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My Next Mac Mini

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Re: My Next Mac Mini

#351

Post by remir »

brandon272 wrote: post #324
remir wrote: post #258

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What Apple lacks is humility. Jobs even said people don't know what they want until "you showed it to them". So, I highly doubt that Apple will listen to what people want. I mean, Apple would make a killing with a new Mac Mini with better spec, a Macbook Air with better screen res, couple of USB-C ports, a 24" iMac instead of 21, etc... But Apple won't do it because that would be listening to people, and this is some…

It's interesting... unless my memory is failing me, you never hear Apple say anything to the effect of, "We listened to our customers, so we decided to _____" I mean, I agree with what Jobs said when he suggested that customers expect Apple to innovate and curate and make it's own decisions about what products it develops. But I think you can also take that too far, especially when your customers are screaming at you…

Yep, even with stuff like the antennagate, they never truly recognized their mistake ("you're holding it wrong!"). Too proud. Same thing with the "touch disease" on the iPhone 6.

Re: My Next Mac Mini

#352

Post by Shorel »

caleblloyd wrote: post #5

The NUC has full Linux support out of the box. You can configure them with 16GB of RAM and a 256GB-512GB SSD for $400-$500, especially if you go for the old model (Gen 6 Skylake instead of Gen 7 Kaby Lake, not much has changed)

Also, Kodi runs great in Ubuntu.

Re: My Next Mac Mini

#353

Post by FussyZeus »

fauigerzigerk wrote: post #164
FussyZeus wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is our small shop, revenues are something like 600% iOS/Android. We make hardly anything on the Play Store because (and you can call this classist if you want, but it's what my data tells me) Android users don't spend money. Now that could be because they don't have it, because they don't see value in software, whatever but the point is if you're an app developer and you want to make money, you go to Appl…

Nothing wrong with that. I'm sure there are many other companies like yours. I doubt that many profitable companies will abandon iOS development just because Mac hardware is a bit dusted or a bit overpriced at this point. But where is the excitement? Where are the growth opportunities? Where's the space for experimentation? Where are things moving? Once all the wealthy people on this planet have their iPhones and the…

I mean, depends on the company. I get what you're saying but for a smaller company looking for exposure to a wide audience with spending money, the data tells us iOS is pretty much the best balance of relatively low introductory cost versus return on that investment. Android has a lower cost still but also a much lower return as I said, even though we have more users, our revenue stream is 6-7 fold on iOS.

Maybe iOS isn't the new platform, but it's certainly a good place to start. Still miles ahead of the next few options.

Re: My Next Mac Mini

#354

Post by OverThere »

nkkollaw wrote: post #335
OverThere wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm still disappointed by no Cinema Display and Apple leaving the display business. I'm baffled by this. Touchbar is innovative to some degree, but I usually connect my Macbook Pro to a bigger display and close it—making touchbar useless. So disappointed by Apple lately...

It's useless even with the display open. I bet most people don't ever use it after the first week.

hahah this might be true.

For me, constantly looking down at the keyboard somehow doesn't feel natural. I prefer to keep my eyes on the screen.

Re: My Next Mac Mini

#355

Post by rz2k »

jsjohnst wrote: post #345
rz2k wrote: post #196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I see that active adapters that support HDMI 2.0 are about $25 now. Apple's $50 multiport adapter is only HDMI 1.4b, I suppose because it only handles the built in USB-C alternate mode.

Yep! That's exactly why. USB-C alternate mode only supports DisplayPort 1.3 and HDMI 1.4b. You'll need an active adapter like you mentioned. Not surprisingly, Apple doesn't sell them, that would be to useful. For future readers, here's one as an example: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01FIVSC6Y/

Note that one actually says it is not compatible with the new 2016 MacBook Pro.

Re: My Next Mac Mini

#356

Post by derefr »

mattnewton wrote: post #216
fowlerpower wrote: post #157

Someone here needs to explain it to me because I just don't understand. We have the largest computer company in the world, a shit load of people work there, supposedly smart people. Yet they can't put together a refresh of many of their desktop machines. Why the fuck not? What do all those people getting paid all that money do all day? I can only imagine the conversations, "it takes years it has to be super innovativ…

As an apple alumnus, I believe it has to do with a culture of "laser focus" There is an internal course called "what makes apple apple" that you can take, but it's not necessary to pick up one of the key pieces of culture: the importance of saying No to most things. Apple has built their reputation on high quality. To continue to deliver takes immense effort, even for incremental programs, and often almost if the tal…

> It isn't a hobby for them.

Can you explain what exactly was meant (in an internal-politics sense) back when the Apple TV was referred to in each keynote that mentioned it as a "hobby project"?

Re: My Next Mac Mini

#357

Post by tinus_hn »

donatj wrote: post #174
tinus_hn wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The touchbar also increases security so it's not useless even if you close the laptop.

How's that?

The touchbar is similar to an iOS device so it is a separate computing device that has a small attack surface so it is difficult to hack.

It for instance controls the camera, so without hacking the touchbar it is impossible to use the camera without the light turning on.

It also controls the fingerprint reader in a way that makes it hard to get the secrets that are protected by the fingerprint without actually providing the fingerprint.

Re: My Next Mac Mini

#358

Post by derefr »

intrasight wrote: post #162
fowlerpower wrote: post #157

Someone here needs to explain it to me because I just don't understand. We have the largest computer company in the world, a shit load of people work there, supposedly smart people. Yet they can't put together a refresh of many of their desktop machines. Why the fuck not? What do all those people getting paid all that money do all day? I can only imagine the conversations, "it takes years it has to be super innovativ…

I think what you're missing is that Apple pursues high-margin endeavors, and competing with a $300 NUC isn't going to be a high-margin business. Some easy money for Apple would be to sell OS licenses for Intel NUCs.

There are some little things a Mac Mini has that you can't get by just (essentially) Hackintoshing a NUC.

For example, Apple's custom UEFI, plus a Bluetooth controller that boots in HID mode and loads configured pairings from NVRAM, allows you to "hold down [key combination] at boot" on your Mac Mini's Bluetooth keyboard.

Or the fact that all the desktop Mac models have internal speakers (and not just the motherboard PC speaker kind) and internal microphones, so OSX can guarantee it always has those devices available to use to play system event notification sounds, or for Siri, or for FaceTime, or for visual-impairment accessibility tooling, etc.

Or the fact that you can still plug FireWire or DisplayPort devices into a Mac Mini through its Thunderbolt port (with a passive adapter to map the pins) and the motherboard will happily accept the device; whereas no PC would have any idea what to do with those wire protocols, even if you plugged them into the port of an explicit Thunderbolt PCIe card you bought.

If you could get these things from a NUC, then sure, there'd be no point in the Mac Mini.

Re: My Next Mac Mini

#359

Post by cbsmith »

slrz wrote: post #317
cbsmith wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You mean the way my VPN software needs to have a backdoor in it just so that the touchbar keeps working while I'm connected? ;-)

Can you explain?

The tool bar is modeled as a separate computer, that talks to the laptop not over USB, but a network interface.

That actually opens up a huge can of worms, as networking as a host of security issues. One example is with a VPN connection. For obvious security reasons, when a lot of VPNs are active, they force all networking to flow through them. That is problematic, because the remote side has no way to route the toolbar traffic back to it.

So, VPN software is now busily building out exceptions to their routing rules. Don't worry, I'm sure this won't lead to bugs or future security holes...

Re: My Next Mac Mini

#360

Post by beautifulfreak »

jdietrich wrote: post #321
beautifulfreak wrote: post #316

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"It is in fact a quite mainstream machine, nothing too special about it." The mini introduced a form factor that has since been emulated so often that it seems less special than it was at first, but it was something new. Small computers extant back then were larger than the mini. Most were based on the Mini ITX motherboard design, introduced in 2001, and all of them looked like boxen (ugly). The mini's dimensions gav…

The Mac Mini was special over a decade ago. It's now just commodity hardware in an aluminium unibody. There are a multitude of competing machines from Intel, Gigabyte, Asus, Zotac and others. There is absolutely no reason why Apple couldn't redesign the Mac Mini chassis to take an industry-standard NUC motherboard and offer a refresh every 12 months. I won't buy Apple hardware any more because I don't want to be lock…

I actually feel the same way. I wanted to buy a Mini in 2014, to upgrade from a 2012 model, but the new one was no better than the one I had, at least not in the ways that were important to me. My comment was about the psychology of Apple. I do wonder if their engineers don't see Apple computers as containers, as boxes. They abandoned the cheese grater Mac Pros, the most box-like in design (and best for users). Maybe Jonny Ive et al resist the slippery slope of their computers being seen as commodities. There could be wisdom in that. The Apple brand relies on the perception of design virtuosity. But I agree, they should have had more in the pipeline. Let's hope they get back to the drawing board and make up for their neglect.
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