Dear WeatherCatters who are keeping an eye on Apple developments,
For many years, I have been running a refurbished early-2010 17" MacBook Pro.
https://support.apple.com/kb/sp621?locale=en_USUnfortunately, this computer wasn't particular well treated by its previous owner and finally it is showing signs of giving up the ghost. I would much prefer to buy a new computer to avoid these sorts of problems and would also like to get as much ram as possible. 16GB just doesn't cut it anymore.
Apple doesn't make that many computers that would meet that spec. Regular iMacs and MacBook Pros are limited to 32 GB. I'm not sure doubling my memory is sufficient. The iMac Pro certainly would meet the spec, but is extremely expensive - ditto for the Mac Pro. That leaves one candidate as a compromise between price and performance - the Mac mini:
https://www.apple.com/mac-mini/The options of 64 GB of ram and 1 TB SSD definitely bring up the price, but even with a 5K monitor it is substantially less than the iMac Pro. In fact you could buy 2 monitors and still be cheaper than the iMac Pro.
Of course getting a monitor that supports the full resolution of a Mac is another kettle of fish. Here is an article about it:
https://www.monitornerds.com/best-4k-and-5k-displays-for-mac/ If you want to use the Thunderbolt 3 (USB-C) adapter, you basically have no choice right now but the LG models sold at the Apple store:
https://www.apple.com/shop/product/HKN62LL/A/lg-ultrafine-5k-displayThat still leaves a problem about replacing my obsolete USB hubs to a model that supports USB 3. However, I'm hoping that shifting from Firewire 800 to USB 3 for my hard drives will be seamless
Do I seem to have my head around the basic problem? I'm hoping that I can make the leap from High Sierra to Mojave without too much suffering.
Any thoughts would be definitely appreciated!
Cheers, Edouard