Apple debuts new Mac minis with five times better graphics - Page 5

HDMI only supports screen resolutions up to 1920 x 1080.
As a COMPUTER, the mini can drive a typical 22" (and up) monitor at 1920 x 1200 and the Apple 30" monitor, whatever resolution is. HDMI also adds DRM to the mix, if you like that.

You're better off with an external Blu-ray player that will also UPSAMPLE DVDs to 1080p resolution and also has multi-channel audio outputs. The internal DVD drive will not upsample video. Upsampling really does make a difference.

If you have a Full-HD TV, you'd be disappointed with the max 7120p that AppleTV outputs.

I connect my MacBook Pro to my HDTV to view photos, email, web surf and even do presentations from VectorWorks. Maybe even crank up World of Goo or Call of Duty 4!

There's something incredibly cool about showing photos and being able to switch to Safari and Google to find some info, look at satellite photos or maps or even find local music online. I can even pass around my wireless keyboard and mouse! You CANNOT do that with an Apple TV! The mini is MUCH more flexible!

I'm anxiously awaiting the updates on how to replace 1GB with 4GB ram and replace the 120GB HD with an SSD. Already got my plastic putty knifes n magnetic screwdriver at the ready

Dobby

The Dell Studio is a design object with plenty of way more powerful Dell Computers aviable at the same price point as well as much cheaper ones of similar performance.
Apple does not have a entry level mac any more, what they have done is taking the macbook remove a 13" screen, keyboard and batteries, folded what is left in a very small box and charge the same price more or less.

An example I have a G4 tower (1.2 GHz, 1.5 GB RAM 750 GB HD) and a 2 year old 1920x1200 TFT.
Replacement options.
Mac Mini. =I have to settle with a to small HD and have to allways use an external drive.
iMac=Why pay for a monitor when I allready have one
mac Pro=the former low end octacore seem to be a better deal than the current quadcore.
macbook= Relly do not need a portable as I prefer to have my documents on gmail or a usb-stick if I need to move them.

Perhaps the next Mini in 2012 will be better....

Apple really blew it with the Mini update.
A $100 pricecut, plus 2GB and 2.2 C2D as standard would cut it for me.

As far as I can tell, there is also the eeebox in the EPA Energystar database. Does the mac mini with its fancier GPU and larger CPU really use less energy than an eeebox with a 1.6 atom and intel GPU?

United Kingdom is really the only place in Europe I've seen that sells these new machines pretty much at the same price as U.S after you take currency into account. In all other countries that use Euro, Krone, they are charging around 120 Euro more than before.

If they want to adjust the pricing with currency so the margin doesn't go down in the other countries, why not keep the correct pricing so the margin doesn't go up? I usually don't call Apple's products rip-off because I think they well worth it, but not when you were paying as much as the others yesterday and suddenly have to pay that much more than the others for nothing(nothing more than what people in U.S and GB receive).

I agree that with how long it took I somehow expected a slightly more radical upgrade, but this upgrade really brings this machine back into the limelight for people to at least consider it.

Nevertheless I really think that Apple should have considered making the Mac Mini slightly thicker and offered either a 3.5" HDD or a 2 2.5" HDDs for a RAID setup. The Mac Mini's small form factor makes it ideally well suited for two tasks: SFF server or an HTPC. Those interested in the machine as a HTPC would probably prefer the larger HDD because HD content makes 500GB an absolute minimum and 1-2TB highly desirable. Those running these machines as server though would probably prefer to have 2 2.5" HDDs so that they could have some redundancy. Right now the machine doesn't seem perfect for either target audience.

Now that the base model not only has a dual core processor, but also a SuperDrive what exactly is the selling point for the higher end Mac Mini anymore? As some people have noted you could upgrade the HDD to a 500GB drive and 4GB of DDR3 for about the same price as Apple charges $200 for the more modest upgrade of a 320GB HDD and 2GB of DDR3. Either Apple should cut the price on the higher end model or they should give you something to make the upgrade worth your while. The profit margin will no doubt be good on the higher end model, but I think that the sales of the higher end model will be really weak compared to previous generations of the Mac Mini. AFAIK the lower end Mac Mini model has consistently outsold the higher end model by a wide margin, but I think that the sales of the higher end model will only decline even more.

If I were Apple I would also look into the possibility of an optional BD-ROM drive. For an additional $150-200 you get the drive plus a new version of iDVD that plays back Blu-ray. Since the Geforce 9400 is HDCP compliant and has sufficient processing power to handle it the only thing missing is playback software. Including that along with a minor improvement in memory and HDD would make a very provocative upgrade that a lot of people would take.

As it stands right now the higher end Mac Mini seems like stupid purchase on launch day and in 3-4 months when HDDs and DDR3 memory are even cheaper nevermind 6-9 months from now when this same model may still be the most current model only somebody who is absolutely clueless that one can upgrade their own memory or HDD is going to take Apple up on the $799 Mac Mini. Heck, even if you weren't comfortable doing it you could pay somebody $50 for their labor and still come out ahead today nevermind 3-6 months from now.

I disagree. The mac mini upgrade is the only one that has taken an appreciable step forward in functionality.

1. Faster graphics
2. Latest Wifi Networking
3. Dual monitor support
4. DDR-3 and 1066 bus

The processor didn't jump that far but the 4GB memory ceiling helps. I think it represents the best real world value for consumers. Sure it's not a gaming machine but it can game enough. It comes pretty well stocked in it's SFF. Gigabit and Bluetooth included.

I find it far less perplexing to understand where the money is going versus the Quad Core Mac Pro which seems artificially inflated in price.

I'm fine with these updates. It is pretty cool to imagine a mini having dual monitor support. I really wish Apple weren't so stingy with the RAM and HD updates but the prices are so cheap it is hard to sweat that too much. In a household like mine where a couple G4 towers are still being used daily, this would be a no-brainer for replacing them.

woohoo, have been waiting for the mini bump. now i'm just gonna wait til the snow leopard bump and i'll be picking one of these up

Look, personally, I am estatic that Apple released a decent GPU with FIREWIRE on a device that is under $1000. If it runs GAMES (3d), it will run Motion, Illustrator and perhaps FCP unless in the EFI Apple somehow crippled FCP, Pro Apps (would no be surprised), but lets hope I'm wrong.

Anyway, FIREWIRE WAS NEVER EVER EVER EVER about being a PRO DEVICE.

I'll explain this again and see if someone can explain why Apple did this.
With the first generation Macbook, Rev 1, rev 2, rev 3, OPEN_GL benchmarked at 70%, 120% then 171% when the Macbooks got Leopard. Keep in mind, you still couldn't play games but according to barefeats, you could RUN PRO APPS, especially MOTION, FINAL CUT. Personally, I benchmarked all the machines first hand when I worked for Apple. This story gained a lot of traction and PRO users started buying the MB for a 2nd machine (emphasis on 2nd machine), but when the next rev came out, it was a X300 or X1300, and the bench mark for OPEN GL went all the way down to 70% again rendering MOTION and PRO APPS Useless, it didn't do anything else, no improved battery life, no faster benchmarks, not cheaper, so, you have to ask yourself, why did they do it? They did it to cripple PRO apps running on the macbook Pro.

So, when the latest Aluminum came out (UNI BODY), by omitting firewire they essentially did they same thing, knowing that PRO users would need FIREWIRE for their video camcorders, they were screwed, so it made the MACBOOK able to run PRO APPS but there was no firewire for editing video. Only this time, not only were the VIDEO ENTHUSIAST, plus all the thousand of mom and pops who signed up with One To One (What I did), they complained that they could not connect a cam corder with their new macbook, but musicians were peeved as MOST PRO AUDIO DEVICES use firewire, so thousands of musician were left out in the cold. Not to mention the I.T. pro that could no longer run the MB in target mode. Again, this is not about PRO use for firewire but more about APPLE saying NO PRO APPS with a laptop.

This can be further ilustarted in that last QTR prooves that LAPTOPS far out sell desktops (and MINIS), not to mention no REMOTE EDITING (mini), so Apple (if not crippled with EFI and you can run PRO APPS) probably figures, the machines are not mobile and they won't lose to much as the PRO will still need a laptop for remote editing, something you cant do with a mini.
Should be interesting to see if APple threw us a bone of if they crippled it.

The irony is that Apple would have received MORE sales as the PRO also needs the express slot many times and a MACBOOK with decent GPU and FIREWIRE would have been a 2nd device for most, not first, now there is a good chance the mini might end up in edit bays and audio bays.


WIl have to wait to see the benchmarks for PRO APPS.

I think APPLE should redo te FIREWIRE on the MAACBOOK, nothing about design as the slimmy move they did with the 1st-3rd rev proves that the only people affected with the lame X3100, were PRO APP users.

Curious... was this a result of Leopard or the change from Intel GMA 950 to X3100 integrated graphics? On paper, the X3100 should have been more capable but maybe that didn't extend to OpenGL.

You do realize that the white macbook has firewire and the same 9400M right?


Revs A-C had the GMA950. The reference GMA 950 drivers from Intel aren't the best but at least they were mature.

Revs D-F had the GMA X3100. The Intel drivers SUCKED for the X3100 for a long long time and never really got optimized. The chip never performed as well as it should have on either windows or osx. No conspiracy. And probably one reason that Apple moved to nVidia vs staying intel.

Second, XBench sucked as a benchmark...which was what sparked that rumor that the new MacBooks with the X3100 were worse at OpenGL than the older MacBooks The Cinebench10 results showed the GMA950 as scoring 1260 vs the X3100 scoring 2030 on the OpenGL tests.

Finally, your assertion is completely wrong. Bearfeats benchmarked the santa rosa macbooks as faster than the original macbooks in iMaginator, Motion and Cinebench. Not really usable but still faster.

http://www.barefeats.com/mbook1.html

Remind me not to trust the Apple "genius" that mans the one to one stations. You'll have to explain how Apple is going to cripple just "pro apps" in the EFI sometime too. Especially given that Photoshop is a "pro app" that worked just fine on the MacBook.

Let me understand this. The Mini comes with OSX, iLife '09, Nvida graphics, DDR3, Intel C2D, a Super Drive, a $100 printer rebate, iWorks for $40 -- all this for $599 -- and you misers bitch about it?

Give me a break!

@domerdel2:

I'm very interested in this matter as I wanted to do the same thing, please post any news when you're done, it'd be very appreciated!

Cheers

TIA

nipponjin

If you believe this poster on another well-respected site, then this should be your green light.


"I just bought the lower end mac mini ($599) model at my local apple store and I love it.

It runs much faster than I'd imagined and I have it currently hooked up to my 24" LED ACD and works great.

I installed the 320gb hitachi travelstar 7200rpm hdd into it and swapped the RAM out for to 4GB.

I can 100% confirm that even if you get the lower end mac mini the 128mb of vram goes up to 256vram once you go higher than 1gb.

So basically DONT BUY THE $799 MODEL, its still almost $150 cheaper to buy the lower end (same 2.0ghz) and buy the 320gb hitachi travelstar 7200rpm hdd which costs only $60 and 4gb of RAM for around $54."


http://episteme.arstechnica.com/eve/...1#463001647931

Compare like models only do not throw in towers or mini-towers.

Hmm, I don't think you actually investigated the specs on the dell Studio Hybrid. The base model Dell Studio Hybrid comes with a 2.0GHz Intel® Pentium Dual Core T4200 vs the Mac Mini's 2.0GHz Intel Core 2 Duo. A 160GB hard drive and lists wireless draft-n as an option. And Vista Home Basic. Upgrading to a 2.0GHz Core 2 Duo, Vista Ultimate bumps the price up to $699 then add Adobe Photoshop and Premiere Elements and it's $798. And the wireless is listed as an option but I can't find where to add it yet.

Does it come with a separate copy of Leopard so I can do a custom install and remove all the language packs and printer drivers?

Actually not fake! The picture on the outside of the real box isn't a picture of the real product:

http://www.engadget.com/2009/03/04/a...-and-hands-on/

pic on box has 9 vents, actual product has 10.

So much for Apple's attention to detail!!!

Thank you so much Hudson1 for the link to the post!
Really appreciate it

Cheers

nipponjin

Ordered mine this morning....
2.26 GHz, 4 GB, 320 GB

Replaces a 2001 Dell 1.6 GHz Pentium 4 with a 133 bus and 512 MB RAM that will be going to the basement and dedicated to VPN for work access.

Yeah I could have saved a little dough by doing the memory and hard drive myself...either way, I am happy with the update.

He wasn't saying the new Mac Mini isn't a good buy, he's saying that the higher-priced (upgraded) new Mac Mini is a bad deal compared to the lower-priced one. I'm suprised that the $799 doesn't have a higher clock speed, that would have at least somewhat justified the price.

I'm not complaining, but obviously anyone who has even a little experience can upgrade the $599 Mini RAM and HD for significantly less than what Apple charges. But that's always been the case anyway...

Hey no problem ..I didn't crack into my mini until it was a year old. I'm not always about doing surgery on new hardware.



Oops reading is fundamental. Yes if a person is or knows a grisled Mac mini vet with a putty knife upgrading isn't going to be that hard.

Then they will start to complain if Tim Cook starts going cheapo, replacing aluminum with plastic and replaces designs by Ives and his crew with imitation-robot generic Asian design.

QUALITY COSTS MONEY. GET OVER IT.

You are all free to buy PC's if that's what you want. Nothing wrong with that: just figure out the kind of user you really are.

I don't know about you guys, but I love the Mac Mini. Since I don't really do anything graphically intensive, it's quite perfect for my needs. Include a 4GB stick of ram and a 256GH SSD drive in, it becomes solid!

couldn't agree more..

do you want to show me where the appreciable difference in quality is in those cute cupertino boxes made with mass market taiwanese mobo's and assembled in chinese sweat boxes?


I'm a PC user, the type of person that doesn't buy Apple anymore and with the change goes on Vacation. I also have IMO better hardware and better software choices to boot.

What kind of user does that make me......smart perhaps??

I'd be interested to know what better software choices you have. For likely the first time in my life there's not a PC app out there that I pine for. Granted, PC users have more software in total it is debatable on whether said software is superior.

I didn't say the software was necessarily better just the choice is better.

the iLife series (and yes I've used '09) is actually getting worse.

iPhoto's library organisation is horrendous. iTunes is a bloated mess and does anyone seriously use any of the others? Maybe iMovie once in a while.

iWork in an office world.??

I dual boot XP and Ubuntu and consider myself to have the best of every world.

ditto, there isn't a Mac app I pine for either....now let me just go count my spare change again..

Don't forget to run that virus scan while you're away counting.

I still think the mini update is lame. It only looks good because the mini has been neglected for so long.

Most thought it would get faster cpus. Think about it. The top model really didn't get a processor upgrade. Sure it has a faster FSB but the clock speed is unchanged. And this is from 19 months ago!

The early benchmarks from a Primate labs shows only a modest improvement. That doesn't factor in the graphics improvement but after 19 months is it unreasonable to expect a new mini to be faster that the old one in all aspects?

It isn't like 2.0 is all that horrid a speed. The real lack was the GPU and that's what got fixed. And it does dual monitor and has FW800. It's not a speed demon but it is a heck of a lot more useful than it was 2 days ago.

The gpu was pretty much expected though wasn't it?

The FW 800 and dual monitor support is an unanticipated 'plus' though.

But honestly after 19 months this is really weak. The initial benchmarks bear it out. Its not much faster than the one it replaced. This is the update the pessimists expected. Heck some thought the mini might get quad core cpus. Turns out they get some of the slowest dual core cpus.

But it is better than it was 2 days ago. But if the next update isn't for 18 months those machines are going to look ancient.

I'd blame the iMac before anything.

With both models still in dual core land there needs to be some distinguishing feature for the imac and that's clockspeed.

In fact Apple has soldered the CPU to the motherboard most likely to prevent upgrades as I can easily see the family of 25W TDP processors goes right on up to the P8700 2.53Ghz.

I'm somewhat saddened to see a move towards disposable computers.

anybody please tell me the cpu detail information? does it support VMX and 64bit?

It's good for me to build HTPC except Blue-ray.

MINI....miiiiiinnnniiii, mini.

Folks expecting quads were out to lunch.

Right now mini's represent the best bang for the buck in the Apple line up. That will change when the mobile Nehalems come out because, as I said earlier, the Mini ain't getting one. For 19 months probably.

This was a huge update and one that probably pisses Intel off a bit. On the other hand, their inability to deliver an integrated GPU and drivers that don't suck is really their problem, not Apple's

Criminey...you want a quad? Stack two minis for $1400 (tossing in a few bucks for memory and HD upgrades for both). For Handbrake folks tend to do rips in batches anyway. Splitting the job in two seems easy enough.

The retail price of the 2.8Ghz T9600 ($549 newegg) is almost the price of the cheap mini. Actually, it is the cost of the new cheap mini with edu discount. Can you imagine what a quad mini would cost? What's the price in qty 1000? (Yes, I'm too lazy to look).

Oh, the new mini is verra nice. Mine is going through it's first TC session and mass-o-updates.

And two minis are quiet as hell. The damn TC is louder.

I never expected the mini to go quad. But I think Marvin thought or at least hoped it would.

Still I really expected the mini to get a 2.4 ghz c2d on the top end. Hell it is an $800 computer after all.

Wasn't the last mini able to have the cpu upgraded by the user? Seems like I recall people hack them with old 2.3 ghz merom cpus. If so those are probably the fastest minis around. Murch says that isn't possible with the new mini because Apple have soldiered the cpu.

Newegg.ca didn't seem to have any:

anyone know where a Canuck an get a good 4 GB kit?

This discussion is getting 'dangerous' for me...
the more I read and think about it, the closer I get to seeing the base model mini as my new replacement Mac...

I really don't see how Apple can justify the higher-end $799 model with exact same CPU speed, and only difference being a larger HD and 1 GB more RAM for a $200 premium.

Yes, I wish the base $599 model was a tad better/faster, and I think it should have come in a bit cheaper - like the way they cut the price on the iMac line, but did not on the Mac mini. -- But don't we all wish the same.

The base/low-end mini seems to be the value leader in the current "Early 2009" announcements.