Recommended Mac Desktop Hardware

Northwestern Information Technology (IT) establishes minimum hardware guidelines to assist in purchasing a computer for use at Northwestern. Check with your individual school for additional requirements.

Desktop — Minimum

Expect to use the computer for basic productivity, running multiple applications such as e-mail, web browsing, word processing, music and video players, and photo organization.

Category Description
Model Mac Mini
Processor Intel® Core™ i5 or Apple M1 Processor
Memory 8GB
Storage 256GB Solid state disk (SSD)
Graphics Integrated graphics
Network Gigabit Ethernet, 802.11ac (or higher), Bluetooth 4.0
Operating system Mac OS X 10.15 Catalina (or higher)
Warranty AppleCare Protection Plan

 

Desktop — Power User

In addition to the tasks above, expect to resource intensive programs for audio/video editing, graphic design, running multiple operating systems, storing large multimedia files and playing games.

Category Description
Model iMac with Retina 5K
Processor Intel® Core™ i7 or Apple M1 Max processor
Memory 16GB
Storage 1TB Solid state disk (SSD)
Graphics AMD Radeon R9 M290x with 4GB of GDDR5 memory
Network Gigabit Ethernet, 802.11ac (or higher), Bluetooth 4.0
Operating system Mac OS X 10.15 Catalina (or higher)
Warranty AppleCare Protection Plan

 

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Details

Article ID: 2042
Created
Thu 12/1/22 12:54 PM
Modified
Tue 12/13/22 11:02 AM