My 1.83GHz, Intel Core Duo, 1GB ram Mac Mini from 2007 was starting to feel very sluggish. Lion coming out and requiring 2GB ram meant something had to be done! I thought it might be useful to share my experiences of doing this. I don't do this sort of thing often or for the sake of it but I just want to be economical and not wasteful and get the best out of what I have. I also will only tinker with out of warranty stuff where if I totally screw it up I won't cry but chalk it up to experience.
I concluded that apart from the obvious ram upgrade, a move to an SSD would be enough to make a significant difference. I figure the graphics, cpu and so on good enough for my needs as the machine is hooked up to a plasma in the living room so typically does surfing and playing music / movies. I discarded a processor upgrade on cost grounds and had no need to upgrade the DVD drive and only a G router so no point in upgrading the wireless to N either.
I did a lot of research but in the end only two websites - everymac for checking specs and ifixit for instructions were needed. Everymac was great because they indicated 4GB ram would be possible where the general advice (including the Crucial analyser tool) was telling me 2GB. Some sites even say you install 4GB and you'll be able to address 3GB. I bought from Crucial partly for convenience but partly because their SSD looked on paper to be very fast, albeit so quick the Mini may not get the full benefit. They delivered in just 22 hours for free. Choosing an SSD is simple, you just buy a 2.5" SATA drive and you'd be hard pushed to go wrong. I went for a 64GB one to replace the 80GB HDD.
Overall I would say the actual upgrade is not too difficult. I won't repeat the instructions (ifixit) but would say that getting the case open and shut is the hardest bit and that the case is not as flush now as it was beforehand though no one would notice. You have to take care with the cables and be quite methodical. I was cautious and did the ram, fired her up to check all was well and then did the SSD and a fresh OS install. Next time I would do both at the same time.
With the ram upgraded it was starting to feel a lot better. It was useful to do it in two stages to get a feel for how it was coming along. However, with the SSD in, it flies. It actually feels like the most responsive computer I have ever used! My theory that a dual core 1.83 processor is good enough and not the bottleneck seems to have been proved. No one says the A5 is too slow and that is a dual core at more like 1GHz, accepting it's not a straight comparison.
So for £140 / $225, considerably less than I would have spent on the difference between and a new one and what I could get on eBay for my current one, I have the best computer I have ever used.
Now it's time to set up that fat NAS for the music and photos and so on and plan upgrading the rest of my machines to SSD!!
I concluded that apart from the obvious ram upgrade, a move to an SSD would be enough to make a significant difference. I figure the graphics, cpu and so on good enough for my needs as the machine is hooked up to a plasma in the living room so typically does surfing and playing music / movies. I discarded a processor upgrade on cost grounds and had no need to upgrade the DVD drive and only a G router so no point in upgrading the wireless to N either.
I did a lot of research but in the end only two websites - everymac for checking specs and ifixit for instructions were needed. Everymac was great because they indicated 4GB ram would be possible where the general advice (including the Crucial analyser tool) was telling me 2GB. Some sites even say you install 4GB and you'll be able to address 3GB. I bought from Crucial partly for convenience but partly because their SSD looked on paper to be very fast, albeit so quick the Mini may not get the full benefit. They delivered in just 22 hours for free. Choosing an SSD is simple, you just buy a 2.5" SATA drive and you'd be hard pushed to go wrong. I went for a 64GB one to replace the 80GB HDD.
Overall I would say the actual upgrade is not too difficult. I won't repeat the instructions (ifixit) but would say that getting the case open and shut is the hardest bit and that the case is not as flush now as it was beforehand though no one would notice. You have to take care with the cables and be quite methodical. I was cautious and did the ram, fired her up to check all was well and then did the SSD and a fresh OS install. Next time I would do both at the same time.
With the ram upgraded it was starting to feel a lot better. It was useful to do it in two stages to get a feel for how it was coming along. However, with the SSD in, it flies. It actually feels like the most responsive computer I have ever used! My theory that a dual core 1.83 processor is good enough and not the bottleneck seems to have been proved. No one says the A5 is too slow and that is a dual core at more like 1GHz, accepting it's not a straight comparison.
So for £140 / $225, considerably less than I would have spent on the difference between and a new one and what I could get on eBay for my current one, I have the best computer I have ever used.
Now it's time to set up that fat NAS for the music and photos and so on and plan upgrading the rest of my machines to SSD!!
site they list it as having improved graphics 2x and a whole lot of other stuff. When did they upgrade the new Mac Minis? 
