[jrsharp70]

I have a choice between a 27 inch late 2013 3.2 GHz I five with eight gigs of RAM,

versus

2016 21.5 inch, 1.6 GHz with a 256 gig flash hard drive.

The 2013 is $200 cheaper. I know very little about Macs. Can someone with a good amount of experience give me some guidance?

[Ariel Babalao]

It's all depend on what you are planing to use the computer for.
If you plan to use Virtual Machine on the Mac and or plan to use resource hungry applications such as video editing application, gaming apps etc... then get the 2013.
But if you are just into office documents editing, browsing Internet and multimedia consumption, then 2016 is ok, with the addition that it's a future proof computer in terms of OS update.

[robertk328]

as long as the monitor size isn't a deal-breaker, the 21.5" because of the SSD.

[jrsharp70]

Wow... thanks. why is a 1.6 ghz processor in the 2016 not inferior to the 3.2 in the 2013? what if I told you that the 2013 is $600 and the 2016 is $800, would that change your thoughts?

[Ariel Babalao]

The numbers speak for themselves, 1.6ghz is inferior to 3.2ghz regardless to the year of production.
For the price, you are comparing at today's date a computer of 2013 to one of 2016, obviously the most recent one less powerful will cost that the oldest one, because it's not all about CPU, there is the SSD which is costly today, there is improvement in the overall hardware today.

[robertk328]

Geekbench scores:

27" Late-2013 model: https://browser.primatelabs.com/geekbench3/8099951

21.5 Late-2015 model: https://browser.primatelabs.com/v4/cpu/810849

Note the 2015 model doesn't mention SSD but that will be a huge difference in overall performance. Key is going to be what you plan to do with it. You could also get the 2013 model with the higher end processor and boot off an external SSD if you felt the need to do so. You could then use the internal spinner for storage of media (iTunes, iPhoto, etc.)

[jrsharp70]

Thank you for your input. I had a typo, the one with the 256 SSD was a 2016, not 2015

I got the 27 inch. It is amazing. The spinning hard disk really isn't that slow. I'll upgrade to an SSD if it ever gets annoying. But for now, it is simply amazing to look at. I haven't had a desktop computer since 2001, so this is just incredible.

[robertk328]

congrats on the new machine