successful installation of 1GB in mac mini
This was harder than thought because my putty knife was nowhere as good as the one seen in the video. Anyway, after just having the, screw it and use all force possible, attitude, I was able to get the mac mini open with my flimsy putty knife. I ended up making some slight cosmetic damages, but I don't think they are going to void my warranty... Unless someone can tell me otherwise.
Some recommendations would be to buy a very wide putty knife that is very thin and not too flimsy.
Anyway, now to the serious question. How's the performance of the mac mini now that I have the 1GB of RAM? FREAKING AWESOME! THIS MACHINE GOES THROUGH ALL MY APPS LIKE BUTTER NOW! Then again, this is coming from a guy who uses an iBook 700 G3 with 640MB RAM and has used his mac mini for the past week with only 256MB RAM (had to wait for my RAM to get shipped).
Anyway, I really recommend this procedure for anyone who doesn't mind voiding their warranty if they mess up, but I doubt you will because it's not very hard if you have the right tools and attitude.
Some recommendations would be to buy a very wide putty knife that is very thin and not too flimsy.
Anyway, now to the serious question. How's the performance of the mac mini now that I have the 1GB of RAM? FREAKING AWESOME! THIS MACHINE GOES THROUGH ALL MY APPS LIKE BUTTER NOW! Then again, this is coming from a guy who uses an iBook 700 G3 with 640MB RAM and has used his mac mini for the past week with only 256MB RAM (had to wait for my RAM to get shipped).
Anyway, I really recommend this procedure for anyone who doesn't mind voiding their warranty if they mess up, but I doubt you will because it's not very hard if you have the right tools and attitude.
Comments
I'm eyeballing a Mac mini with 1GB as well. I'm glad to know that performance is decent. Does the HD look like it can be replaced easily?
Originally posted by iDave
Just did the same. I had a harder time getting the mini back together than getting it apart. While I was in there, I looked for the hard drive just to kind of judge the difficulty of replacing it. I couldn't see it but it must be sandwiched below the optical drive somewhere. As soon as 80GB 7200 rpm drives become available, I'll be tearing my mini apart again to put one in.
yeah, after i put the case back together, it didn't fit. So I had to take it off again and carefully put it back on.
The properly align then smush technique worked pretty well for me.
My problem with closing the case seemed to be with a bunch of metal "clips" above the ports on the back. Again, the putty knife seemed to be the perfect tool for aligning those clips before applying the "smush" technique to close it up.
mmmmm....
Now, if only the CPU were upgradable...
Why not use a Firewire drive? Or would an ATA connection be faster?
Originally posted by a_greer
I could buy the mac mini or a g3 900 mhz with 640 mb ram, is there a noteable differance between a 900mhz g3 and a 1.2 g4, i dont NEED portability but it would be sorta cool. thoughts?
well do you have an external monitor you like to use? If you do, get the mac mini with at least 512MB of RAM. Also of note, the iBook G3's have been known to be problem makers. Mine was no exception either. So unless that iBook has Apple Care on it, I would stay clear from that iBook.
Originally posted by iDave
I think the performance boost with a 7200 rpm drive will definitely be worth the disassembly headache. For 5400, it might not be worth it.
My problem with closing the case seemed to be with a bunch of metal "clips" above the ports on the back. Again, the putty knife seemed to be the perfect tool for aligning those clips before applying the "smush" technique to close it up.
After you said that comment, i kinda wanted to buy an internal drive at 7200RPM, but after looking at the prices, I think i'm going to just boot OS X off of an external drive with a 7200RPM drive. This should be faster, right? ( compared to the internal drive now)
At least I know it's cheaper.
Originally posted by Macasaurus
After you said that comment, i kinda wanted to buy an internal drive at 7200RPM, but after looking at the prices, I think i'm going to just boot OS X off of an external drive with a 7200RPM drive. This should be faster, right? ( compared to the internal drive now)
Yes, I did that for a time with my PowerBook. Startup and application launches were noticeably faster, as was opening and saving large files. I was using a Firewire 400, 7200 rpm drive.
Originally posted by iDave
Just did the same. I had a harder time getting the mini back together than getting it apart. While I was in there, I looked for the hard drive just to kind of judge the difficulty of replacing it. I couldn't see it but it must be sandwiched below the optical drive somewhere. As soon as 80GB 7200 rpm drives become available, I'll be tearing my mini apart again to put one in.
iDave, I just posted the link to OWC, in another related thread.
They're showing a 7200RM 60 GB IBM/Hitachi travelstar for $175.97
and a 100GB Seagate 5400 RPM HD for $259.99 with a 5 year warranty.
This stuff should keep getting better.
BTW, they are also showing mini/iMac 1 GB upgrade DIMM's for $202.00
Originally posted by FallenFromTheTree
iDave, I just posted the link to OWC, in another related thread.
They're showing a 7200RM 60 GB IBM/Hitachi travelstar for $175.97
and a 100GB Seagate 5400 RPM HD for $259.99 with a 5 year warranty.
This stuff should keep getting better.
BTW, they are also showing mini/iMac 1 GB upgrade DIMM's for $202.00
I got mine from newegg for 157. Sure it was PQI, but at least it wasn't generic. Also outpost has a couple of good deals
Any good prices on quality upgrades will only make the mini
more attractive. Thanks for updating!