I am trying to help him choose between a used Mid-2010 27" iMac that has a 2.93GHz Arrandale Core i7 and a 256GB SSD and a stock refurb Mid-2011 27".

TLDR; yes, it is possible to add an SSD to a 2011 27" iMac without going through too much hoopla. Between everyone having issues finding parts, non-workable guides (due to parts), and general ...

At $2699, it might be expensive, but the 27-inch iMac we customized with a 3.4GHz Core i7 quad-core processor and a 256GB SSD is the fastest Mac weu2019ve tested to date.

21.5-inch 2.7GHz Core i5 iMac with SSD (Mid 2011): Speedmark 6.5 scores Longer bars are better. Blue bars in italics represent reference systems.

iFixit recommends adding a smaller, cheaper SSD and using that as your boot drive while using your HDD for media files and things of the like. Hard to go against that advice. [iFixit] ...

The iMac Mid 2011 Dual Hard Drive Kit ($69.95) is available for both the 21.5-inch and 27-inch models and comes with a Custom SATA power cable, SATA data cable, custom-cut 3M VHB double-sided ...

But as several readers have noted, there is another way to add an SSD to your Mac: you can keep your old hard drive, and instead replace the Mac’s CD/DVD optical drive, also known as a SuperDrive.

In both videos, the mid-range iMac Pro with a 10-core 3.0GHz Intel Xeon processor recorded a multi-core score of just over 37,400, which is up to 45 percent faster than the high-end 2013 Mac Pro's ...