro 2.66 (June 2009) that has a 500GB 7200RPM hard drive with 8GB DDR3 Ram. However word has it that Apple will be announcing new systems this coming June. Hoping beside the Thunderbolt that this new system (laptop) will also have USB 3 with the new Ivy Bridge from Intel in the MacBook Pros. So for now I plan to wait until June so I can see what is coming out.

Stu

If you deal with any kind of real volume of images, you will indeed run out of space for internal drives … especially with a MBP or iMac … my digital archive spans 14 years and over 12TB of drives … and I have another 20 years of images I haven’t digitized yet … so even with the ability of a Mac Pro to add more drives … there isn’t enough space for drives to get the job done … so externals are the only option … at this point …

Unfortunately, we are at the early stages of infancy for the Thunderbolt paradigm … it’a a bit early to offer conclusive advice as to the best possible path for the long term … there could be great strides in the near future that could offer considerable cost savings for larger volume usage … so my advice would be to not jump too far, too fast … spending too much just yet and work through the short term to see what transpires … it could be that we may see some big changes in long-term storage mediums and the passing of rotational magnetic storage devices (hard disk drives) in the very near future …

SSD’s are coming down in price and growing in volume .. other mediums are being explored … I would only add exactly what you will think you need to get by for a year or so … just to see how things play out … then we will have much more information to work with …

I think the “standard rule” of technology still applies: if you need it now, get it now, if not, wait.

A potentially less expensive, but still effective, storage strategy might be a smallish SSD for boot and scratch, an internal fast HDD for working storage and an external FW800 HHD(s) for archiving and less used files.

Keep current files being edited on the internal HDD and then move them to the FW800 drive(s) for continued access.

Bob

I’m using a 1,1 Mac Pro workstation with 2 dual core Xeons.

I have added RAM to 10Gb and an enterprise quality high speed HDD as the main drive - there are 3 others internally for storage, Time Machine etc. as well as a FW800 Drobo.

To be honest, it’s pretty quick with most things.

My new Fuji X-Pro 1 came with an awful program called Silkypix that is woefully slow on this machine - Aperture and Nik is many times faster (but won’t yet open the X-Pro 1 RAW files).

I’d say pretty much any modern Mac will be fine - I run it on an 11” Macbook Air with only 2Gb of RAM when I am on the road and it works fine on that.