Returning my 2014 mac mini

Larry-K said:

I know I don't, so if you point me to a white paper, I'll read it.

Of course, if you're running on a machine with more than 4gigs of memory to write this, I won't take you seriously.

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Cape Dave said:

You, kind sir, are absolutely 100% totally completely RIGHT! The computer will do more longer and run better with 16GB. I find it hard to believe that in 2014 any human being is arguing for anything less. It is pitiful.

This is especially true if you sell the machine at some point in the future. Or give it to a friend. If it has only 4GB, then by all means give it to an ENEMY.

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Meister said:

The machine I write this on sports a whooping 512mb ram

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ymarker said:

Well folks after a great week, I have decided to return the 2014 mac mini 8 gb ram with the samsung 256gb pcie back to apple.

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sublunar said:

The Parallels note was interesting. I'm wondering if 16Gb of RAM would solve it because it could be the swap file kicking in due to low RAM? Did you take a look at Disk and Memory usage on the Activity Monitor too?

I don't see any lag while running a 16Gb i5 256Gb Samsung PCIe 2013 13" Retina Macbook Pro in clamshell mode on a 30" Dell. That's similar hardware to your Mini and I am very pleased with the fact that the fan doesn't kick in and the rMBP gets vaguely warm while doing my low intensity tasks.

However I am up to 8Gb-9Gb usage with dozens of Safari windows and other small apps open such as Coda or Textwrangler. That's low memory pressure according to Activity Monitor. I don't run any virtual machines as of yet although I am thinking of purchasing VMWare Fusion or Parallels and I am following forum posts at this stage.

Looking at the way Mac OS X is going I would have maxed the RAM on a 2014 Mini to 16Gb because of the memory compression technology that Yosemite apparently has which could also be causing the apparent lag. Does your Mini lag while not running something as memory intensive as Parallels?

The improved fan assembly of the 2014 was of particular interest to me for reasons of quiet computing. The big plus point of the 2014 Mac Mini is the increased thermal headroom due to the more efficient processor and the fan. What I take from that is any 2014 Mini should be able to run at top speed for longer and be quieter. The only question, which early adopters like yourself should be able to answer for the rest of us, is at what point does the fan kick in for a sustained period and is it noisy compared to a 2012 for example?

The point I am trying to make is that for some people, quiet computing and energy efficiency has a value attached to it and Apple haven't stopped pushing the Mini as the most energy efficient Mac. I don't like the way that this is being cast aside as a plus point by many of the naysayers in the hundreds of replies to some of the threads in this forum.

Those folks are too busy trying to get Mac Pro performance at a third of the cost, and seem to be crying about the loss of that option.

Apple want people on the latest OS to reduce support costs and the 'upgrade fee' appears to be having to buy a new Mac more often than they might care to. Do they complain about the resale value of their 'older' Mac being far higher than the 'scrap value' of many Windows desktops at a similar age?

There are some PC home theatre builders who have to juggle low wattage cpu, with passive graphics capable of running 1080p or perhaps even 4k, into a small case, all to run silently in their living room. Some of them think nothing of paying large sums of money for a passive cpu heat sink and case fans that will help keep the noise down. These guys are not bragging about building the cheapest computer but they discuss things such as fan-less power supplies, motherboards, cpus and graphics cards (if applicable, some of these guys look on the Iris Pro 5200 in the low end iMacs with interest). Look at what Apple achieve over the supposedly noisier Brix or NUC products.

The ifixit teardown suggests that only 2 802.11ac aerials have been used within the 2014 model - on par with the Macbook Air, but not the full 3x3 set-up within the Retina models. This is fine for the form factor I suppose as some users might use the ethernet instead.

I think the minority of folks are whining about losing their 4-core option for an assortment of their own reasons. Mainly price I would have thought.

I would have liked to see a 4-core option with Iris Pro 5200 graphics, yes in a case with a bespoke cooling solution for silent computing at sustained 100% usage but I don't really see Apple doing it unless they are planning to axe some of their low end iMac offerings.

There's a few experienced forum posters in here who have shared their experiences of hammering a 4 core Mini and seeing temperatures (and fan noises) rise to the point where components such as hard drives and motherboards start to fail early. This can't be a preferred solution either.

The speculation on the Primate Labs site about the different sockets forcing Apple into a decision about Quad Core vs Dual core makes sense to me. I'm satisfied with Apple retaining the existing case but don't forget I am looking to see if you can thrash the 2014 mini for longer without noise and eventual heat death being such an issue.

Finally, a bit of sketchy speculation regarding the future of the Mini. We know that 2015 should see the advent of the Skylake chipset which will come with Thunderbolt 3 and improved Iris Graphics. Let's say that Intel delays see it slipping to 2016 meaning the 2014 Mini becomes an 18-24 month product with its own entertaining thread about replacement.

Thunderbolt 3 will enable 4k displays with a single Thunderbolt cable rather than the balkanised multi stream transport methods which appear to be un-Apple-like for now.

We also know that if Apple want to release a 4k or 5k Cinema Display they'll want all concurrently available desktop Macs to be able to use it. I think even the current Mac Pro will need a Skylake refresh to be able to connect directly to an Apple branded solution using Thunderbolt 3, and the iMacs will need updating too as well as the 2014 Mini which only has Thunderbolt 2 and slow Iris graphics.

The Retina iMac was launched with powerful OpenCL graphics card and only i7 processors and currently represents very good value for money if you want a 5k display (computer for free etc) and would have purchased the i7 upgrade and fusion drive anyway.

If Apple are planning a 21.5" 4k Retina iMac next year they'll similarly use a powerful graphics card (perhaps one of those Nvidia 970 ones spotted in Yosemite builds) and it would be nice to differentiate by using an upgraded i7 and Fusion drive in those models too.

It continues to reinforce the notion that Apple are heading towards improved graphics and OpenCL compute performance ahead of cpu considerations.

I believe that the by the time Skylake comes along the dual core U-series mobile chips in the mid and high level 2014 Mini currently will have vastly improved graphics and be capable of running 4k displays at 60Hz without significant performance concerns. In effect we could be talking about Iris Pro 5200 graphics in a 25w part (sorry there might be a video ad on that page).

If they reuse the same case for the Mini going forward and keep improving the cooling and noise reduction solutions without feeling the need to make it smaller, we might have a little powerhouse of a usable computer.

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RugDr said:

Most important thing for me is that I wanted to be able to at least jump from my quad 2.6 w/ 16GB to 32GB RAM.

Very disappointed in Apple for this one.

My 2012 is just fine. Thunderbolt, Shmunderbolt.

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