I do have some problem with your configuration of the Mac Cube though. In addition to buying the $999 Cube, a wide screen 20 inch monitor, and additional RAM. You are really looking at around $1800 computer.
The Dell XPS 400 for the same price you get up to 4GB of RAM and 6 PCI expansion slots with 3 being PCIe. Only one open slot is PCIe x16 however.
For the price of the Mac Cube limited at 2GB of RAM would be an obvious sign of Apple purposefully limiting it at that place. There would be no technological reason for this limit. The Cube should at least have two RAM slots expandable to 4GB with two 2GB sticks. This does not compete with the Mac Pro which would have RAM expandable to at least 16GB.
The Cube should also have at least one open PCIe x16 slot for future expansion. As is common in other PC's in this price range.
I can agree that the Mac pro is safe. The iMac and top end Mini I dunno.
I don't think the mini will necessarily play in the same space of the Mac Cube. But of course Apple would have no problem with a customer buying a more expensive computer.
The price difference between the iMac and Mac Cube would not be too much different, in some ways the iMac can come out a bit cheaper. To buy a 20" 1680x1050 monitor from Dell (working with Dells fluctuating prices) costs $400-$450. A 17" 1280x1024 monitor with DVI connection costs around $300-$260. Dell does not seem to offer a 1440x900 equivalent to the iMac.
An interesting thing that came out of the IDC this week is that it was confirmed that Merom is 100% compatible with Yonah.
As long as there aren't cooling issues, the Merom can be popped into the same socket.
There might be some BIOS issues, but upgrade companies for the Mac are used to writing code to get over those problems.
This could mean that a "cube", or some other machine could come in with a low priced single core Yonah, and later be upgraded to a higher performing Merom.
Once the price of the chips go down, this could make it more worthwhile.
Hehehehhe in a couple of years I'm going to pop in a Merom chip and 7200rpm perpendicular drive into my mini and badda bing I'll be good for another couple of years.
Do you think Apple will allow the CPU to be removed and not solder it down?
Are you talking about the mini, or some theoretical machine? Because if you're talking about the mini, we already know that the CPU is on a socket and is therefore upgradeable. Melgross linked to info. about someone who upgraded their Core Solo mini to a 2.16 GHz Core Duo.
That makes sense the low margins of the mini. Apple does not care if you spend another couple hundred dollars for a CPU upgrade.
Then it was the Mac Book Pro or iMac that is soldered.
Laptops are always different,because power issues are always marginal, at best.
There are upgrade companies that are willing to take on that task, but if the machine is already putting out a lot of heat, an upgrade could push it over the edge.
A small, quiet fan could always be mounted under, or behine a Mini, if it were really needed.
I think the new iMac has enough thermal margin to allow this. The reports are that the fans rarely come on.
Hehehehhe in a couple of years I'm going to pop in a Merom chip and 7200rpm perpendicular drive into my mini and badda bing I'll be good for another couple of years.
Socketed procs are koool
Pity about that intel integrated graphics though in a few years the gma950 will be worth $0 in terms of gaming. in terms of HD video though it will continue to be a nice boxx...
Hehehehhe in a couple of years I'm going to pop in a Merom chip and 7200rpm perpendicular drive into my mini and badda bing I'll be good for another couple of years.
Socketed procs are koool
You probably won't be able to do it as the Merom requires an updated VRM as well despite the socket being identical. Unless Apple have already put that in you're stuck with Core Solo/Duo.
Hehehehhe in a couple of years I'm going to pop in a Merom chip and 7200rpm perpendicular drive into my mini and badda bing I'll be good for another couple of years.
Socketed procs are koool
Pity about that intel integrated graphics though in a few years the gma950 will be worth $0 in terms of gaming. in terms of HD video though it will continue to be a nice boxx...
Still doesn't worth much....
here's some game benchmarks on the dell coreduo mini.... I mean apple mini.
It definately shows benefit with dual channel ram, but once CPU demanding games are played, GMA950 chokes as expected.... and barely keeps up with Macmini G4 @ 1.42Ghz. Well, few $ more for the ATI x1600 could've been the best seller mac ever..... as CoreDuo iMac shows respectable gaming ability.
good articles y'all now that the benches are coming in. personally, i would love to see a mac mini core solo or core duo be paired up with a nVidia 7600GT GPU. or, core solo with 6600GT GPU and core duo with 7600GT GPU. let the iMac lines have the x1600xt etcs.
It definately shows benefit with dual channel ram, but once CPU demanding games are played, GMA950 chokes as expected.... and barely keeps up with Macmini G4 @ 1.42Ghz. Well, few $ more for the ATI x1600 could've been the best seller mac ever..... as CoreDuo iMac shows respectable gaming ability.
Yeah, but to be fair, none of those games or photoshop is running natively for the intel processor, so I kinda expected results like this. I also thought it was damn near impossible to get Unreal installed on the new Intel Macs? Anyway, I'm not sold yet that the integrated graphics is worse than the 32MB 9200 that was in the G4. Now, once Doom 3, Quake, UT 2K4, and Photoshop are universal binaries, run the benchmarks again and if the G4 still beats the Core Duo, then I'll concede that the integrated graphics need a little help. The guy's philosophy on gaming is kinda weird too. I can understand why people would want to play games on a Mac - I do myself, but you also have to be able to meet the minimum requirements to expect the system to run it well ... for example, the system requirements for UT 2K4:
933 MHz G4 - G5
OS X 10.2.8
256 MB RAM
DVD Drive
6 GB HDD space
32 MB AGP Video Card
The old mini barely met those requirements, so I'm not surprised it didn't perform well. The new mini lacks AGP video support and a G4 - G5 processor, so I'm a little surprised they got UT to install in the first place.
Anyway, just my $0.02 worth. You might also try reading the Ars Technica Review ... I think they did a pretty good job comparing the new Intel Mini and the G4 mini
good articles y'all now that the benches are coming in. personally, i would love to see a mac mini core solo or core duo be paired up with a nVidia 7600GT GPU. or, core solo with 6600GT GPU and core duo with 7600GT GPU. let the iMac lines have the x1600xt etcs.
7600gt?.... This thing edges/beats ati x1800, but nvidia never found home with apple. Driver support was just horrible compared to ATI support. Anyway, I would've been happy to take one of the coreduo mini home if it had ati x1300 with 64MB vram. Atleaset the card will support shader 2.0/3.0 and opgl 2.0 support along with much better video playback capability in deinterlacing/scaling(with proper driver release to activate avivo technology of course). If apple manages to put 7600GT in a mini.... I'll pay $999 for one of those special addition mini......
I cannot understand why this conversation continues.
The Mac mini is NOT a GAME MACHINE
Apple did NOT create the Mac mini to be a GAME MACHINE.
Intel GMA950 chipset is NOT for GAMES.
Intel did NOT design the GMA950 for GAMES.
So why do people continue to look at the Mac mini and the GMA950 and be disappointed with its gaming benchmarks when neither were conceived to be made for gaming?
I cannot understand why this conversation continues.
The Mac mini is NOT a GAME MACHINE
Apple did NOT create the Mac mini to be a GAME MACHINE.
Intel GMA950 chipset is NOT for GAMES.
Intel did NOT design the GMA950 for GAMES.
So why do people continue to look at the Mac mini and the GMA950 and be disappointed with its gaming benchmarks when neither were conceived to be made for gaming?
I don't think apple makes any macs for gaming.... atleast they don't call or have a gaming model macs.... However, they do have macs capable of gaming with decent graphic interface to drive 3d tasks....and we're simply saying macmini can't.
We know intel didn't design GMA950 for games and it's not designed to do anything other than simple 2D desktop functions to display emails and word processing..... but this isn't acceptable for todays's pc standards other than coporate use.... I'm not going to use a macmini to do excell, word, powerpoint, and emails all day long at home. Macmini is not a corporate pc either!....
I cannot understand why this conversation continues.
The Mac mini is NOT a GAME MACHINE
Apple did NOT create the Mac mini to be a GAME MACHINE.
Intel GMA950 chipset is NOT for GAMES.
Intel did NOT design the GMA950 for GAMES.
So why do people continue to look at the Mac mini and the GMA950 and be disappointed with its gaming benchmarks when neither were conceived to be made for gaming?
Quite simply because people want a cheap macintosh computer that they can use for gaming.
I think people look at the mini as a console because of all the features Apple is touting (HD movie playback, the iLife suite, DVD burning etc), if you could play games well on them, I bet they'd be much more popular. People probably think that if it's capable of the above, surely it will be a good cheap gaming PC. Unfortunately, not so.
Quite simply because people want a cheap macintosh computer that they can use for gaming.
Which is a quite different issue from the current state of the mini or the market Apple has built it for.
Quote:
I think people look at the mini as a console because of all the features Apple is touting (HD movie playback, the iLife suite, DVD burning etc), if you could play games well on them, I bet they'd be much more popular.
No actually PC gaming over the years is becoming less and less popular, while console and handheld gaming have become more popular.
Since the mid 90's sales of PC gaming have steadily declined to the point they are about half of what they were at their highest point.
In 1998 PC gaming software was at $1.8 billion dollars in revenue. In 2005 PC gaming software is at $953 million dollars in revenue.
In 1998 console and handheld gaming software was at $3.7 billion dollars in revenue. In 2005 console and handheld gaming software are a bit over $6 billion dollars in revenue.
Quote:
but this isn't acceptable for todays's pc standards other than coporate use....
So far benchmarking of the Intel mini shows its fair with 2D gaming and suffers at 3D gaming. What barometer has gauged that 3D gaming is an absolute must for any modern computer?
If that were true Dell would not be able to sell its XPS 600 Extreme Gaming box for $4200.
Comments
Mac cube: $999 (1.66 Duo, one 3.5" hd, upto 2gb ram. replacable gfx, 64mb standard)
$1399 (1.83 Duo, one 3.5" hd, upto 2gb ram. replacable gfx, 128mb standard)
Over all this line up looks great to me.
I do have some problem with your configuration of the Mac Cube though. In addition to buying the $999 Cube, a wide screen 20 inch monitor, and additional RAM. You are really looking at around $1800 computer.
The Dell XPS 400 for the same price you get up to 4GB of RAM and 6 PCI expansion slots with 3 being PCIe. Only one open slot is PCIe x16 however.
For the price of the Mac Cube limited at 2GB of RAM would be an obvious sign of Apple purposefully limiting it at that place. There would be no technological reason for this limit. The Cube should at least have two RAM slots expandable to 4GB with two 2GB sticks. This does not compete with the Mac Pro which would have RAM expandable to at least 16GB.
The Cube should also have at least one open PCIe x16 slot for future expansion. As is common in other PC's in this price range.
I can agree that the Mac pro is safe. The iMac and top end Mini I dunno.
I don't think the mini will necessarily play in the same space of the Mac Cube. But of course Apple would have no problem with a customer buying a more expensive computer.
The price difference between the iMac and Mac Cube would not be too much different, in some ways the iMac can come out a bit cheaper. To buy a 20" 1680x1050 monitor from Dell (working with Dells fluctuating prices) costs $400-$450. A 17" 1280x1024 monitor with DVI connection costs around $300-$260. Dell does not seem to offer a 1440x900 equivalent to the iMac.
As long as there aren't cooling issues, the Merom can be popped into the same socket.
There might be some BIOS issues, but upgrade companies for the Mac are used to writing code to get over those problems.
This could mean that a "cube", or some other machine could come in with a low priced single core Yonah, and later be upgraded to a higher performing Merom.
Once the price of the chips go down, this could make it more worthwhile.
Socketed procs are koool
Originally posted by TenoBell
Do you think Apple will allow the CPU to be removed and not solder it down?
Are you talking about the mini, or some theoretical machine? Because if you're talking about the mini, we already know that the CPU is on a socket and is therefore upgradeable. Melgross linked to info. about someone who upgraded their Core Solo mini to a 2.16 GHz Core Duo.
edit: here's the link
That makes sense the low margins of the mini. Apple does not care if you spend another couple hundred dollars for a CPU upgrade.
Then it was the Mac Book Pro or iMac that is soldered.
Originally posted by TenoBell
Do you think Apple will allow the CPU to be removed and not solder it down?
Several of their machines already have sockets.
Originally posted by TenoBell
Ah yeah I did see that.
That makes sense the low margins of the mini. Apple does not care if you spend another couple hundred dollars for a CPU upgrade.
Then it was the Mac Book Pro or iMac that is soldered.
Laptops are always different,because power issues are always marginal, at best.
There are upgrade companies that are willing to take on that task, but if the machine is already putting out a lot of heat, an upgrade could push it over the edge.
A small, quiet fan could always be mounted under, or behine a Mini, if it were really needed.
I think the new iMac has enough thermal margin to allow this. The reports are that the fans rarely come on.
I think the new iMac has enough thermal margin to allow this. The reports are that the fans rarely come on.
yes, god bless that 65nm process
Hehehehhe in a couple of years I'm going to pop in a Merom chip and 7200rpm perpendicular drive into my mini and badda bing I'll be good for another couple of years.
Socketed procs are koool
Pity about that intel integrated graphics though
Originally posted by hmurchison
Hehehehhe in a couple of years I'm going to pop in a Merom chip and 7200rpm perpendicular drive into my mini and badda bing I'll be good for another couple of years.
Socketed procs are koool
You probably won't be able to do it as the Merom requires an updated VRM as well despite the socket being identical. Unless Apple have already put that in you're stuck with Core Solo/Duo.
Originally posted by sunilraman
Originally posted by hmurchison
Hehehehhe in a couple of years I'm going to pop in a Merom chip and 7200rpm perpendicular drive into my mini and badda bing I'll be good for another couple of years.
Socketed procs are koool
Pity about that intel integrated graphics though
Still doesn't worth much....
here's some game benchmarks on the dell coreduo mini.... I mean apple mini.
http://www.barefeats.com/mincd.html
It definately shows benefit with dual channel ram, but once CPU demanding games are played, GMA950 chokes as expected.... and barely keeps up with Macmini G4 @ 1.42Ghz. Well, few $ more for the ATI x1600 could've been the best seller mac ever..... as CoreDuo iMac shows respectable gaming ability.
Originally posted by bitemymac
Still doesn't worth much....
here's some game benchmarks on the dell coreduo mini.... I mean apple mini.
http://www.barefeats.com/mincd.html
It definately shows benefit with dual channel ram, but once CPU demanding games are played, GMA950 chokes as expected.... and barely keeps up with Macmini G4 @ 1.42Ghz. Well, few $ more for the ATI x1600 could've been the best seller mac ever..... as CoreDuo iMac shows respectable gaming ability.
Yeah, but to be fair, none of those games or photoshop is running natively for the intel processor, so I kinda expected results like this. I also thought it was damn near impossible to get Unreal installed on the new Intel Macs? Anyway, I'm not sold yet that the integrated graphics is worse than the 32MB 9200 that was in the G4. Now, once Doom 3, Quake, UT 2K4, and Photoshop are universal binaries, run the benchmarks again and if the G4 still beats the Core Duo, then I'll concede that the integrated graphics need a little help. The guy's philosophy on gaming is kinda weird too. I can understand why people would want to play games on a Mac - I do myself, but you also have to be able to meet the minimum requirements to expect the system to run it well ... for example, the system requirements for UT 2K4:
933 MHz G4 - G5
OS X 10.2.8
256 MB RAM
DVD Drive
6 GB HDD space
32 MB AGP Video Card
The old mini barely met those requirements, so I'm not surprised it didn't perform well. The new mini lacks AGP video support and a G4 - G5 processor, so I'm a little surprised they got UT to install in the first place.
Anyway, just my $0.02 worth. You might also try reading the Ars Technica Review ... I think they did a pretty good job comparing the new Intel Mini and the G4 mini
Originally posted by sunilraman
good articles y'all now that the benches are coming in. personally, i would love to see a mac mini core solo or core duo be paired up with a nVidia 7600GT GPU. or, core solo with 6600GT GPU and core duo with 7600GT GPU. let the iMac lines have the x1600xt etcs.
7600gt?.... This thing edges/beats ati x1800, but nvidia never found home with apple. Driver support was just horrible compared to ATI support. Anyway, I would've been happy to take one of the coreduo mini home if it had ati x1300 with 64MB vram. Atleaset the card will support shader 2.0/3.0 and opgl 2.0 support along with much better video playback capability in deinterlacing/scaling(with proper driver release to activate avivo technology of course). If apple manages to put 7600GT in a mini.... I'll pay $999 for one of those special addition mini......
The Mac mini is NOT a GAME MACHINE
Apple did NOT create the Mac mini to be a GAME MACHINE.
Intel GMA950 chipset is NOT for GAMES.
Intel did NOT design the GMA950 for GAMES.
So why do people continue to look at the Mac mini and the GMA950 and be disappointed with its gaming benchmarks when neither were conceived to be made for gaming?
Originally posted by TenoBell
I cannot understand why this conversation continues.
The Mac mini is NOT a GAME MACHINE
Apple did NOT create the Mac mini to be a GAME MACHINE.
Intel GMA950 chipset is NOT for GAMES.
Intel did NOT design the GMA950 for GAMES.
So why do people continue to look at the Mac mini and the GMA950 and be disappointed with its gaming benchmarks when neither were conceived to be made for gaming?
I don't think apple makes any macs for gaming.... atleast they don't call or have a gaming model macs.... However, they do have macs capable of gaming with decent graphic interface to drive 3d tasks....and we're simply saying macmini can't.
We know intel didn't design GMA950 for games and it's not designed to do anything other than simple 2D desktop functions to display emails and word processing..... but this isn't acceptable for todays's pc standards other than coporate use.... I'm not going to use a macmini to do excell, word, powerpoint, and emails all day long at home. Macmini is not a corporate pc either!....
Originally posted by TenoBell
I cannot understand why this conversation continues.
The Mac mini is NOT a GAME MACHINE
Apple did NOT create the Mac mini to be a GAME MACHINE.
Intel GMA950 chipset is NOT for GAMES.
Intel did NOT design the GMA950 for GAMES.
So why do people continue to look at the Mac mini and the GMA950 and be disappointed with its gaming benchmarks when neither were conceived to be made for gaming?
Quite simply because people want a cheap macintosh computer that they can use for gaming.
I think people look at the mini as a console because of all the features Apple is touting (HD movie playback, the iLife suite, DVD burning etc), if you could play games well on them, I bet they'd be much more popular. People probably think that if it's capable of the above, surely it will be a good cheap gaming PC. Unfortunately, not so.
Jimzip
Quite simply because people want a cheap macintosh computer that they can use for gaming.
Which is a quite different issue from the current state of the mini or the market Apple has built it for.
I think people look at the mini as a console because of all the features Apple is touting (HD movie playback, the iLife suite, DVD burning etc), if you could play games well on them, I bet they'd be much more popular.
No actually PC gaming over the years is becoming less and less popular, while console and handheld gaming have become more popular.
Since the mid 90's sales of PC gaming have steadily declined to the point they are about half of what they were at their highest point.
In 1998 PC gaming software was at $1.8 billion dollars in revenue. In 2005 PC gaming software is at $953 million dollars in revenue.
In 1998 console and handheld gaming software was at $3.7 billion dollars in revenue. In 2005 console and handheld gaming software are a bit over $6 billion dollars in revenue.
but this isn't acceptable for todays's pc standards other than coporate use....
So far benchmarking of the Intel mini shows its fair with 2D gaming and suffers at 3D gaming. What barometer has gauged that 3D gaming is an absolute must for any modern computer?
If that were true Dell would not be able to sell its XPS 600 Extreme Gaming box for $4200.