make an upgradable iMac...

http://www.pcpro.co.uk/reviews/desktops ... entre-m90z

Looks interesting, especially the interchangeable foot, a hinge, a height adjustable stand or a telescopic wall bracket...

Looks good.

It's the first all-in-one I've seen that I might actually want.

Apple won’t do this. You can upgrade the RAM and HD, but that’s it. The iMac is an appliance (pretty much a console in that respect), and not for the geeky internal fiddling that some like. The iMac target audience is not someone who likes to tinker.

Funnily enough I couldnt see businesses upgrading these Lenovo's either. I used to manage procurement as part of a previous role and as a rule of thumb most PC's (whether upgradable or not) would be replaced within 5 years. The only upgrade ever carried out was a bit more RAM.

The funny thing is that I bought mine with exactly that reasoning. I wanted machines that will last me till I need to replace in several years time.

It looks like sh*t and it's no more upgradeable than an iMac anyway is it?

It says the CPU is fixed but the HDD & memory can be upgraded. Isn't that the same as the iMac?? Or can you not do the HDDs in an iMac?

Whilst it is true, that the average PC, be it home or business rarely gets upgraded, it isn't unknown, that the hard drive, optical drive or the mainboard will fail during the machines lifetime. Especially if they are in a dusty environment - the old slot-loading DVD drives were the worst, a friend of mine is a heavy smoker and his slot loaders used to last about 9-13 months, before they would get too gunged up to work!

Being able to replace those items, on site, with no special tools is really helpful for the standard tech / sys admin. Slapping in a new hard drive, in seconds, and letting it rebuild itself from an image on a server is a lot easier and than having to dissect an iMac, or having to send it off to an Apple Service Centre...

Edit:


How many different stand formats does the iMac have? There is the standard hinge, but that's it. The Lenovo has the standard hinge, the wall mounting telecoping arm and the height adjustable foot.


You can do the HDDs on the iMac, but you either need to dismantle half the machine (breaking the warranty) or send it off to an Apple Service Centre (if there isn't an Apple Store in the area).

If it is like Lenovo's other devices, you unclip the back and unclip the hard drive and clip the new one in... That is a lot quicker and easier than on an iMac.

For a company installing hundreds of these, that is a good argument to go with them, because, no matter how reliable a manufacturer's products are, some will, inevitably fail. If you can replace the faulty part in 30 seconds on site, as opposed to 15-20 minutes, or sending it away to be repaired, that makes a huge difference in the TCO of the product.

Over the years, I've been very lucky, I've lost 1 hard drive and killed one processor, whilst upgrading its cooler. I've had to replace 2 DVD writers, other than that, from the 15 or so computers I've owned, none have died prematurely on me. But we had a delivery of 60 Compaq laptops, back in the 90s, with an 90% failure rate (either dead on arrival or failing within 1 month), even though Compaq won the Computer Shopper reliability award that year, with a reliability rating of over 98%... We just got a faulty batch.

Well my home is smoke free and so should be fine for the duration. I also keep back ups so that should eliminate any problems.

Good for you.

Not many do though. I have altered my back ups to a time when it can be done efficiently. I am still looking to improve it.

Ironically the first G5 iMacs were a lot more upgradeable (with Apples blessing) than any of the subsequent models. You could even source a replacement display from Apple as a user replaceable part. Then Steve stuck his oar in and decided users were too stupid to be allowed near anything other than the RAM.

But to be honest he is right on that score. The vast majority of users would not be capable doing even that. Unless you have programs that have to be at the cutting edge you can cope with an older mac so do not need to upgrade as often.