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My Next Mac Mini

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Re: My Next Mac Mini

#91

Post by zymhan »

mynegation wrote: post #56
zymhan wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah what the hell, how can you write a tech blog complaining about a product if you don't perform even the most basic of system maintenance. Or, if you are doing maintenance, why not explain what you are doing? Also, can't a Mac Mini that old be upgraded with a 2.5" SSD and more RAM?

It would be a fair criticism if cards were not so obviously stacked against me, the end user and maintainer. New versions of software are written for new and more powerful hardware. I don't know about Mac mini specifically, but it is incredibly hard or even impossible to upgrade Apple products with new hardware.

If you can make a Mac Mini into an HTPC, you can follow some Youtube videos to replace a Hard Disk and RAM. It's just a few screws and a single cable.

Re: My Next Mac Mini

#92

Post by srj »

rwmj wrote: post #12
Marazan wrote: post #3

Apple's attitude to the Mac mini truly confuses me. Many years ago I was interested in getting one for eithet iPhone development or as a media pc but every time I looked they kept seeming to jack the price or downgrade the spec (relatively speaking).

TBH I've never understood what Apple gets out of selling the Mac Mini. It cannibalizes their own low-end laptops/desktops, and at the same time must be quite a marginal product mainly sold to a small number of hackers who probably put Linux on them.

If you already have an expensive IPS monitor which Mac do you buy to do your design work? There's the old mini and then the really pricey trashcan Mac.

Re: My Next Mac Mini

#93

Post by labrador »

scribu wrote: post #85
labrador wrote: post #80

I don't understand, since Apple has so much money, why they don't put some of it into the Mac line. It seems short-sighted.

I think the limiting factor is not money, but mental bandwidth. Even if they could just go out and buy a whole extra product team that's up to their standards, they would still need constant attention from the leadership to be successful.

It may be possible to turn the PC OP found into a hackintosh. There's nothing preventing Apple from taking that machine and making macOS run on it. I can't imagine they'd need a lot of people to do that.

Re: My Next Mac Mini

#95

Post by _ph_ »

mobiletelephone wrote: post #73
finstell wrote: post #34

Nowadays, I kind of enjoy seeing posts about people abandoning Apple ecosystem. Although it's painful, I myself have been yet another avid fan of pretty much Apple offered, it feels like this is not going to last forever. When they do the math, iPhone might seem the most lucrative (they seem not to care about anything else) but since they are killing the ecosystem with no Mac Pro, no Mac Mini and with so called pro M…

I don't buy this argument. Developers will work on platforms that have users with money to spend, even if the development hardware is poor value. In this sense, Apple has us hostage!

Yes, as long as iOS stays a solid market, iOS developers are going to own one Mac at least. But when the Mac platform itself stops being attractive to developers and they are only using it because they "have to", it is going to have an impact onto iOS as well. Innovations go, where the developers like to be.

Re: My Next Mac Mini

#96

Post by bsenftner »

rwmj wrote: post #9

I would take a look at the Gigabyte Brix. The basic model is £119 [1] - considerably cheaper than the Intel NUC. I have a couple running a firewall and a little server, and they have trucked along for years without problems. [1] For a more complete spec including the other parts you may need, see: https://rwmj.wordpress.com/2015/05/04/new-home-gateway-route...

I've been picking up Intel ComputeSticks: $99 gives you Win10, WiFi, 4GB RAM, HDMI & USB. I seem to remember I put a 32 GB SD card into my first one... I've been putting them behind our TVs, giving them web access.

All I put on them are Chrome and Mame.

The $99 ComputeSticks are just powerful enough to play standard def video from someone like NetFlix or Amazon. Higher bit rate streaming video is too much, and the'll stutter. But they have higher spec ComputeSticks I've not played with for $199, and $299. (Maybe I'm being grumpy, but most video content simply does not need to be 4K, or HD.)

They are great with 3D graphics, as far as rendering. I write 3D, and have been having a good time with their 3D performance, using WebGL.

Seems like the Nuc prices are just at that level that one could pick up a desktop with the necessary CPU, video card and RAM while being expandable to the future - where the Nuc is not...

Re: My Next Mac Mini

#97

Post by cesarb »

coldtea wrote: post #10

> Well, perfect except that six years in this machine is very creaky. It needs a reboot every week or so (otherwise it will refuse to launch anything). That sounds totally unrelated to the age of the machine, and totally related to what's installed, the mini running out of disk, etc. Maybe do a clean install of the OS? Aside from the mechanical parts (CD ROMS, Hard Disks, etc), the "digital" parts of a PC do not age…

There's one mechanical part which affects the execution speed: the fans. When they fail (or when the heatsink gets completely filled with compact dust), the CPU can overheat and throttle its speed.

Re: My Next Mac Mini

#99

Post by ianai »

newscracker wrote: post #41
Marazan wrote: post #3

Apple's attitude to the Mac mini truly confuses me. Many years ago I was interested in getting one for eithet iPhone development or as a media pc but every time I looked they kept seeming to jack the price or downgrade the spec (relatively speaking).

> Apple's attitude to the Mac mini truly confuses me. I'm probably speaking for thousands of people. It's been complete frustration to see what Apple hasn't been up to on the Mac front. Apart from not updating a few ranges for years (and introducing updates that reduce or remove the kind of expandability the core Apple customer base wants), not reducing the price of old systems is highly insensitive on the part of th…

They definitely have unmet demand. They also just cut their CEOs pay for under performance. They could upgrade the whole line in one go and be right back to relevance.

Re: My Next Mac Mini

#100

Post by gtani »

radley wrote: post #71
mynegation wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It would be a fair criticism if cards were not so obviously stacked against me, the end user and maintainer. New versions of software are written for new and more powerful hardware. I don't know about Mac mini specifically, but it is incredibly hard or even impossible to upgrade Apple products with new hardware.

Only the "current" Mac Mini has upgrade restrictions. But the prior model has almost identical specs and can be upgraded.

Yes, the quad cores sold prior to Oct 2014 can be found in craigslist/ebay etc for US$700-1100 tho i think they're limited to 16Gb RAM

http://barefeats.com/macmin14.html

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