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Hard drive question on "new" iMac

Hi, I just purchased a "New" iMac from Amazon (A renewed or refurbished) iMac for my Mom to replace the one that just died on her. I just finished setting it up and migrated all the stuff from the old iMac to the new one using migration assistant and the time machine backup. After I was finished I was a little puzzled about the hard drive and the space available. When I purchased this iMac (2017 model) on Amazon, the description said it had 8GB Ram and a 1 TB HDD. After the migration, I realized there was just 190GB free space, which I thought was low. After looking it appears the Hard drive is only a 250 GB drive and not 1 TB. Unless I'm missing something. For what she'll need the computer for, it's plenty of space and the fact that it came with 16GB of RAM instead of the 8GB it said, I guess that's a bit of a wash. But I'm a little confused when I used Disk Utility and it shows 2 drives. One labels Macintosh HD and the other Untitled - Data. Why would that be? Also it shows in the upper right corner in the screen shot I'm attaching, it says 250.69 GB shared by 5 volumes. Is that normal? I'm attaching a few other screen shots showing the drive/computer info. Any thoughts on this, I'd appreciate it. Computer seems pretty nice so far, fast and responsive.





[Image Edited by Moderator to Remove Serial Number]

iMac Line (2012 and Later)

Posted on Feb 11, 2022 11:56 PM

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Feb 12, 2022 12:46 PM

OK, your iMac was originally available in 4 different storage options:


  • 1 TB HDD
  • 1TB Fusion drive w/24GB SSD
  • 256 GB SSD
  • 512 GB SSD


I think it most likely has an original 256GB SSD. (If it were somehow a split 1TB Fusion drive you would only be seeing a 24GB SSD.)


For reference, here is a complete rundown on your model --> Apple iMac 21.5-Inch "Core i5" 3.0 (4K, Mid-2017) Specs


I believe there's nothing to worry about here unless you're concerned about having paid for a 1TB HDD but "only" got a 256GB SSD ... although having 16GB RAM instead of 8GB is a real blessing.


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13 replies
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Feb 12, 2022 12:46 PM in response to Steve Scherf1

OK, your iMac was originally available in 4 different storage options:


  • 1 TB HDD
  • 1TB Fusion drive w/24GB SSD
  • 256 GB SSD
  • 512 GB SSD


I think it most likely has an original 256GB SSD. (If it were somehow a split 1TB Fusion drive you would only be seeing a 24GB SSD.)


For reference, here is a complete rundown on your model --> Apple iMac 21.5-Inch "Core i5" 3.0 (4K, Mid-2017) Specs


I believe there's nothing to worry about here unless you're concerned about having paid for a 1TB HDD but "only" got a 256GB SSD ... although having 16GB RAM instead of 8GB is a real blessing.


Feb 12, 2022 12:57 AM in response to Steve Scherf1

The unit appears to have / had a Fusion Drive that no longer is seen as one.


That would explain the smaller SSD; another unknown larger storage is the

other portion, usually a rotational hard drive accessed through the SSD drive.


So something happened to the Fusion drive to make it appear broken.

I've never had a Mac with one of those, it's a hybrid idea where the

heavy lifting is done by the SSD & the HDD helps supply bulk storage.


What needs to be done, is try and figure how to re-enable the Fusion

connection between the smaller SSD and larger Storage hard drive.


The specs seemed a bit high for such an uncharacteristically small drive.

Just looked up the Apple Support article. This may apply..


..I did not think that I had it bookmarked; but did.

If your model checks out as one with Split Fusion drive:


• How to fix a split Fusion Drive - Apple Support

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT207584


"IF your Fusion Drive appears as two drives instead of one in the Finder,

it's no longer working as a Fusion Drive. Here's how to fix it."


[The instructions tell how to test and see what your Mac has

and now to fix the problem to restore the missing portion.]

To find out what may be missing, since the serial number didn't work to

look up the iMac, was all the other specs you wrote. Everymac was one

of two sites with an ultimate lookup; & your model shows with a Fusion.


Some of those with a 1-TB (5400/7200-RPM) hard drive, do not use a SSD.

So that appears to be the reason for two hard drive icons; but, one is not

at all there. (Evidence suggests a Fusion drive; partially disconnected.)


..Edited: to include other found information on Fusion drive..


Feb 12, 2022 10:16 AM in response to MartinR

..MartinR:


The remaining screenshot, that hosts 'did not remove' due to Serial number,

still shows two drive names. But uncharacteristically, both same capacity.

[And missing with actual drive report, are progressive partition numbers.]


And both the same size. The iMac shipped with larger drives;

A Fusion, once broken, would not find its rotational portion.


He could get and run DriveDx, to see exactly what the item is; or is not.

https://binaryfruit.com/drivedx


And an ASC instructional User tip: "How to use DriveDx"

https://discussions.apple.com/docs/DOC-250004005

That utility has 'several free-trial runs' before it shuts down.


The link I'd posted previously, could help determine HDD/Fusion status.

That version of higher CPU iMac normally has larger storage stock drives.


But whatever the thread author decides; I just provided the means

for him to check the unit. [With or w/o Command-line instructions.]


..Anyway, didn't help the entire image was removed due to a Serial Number.

I'd checked that; and there was nothing in three SN report databases, on it..


Did you also check the earlier thread where this matter was discussed?

[Any Time Machine may still be relevant if that contained a Fusion from SSD.]


PS: A notification from Martin arrived, but not from Steve!

I see both in ASC but not from email I usually get.


Feb 12, 2022 9:54 AM in response to K Shaffer

The Disk Utility screenshot looks normal to me. So does the System Information screenshot.


I'm not convinced it's a split Fusion drive. It appears to be just a 250GB SSD. (I don't believe Apple's fusion drives ever had more than a 128GB SSD flash storage section.)


Steve Scherf1 - Open Disk Utility again. Then in the menu strip, select View > Show All Devices. The left pane in Disk Utility should then look something like this:


You can also select the top level device in Disk Utility (in my example APPLE HDD ST1000DM003 Media) and Disk Utility will show you what the entire storage device capacity is.


Please post a screenshot for comparison.


Normally the APFS container has two Volumes that are illustrated as "disks:" Macintosh HD and Macintosh HD - Data. You may have renamed them (knowingly or not).

Feb 12, 2022 10:11 AM in response to MartinR

When your system drive is formatted as APFS, macOS creates an APFS Container and by default the Container is the entire disk regardless of whether it's an SSD or an HDD. And when you install macOS, the installer creates 5 Volumes inside the Container, only 2 of which are normally visible: Macintosh HD and Macintosh HD - Data. The other 3 are hidden and are used for for recovery and system use.


Macintosh HD is a Volume that contains the macOS system. It's read only and can only be modified by Apple (through installation of macOS or a macOS update such as a Security Update).


Macintosh HD - Data is also a Volume and it's the one you can write to. It contains user-installed applications as well as all user data.


macOS does some magic behind the scenes to link Macintosh HD and Macintosh HD - Data so they appear to be a single "disk" called Macintosh HD in the Finder.

Feb 12, 2022 11:11 AM in response to MartinR

Thanks for all the helpful info guys! I'm inclined to leave it as is, I guess. Seems to be running good, and my Mom isn't going to use it a lot. Mostly email, FaceTime. My wife and I will use it when we visit to surf the web and play some games on Facebook. So not doing anything intense on it like Photoshop or something like that.


The Overview of the iMac is: iMac (Retina 4K, 21.5-inch, 2017)


Hardware overview: Model name: iMac

Model Identifier: iMac18,2

Processor Name: Quad-Core Intel Core i5

Processor Speed: 3GHz

Number of Processors: 1

Total number of cores: 4


Feb 12, 2022 1:10 PM in response to MartinR

Martin, thank you so much for all the help and looking into this for me! I really appreciate it! I did send a message to the seller via Amazon, asking why the description and actual computer are different. Maybe they can give me some money off the price?? Doesn't hurt to ask, right!? I am happy I got double the RAM, but would also have liked the bigger drive....but I don't think that will really be an issue for what the computer will be used for. Thanks again!!


Steve

Hard drive question on "new" iMac

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