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Advice needed for Mac Mini purchase

M

madmen90

Guest
Original poster
Oct 17, 2014
2
0
I'm a student with a mid-2007 Macbook. I use it for streaming video, playing VLC files, photoshop editing (once a month or so), and Word/email/internet. It's sometimes horrible with video streaming, but otherwise it does its job.

My replacement should be able to do all of this and display two HD monitors. I'm hoping the Mini will last me at least 4 years with OS updates.

I'm trying to decide between the low- and mid-tier Mac Minis:

Low-tier (1.4GHz i5): I'd choose the 8GB RAM option and install an SSD myself.
Mid-tier (2.4GHz i5): I'd install an SSD.

Questions:

Will the mid-tier option give me an extra OS X upgrade, 5 years or so down the road?

Will the low-tier option power both monitors?

Is there a good reason to drop another ~$120 for the mid-tier option?
 
M

markusbeutel

macrumors regular
Sep 26, 2014
144
14
madmen90 said:
I'm a student with a mid-2007 Macbook. I use it for streaming video, playing VLC files, photoshop editing (once a month or so), and Word/email/internet. It's sometimes horrible with video streaming, but otherwise it does its job.

My replacement should be able to do all of this and display two HD monitors. I'm hoping the Mini will last me at least 4 years with OS updates.

I'm trying to decide between the low- and mid-tier Mac Minis:

Low-tier (1.4GHz i5): I'd choose the 8GB RAM option and install an SSD myself.
Mid-tier (2.4GHz i5): I'd install an SSD.

Questions:

Will the mid-tier option give me an extra OS X upgrade, 5 years or so down the road?

Will the low-tier option power both monitors?

Is there a good reason to drop another ~$120 for the mid-tier option?
Click to expand...

Get neither and find one of the previous gen quad i7's. New models are garbage for the price in comparison. (Note, the new versions aren't able to be modified by the user either - not even the ram).
 
A

aajeevlin

macrumors 65816
Mar 25, 2010
1,427
715
markusbeutel said:
Get neither and find one of the previous gen quad i7's. New models are garbage for the price in comparison. (Note, the new versions aren't able to be modified by the user either - not even the ram).
Click to expand...

Agreed, I would be "okay" with the CPU. But the fact that you can't self upgrade the HDD/RAM that's just a big NO.
 
M

madmen90

Guest
Original poster
Oct 17, 2014
2
0
markusbeutel said:
Get neither and find one of the previous gen quad i7's. New models are garbage for the price in comparison. (Note, the new versions aren't able to be modified by the user either - not even the ram).
Click to expand...

aajeevlin said:
Agreed, I would be "okay" with the CPU. But the fact that you can't self upgrade the HDD/RAM that's just a big NO.
Click to expand...

From what I've read, the RAM isn't self-upgradeable (that's why I'd buy the 8GB option for the low-tier model), but the HDD should be, right?
 
A

aajeevlin

macrumors 65816
Mar 25, 2010
1,427
715
You are right I'm not exactly clear on the HDD. However, it's hard to get over the fact that you can't upgrade the RAM down the road.

I'm sort of in the same boat as you. I'm still running my 2009 mini, its working well but it's not as fast anymore. Plus, since I have lose faith in this upgrade I'll be picking up a quad core i7 2012 as my new mini and work horse. I plan to upgrade it as I go and sticking to it for as long as I can until (and hope) Apple will actually dish out something good.
 
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