Video of claimed next-gen Mac Mini surfaces online - Page 3

OK ladies and Gents.... the reason for 5 USB is nothing to do with you guys wanting more or less..

its a feature if the Nvidia Chipset......

FIrewire 800 is cheeper to build in than the old 400 due to bulk buying the chipset..

Both display ports are there because they want you to use your own monitor (if your moving from PC to Mac) , the 24" LED or one of the new LED displays that are coming soon. (note that the old ones are vanishing from the apple store..)

Soon all the apple displays with have the new display port connection..

all this talk about HDMI... well if you want HDMI just use a DVI to HDMI cable its not rocket science, this is a computer not a DVD player.. so HDMI does not come into it...

osX 10.6 is just round the corner its going to be INTEL+Nvida optimized so the layout of this prototype is not a surprise...

The mini I guess will share everything the new macbooks have.......

How do you figure it's overpriced? If there's a less expensive alternative for operating Apple's software, I haven't heard about it.

Consider that if I were to update iLife and then add the new OS when that arrives, it would set me back $208 here in Canada. Compared to what it would cost me to gather up Windows software of a similar quality, that's very, very cheap. Now I've got a mini that is closing in on two years and probably about a year from now the hard drive will go, which likely will set me back maybe $150 to replace, especially considering how difficult the mini is to service, so installing it myself is not an option.

So now I'm at $358 and all I've done is update software and perform some maintenance.

Complicating this is that later this year I intend to buy an HD camcorder so the new iMovie would come in handy and so, too, would an upgrade in performance which both the next OS X release and the likely component upgrades (the 9400 M, faster processor, more faster memory) will bring with the revised mini. Here in Canada the base mini, which is what I have, retails for $649. Considering the current economic climate, that price will certainly not go up any time soon.

To whine that $650 is too much money for all the upgrades that would bring is not looking at the big picture. I would be getting updated software and a substantial performance boost that will prove critical considering what I intend to do with the computer a few months down the road. If instead I chose to turn to the dark side being as an upgrade is needed to properly edit HD video and the current mini isn't quite powerful enough do you really think that factoring in software, etc. I'd be able to make the switch for much less than $650 Cdn.? Myself, I doubt it. And then I'd be stuck with a PC instead of a Mac. No thank you.

Amen.

Lemon Bon Bon.

One possibility for the delay was they needed to also upgrade the iMac first or in parallel, and there may have been delays for the new iMac. The performance boost these rumored specs would give the mini could results in cannibalization of the more profitable iMac sales.


Just a point of correction, the Airport Extreme's footprint is exactly the same as the current mini. It's not the bigger footprint of AppleTV or Time Capsule. So if they make the mini with the larger footprint, now their base station is the odd-man out size-wise. I also don't think the n antenna is so big that it wouldn't fit in a mini of the current size.


Um, might I suggest you try getting a camera and taking a few photos? Or perhaps taking an art class to learn about perspective? At the angle the photo was taken, you should NOT be able to see the top or sides as you claim. Don't believe me? Try standing directly in front or your house from about 10 feet away. Can you see the sides?

It may be a prototype that never sees the light of day. It might be a hacked or mocked up mini that some hobbiest built. But your basis for claiming the photo itself is fake are totally wrong.

Just because so many folks have responded that they would love a computer like this I have to point out that this is a really bad design for a small computer.

It would have a huge amount of that same "empty space" that you say you don't like about the Mac Pro. Making the mini taller like this would just add about 200% more empty space than it has now. There is no reason to add all that space to get the specs that you want on the internals.

The cube was smaller than this overall and worked by convection cooling which is why it was also silent. The internals were oriented at 90 degrees to the internals in the Mac mini, with the cooling slots, and the CD slot on the top. Components were slid in and out of the bottom or top depending.

This design on the other hand, is a big metal box that is fan cooled and has the vents at the back on the bottom, so the heat would build up inside the top like crazy. It's internals would have to be oriented the same as the current mini, It would run very hot and the fan would be very loud.

Both this design and the coloured ones on the next page look very cool indeed, but they are not good designs by a long shot. There is more to a design that just making it look cool.

It's probably already been said, but why would Apple wait so long only to release the new Mini with the same tired appearance? Not gonna happen. Hopefully. Please?

I own a Mini and it sits comfortably under my 40" Sony LCD in my living room. Throw in a wireless mouse and keyboard and you've got some hardcore couch net surfing!

My old mini did this as well except it was more of a sharp cracking noise and the drive burned out after 14 months. I added RAM and made a heat sink for underneath of copper and aluminium etching plates which almost completely got rid of the cracking noise but obviously didn't prevent the drive breaking.

Still, I love it, and would happily have one again for internet type stuff, not heavy work.

I see the potential in this mock up and if I was looking for a desktop computer this year I might be interested. What holds me back at full commitment to the unit is the quoted processor specs of 2GHz which would be way to slow unless that was a quad core chip. Quad core would be nice on a development machine as the GNU tools can make use of al the cores easily for building software. Of course the issue of having a slow hard drive would adversely affect the machines use in that manner. Hopefully the option of having a 3.5" drive in the unit is real. Moreso I hope the unit is a bit more serviceable.

Dave

This is exactly what Apple does. If they believe a form factor is good, they are not changing it for many years to come.

Let's take a look at the Mac Pro. With the exception of the second optical drive, the machine is optically virtually the the same as a 2003 PowerMac G5. Never mind the port layout and internal config. That's 6 years!
Same this with the previous Macbook Pro, the 15" model; Not too different than the first aluminum Powerbook G4. Same thing: 6 years...

To me, this is exactly what Apple would be doing with the Mac Mini. That said, this one could easily be an internal development unit. I ended up having several of those in the past.

Looking at this from Apple's perspective, what would be the likelihood that Apple would lose a single sale as a result of not changing the machine's outward appearance?

I would guess no lost sales from retaining the existing form factor. More sales would likely be lost if the machine is weak in terms of its specs and being as current economic conditions dictate that even Apple hold the line on pricing, whatever development cost goes into the device it will focus on providing the best specs possible for a given price.

The Cube failed because it represented an emphasis on form over function. The mini corrected that by being a remarkably small device that carried on in spirit what I'm sure Jobs had envisioned long-term for the Cube only doing so in a very appealing cost vs. performance overall package.

Bang for the buck, people, bang for the buck.

That would hit the home theater and the desktop crowd.
I'd bet this is a prototype, with the MiniDVI swapped over to HDMI.

Apple had already indicated that they are quite happy with their AppleTV pet project, which means the mini will not be designed as a media center, which means no HDMI.

BTW, monoprice will soon release a miniDP to HDMI adapter.

I vote real. Perhaps a test model and not the final case, but it looks real to me.

Viral marketing?

The assertion made by 'astrosmash' was...

"Most minis are actually purchased by corporations for use in server and processing farms".

How does showing a picture of one server farm using the Mac mini (which everyone here has already seen) any kind of proof or even support of his claim?

If this is real...which I absolutely think so...maybe Apple will offer a MiniDisplay Port to HDMI adapter for those that want to use this in conjunction with their TV? I hope for a merger of the AppleTV and Mac mini — At least it could be done via software and a dongle in this case...

mDP-to-HDMI adaptor and HD movie rentals via iTunes (not just the AppleTV) would cover it for me. Update FrontRow with a few other of AppleTVs online tricks and it would seal the deal.

So if we have miniDP to hdmi, vga and dvi, why bother with the miniDVI?

I'd guess the MiniDVI is gone by production.

The Mini is overpriced, because it's hardware sucks - 80 and 120 GB HDs are pathetically small in this day and age, 1 GB standard is pretty bad too, it's C2D is a couple generations old, not to mention the graphics chip, lack of full 4 GB RAM support, 802.11n, included Superdrive on all models.

The OS is great, iLife is just so so, but the HW is really, really bad at this point. For what it is, it shouldn't be more than $500 at the very most for the $800 model, the HW just is not up to par anymore.

Throwing a bone to the people waiting for this update? "It's coming, just a little longer, we promise."

Mini DVI is more flexible that Mini DP. If large part of the Mac mini's "mission" is to lure switchers into the light.
A big part o the sales pitch for the mini is to be able to use ALL your current peripherals, that includes the monitor.

Unless Apple suddenly gets religion and gives away the Mini DP adaptors (DVI and VGA), having to spend ANOTHER $30 on a display adaptor sours the taste.

And a minor detail... Currently, how many monitors actually USE Mini Display Port connectors? How many have been announced that will INCLUDE them?

Oh, yeah, right. ONE. Yes, ONE monitor supports Mini DP. That means the great majority of mini buyers will be forced to buy an adaptor to be able to use it with current hardware.

Great solution.


Why complain about the old specs? I'd guess that most people here agree on that point.

From what appears to be included on the mystery mini, it may be answering a lot of nagging shortcomings of the mini, especially, one would HOPE, the woeful integrated graphics.

One suspects that Apple would try and bring the mini's architecture up to the same standard as the MacBook line. Why do you think the MacBook and MacBook Pro and iMac share so many of the same components? It's a way to economize and maximize profits. So 4GB RAM capability, 'N' wireless and gigabit Ethernet should be in the new box. I pray that while they're at it, Apple redesigns the box make it easier for users to install RAM and swap hard drives!

200GB hard drives are pretty much the norm these days. Besides, there's a FireWire 800 port on the thing. That's what FireWire is for (NOT USB): adding external storage devices! Connect a honking big 7200 rpm external FireWire drive to it and boot from it. Problem solved.

This is why Apple adds ports to their machines and doesn't add bullshit stuff like card readers and superfluous buttons and lights, like cheap asian audio gear. Figure out your own solution. Buy the stuff you need and do it. Not everyone has the same computing and peripheral needs.

The video appears to have been removed.

Nope, it's still showing. Not that it would need to be as further evidence of it being legitimate. The video itself is clear enough.

That fact that it's not just a shell but has fully fitted ports suggests to me that this refresh can come any time now.

Given that possible iMac chips are being launched tomorrow:

http://www.fudzilla.com/index.php?op...1680&Itemid=35

"On February 23rd, Intel is planning to launch an R0 revision of its Core 2 Quad Q8200 chip, which is currently using M1 stepping. Additionally, it plans to launch an energy efficient 65w TDP model of the same chip with the same stepping revision, the Q8200s, as we've mentioned previously.

These chips will be manufactured with "all green" materials and will now be halide free, which means no halogens or halide compounds such as bromine and antimony. This is just another one of Intel's steps to go above and beyond basic "lead-free" manufacturing to produce safer, smarter, and more energy-efficient technologies. "

This means that both Mini and iMac refresh can appear on Tuesday. Unfortunately, the iMac may not see a redesign but you never know.

I can''t play the video. I click play and it immediately goes to Stop and shows other videos that will play.

I would imagine with the Mac Mini, iMac, and Mac Pro all over due for updates, as well as, a demo of Snow Leopard that was expected by many to be at MWSF, that Apple would hold a special event at Cupertino for the release of the new desktops. Not everything needs to be available at the end of the event. In fact, now that Apple's growth has become excessive I think it is in their favour to stagger the actual releases. This means they can announce and demo them while promising a self imposed future date to some of the products.

How many switchers do you think have mini-DVI adaptor cables? I'm going to hazard a guess at a big round zero.

Unless the switcher is using an S-video or composite display, which one would presume a rarity, then mini-DP will be precisely as convenient as mini-DVI, and much more future-proof.

It is a good point...the mini DVI to DVI adapter + mini DVI to VGA adapter should be included in the box...but that brings up the point of why both have both ports on the unit...IF...you could just include adapters that go from mini Display port to VGA or DVI?

I have to agree with the doubters. Why such a static video? All it shows is the thing being turned around and around. Why not flip it upside down? Why not show it in action by showing it running? That would absolutely silence anybody who thought it was fake. It really wouldn't be that hard to take the case top from an existing mini then add a fake back panel with connectors glued inside. Even without the CNC or machine tools available to design students, somebody with a hand file or Dremel, putty, paint and a couple of days could still modify an old mini's back panel to house nonfunctional connectors.


Those are the wrong chips. Those are desktop chips you're pointing to. The iMac uses laptop chips. I can't see an iMac effectively dissipating 65w TDP anyway.

Is it possible that they put an Intel Atom on it?

I'd be shocked to find out that the unit in the video is a manually created mock up. It looks real to me but that doesn't mean it is the next Mini either as it could be an escaped prototype.


All this whining about how much power the IMac can handle is BS. Apple simple engineers a thermal solution to handle the chipsets in question. More so the iMac had a G5 in there at one time. In the past thermal solutions for the hotter processors often involved large fans to help the Aluminum heat sink cool the processor. It may very well be possible for Apple to use carbon nano tech to produce a heat sink that works well with a smaller fan. Every body has been thinking water cooling but I don't see Appple doing that in iMac.

The problem with iMac is that if they stay with a mobile processor they will be very far behind the performance curve for a whole year. IMac needs a faster processor than anything Intel can offer up from it's mobile line right now. That to fill the massive gap in performance they will have once the Mac Pro gets updated. It is either a much faster desktop based iMac or a new model "XMax".



Dave

There's nothing changed besides the ports, no reason to flip it over. They might not have an adaptor to hook it up to a display and the machine may not have a system installed.


No it wouldn't, even if the guy mailed it to those people, they'd still find something to complain about it. Even if he booted it up, they'd say, hey we can't see the cable exactly coming out the back going right into the display circuitry, maybe he has hard-wired the display cable from another machine into the back of the screen.


If he's done that with a dremel, I hope he gets a job very soon because the alignment is spot on. I'd also like to know where he got a Mini-dp socket because AFAIK you only get them on Macbooks and Macbook Pros. A Mini-DVI one he could have picked up from an old laptop or iMac.

Anyway, it's way too much trouble to go to for what seems like zero gain. It's not as if the guy is saying who he is so he's not doing it for credit and he's posted it on a video sharing site so it's not for click-throughs. Why would he do this?


The 3.06GHz Core 2 Extreme chips have a 55W TDP. A 65W TDP isn't a big stretch and the numbers aren't usually accurate. They will have to do much better cooling though because the desktop chips will shut down quicker. They put a desktop G5 chip in the iMac at one point without aluminium casing and it did suffer from shut-downs but they'll have to figure out how to do it. If they ship another set of dual core chips, their iMac just isn't worth the money. Desktop chips are a fraction of the price and I reckon it would allow them to make 24" models all round. The LED parts add to the cost but the common inventory parts should help lower them a bit.


Could be but the Mini was always the same spec as the Macbook and the Macbook redesign caused a price increase. The original white one is the same price as before. In order to keep the price point the same, there's no reason to redesign it. The top plastic shell could be replaced quite easily I guess but nothing major.


Exactly, mobile chips are not progressing fast enough until the end of the year. With Core i7 desktops cropping up, before the next refresh, the iMac will look ridiculously bad next to a PC tower. They need to use quads and I think Apple may have asked them to make the low power desktop models.

The mini IS overpriced/underfeatured. The CPU is not that bad, sellng a "superdrive" that is unable to write to DVD ony to read them was OK for the B&W 300 MHz G3 back in 1999. Having a DVDROM 10 years later is
Integrated graphics of a budget version that is also is outdated to current budget versions
Absurdly small hard disks
memory limitations
Compared to this the CPU is acually one of the strong points

By replacing the top and bottom plastic of the case with metal better cooling and unified look would be had. I put my mini on small rubber feet so it "leviatate" about a 10-15mm above the desk, this also improves cooling (fold@home 24/7 for years). So there is room for much improvement with the current case.

Just like the ps2/3, xbox 1/360

Do some research please

HDMI version \t1.01.2a \t1.3+
Maximum signal bandwidth (MHz) \t165 \t340
Maximum TMDS bandwidth (Gbit/s) \t4.95 \t10.2
Maximum video bandwidth (Gbit/s) \t3.96 \t8.16
Maximum audio bandwidth (Mbit/s) \t36.86 \t36.86
Maximum Color Depth (bit/px) \t24 \t48[A]
Maximum resolution over single link at 24-bit/px[B] \t1920×1200p60 \t2560×1600p75
Maximum resolution over single link at 30-bit/px[C] \tN/A \t2560×1600p60
Maximum resolution over single link at 36-bit/px[D] \tN/A \t1920x1200p75
Maximum resolution over single link at 48-bit/px[E] \tN/A \t1920×1200p60

Bad is not what I would describe the hardware to be. I have the base mini and do quite a lot with it. As for the size of the HD, I have a couple of external drives attached to my machine, as well as a time capsule, so storage is not an issue.

You have to understand that from my perspective, I don't feel as if Apple is gouging. I paid more money for my first DVD burner and I paid 10 times more money a few years ago for a G4 tower that didn't have the power of the current mini.

If you don't care about the OS, haven't got tons of legacy software, etc. then you don't look seriously at the mini. You can get a PC tower for similar money that specs out more impressively. But if the OS does matter and you refuse to buy the product because you think it's $100 too expensive, well then it's your loss.

By the way, if iLife is in your view just so so, are you saying that to get the same functionality in PC software, it would be easy to accomplish that for less than $100 because I'm not seeing that. The iLife package is excellent and meets a lot of people's needs. Obviously not yours and as such, clearly, you're not a potential Apple customer. That being the case, why should Apple waste its time trying to make you happy. You're not the target consumer that Apple designs its products for. Apple has never competed on price and if all you want is the cheapest computer you can get your hands on, lots of PC makers have products to suit you. If you're waiting for Apple to sell the cheapest machine in the market, don't hold your breath. It has never been Apple's intention to do so, something the company made crystal clear when addressing the media. Apple has never competed on price and doesn't pretend to. The company's marketing efforts are paying huge dividends and it allows the company to make a decent profit even now during an economic downturn.

Assuming this Mac Mini is real, thee only thing I can think of for having mDP and mDVI is push their mDP, but regulate a secondary display to only SL-DVI. This may be a strategic move or it may be a limitation of the GPU. We know that DP can handle daisy chaining of displays, but is the Nvidia iGPU used in the MB able to handle 2x 30" displays?

The Macbook Wheel is more real, seriously.

I've been living with an old Mac Mini for some time now, and am basically waiting for the next big upgrade so that I can have Snow Leopard, all the new iLife, and whatever new design and upgrades Apple adds to the mini.

I like the rear panel on the video, what I would like to see is:
- better graphics
- new case design (like the darker ones in the mockup photos, maybe)

I like lots of USB (since I am currently using a hub), and FW 800 is cool. Can you adapt 800 to 400? (probably a dumb question) I have a FW400 recording interface right now.

Just a random guess.. maybe this is a prototype after the internal design was changed, but before any work was done on the physical design/appearance.

Well, as usual, the Maestro nails it. That's it. Right there. Can Apple get beyond their design 1st, performance 2nd design cul-de-sac in the next iMac revision?

Lemon Bon Bon.

Hey, leave something for me to kick, will ya?

Lemon Bon Bon.

It's vital that they get the Nehalem into the consumer line. Yeesh. It's not difficult, every other PC vendor is doing it! And these days, not all those boxes are as ugly as they used to be either. Some of those PC towers are looking much nicer these days.

Desktop parts have never been cheaper. They have no excuse for not having the quad cpu, a decent gpu, decent ram and hd in a consumer computer.

It's just metal and plastic, folks. Adding a couple of models for choice would get them out of the minamilist corner they have painted themselves into.

The mini has no mini keyboard or monitor to go with it. Crap gpu or lack of...tiny ram and hd. I hope the years didn't pass for a mere bump. Sticking they macbook's specs into a biscuit tin isn't what I'd call a major update.

Lemon Bon Bon.

No, no, no, no, no, no.....

An Atom CPU would not be a great idea. Not even for an AppleTV would the Atom processor be a good idea.