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glasgood

macrumors member
Original poster
Dec 18, 2012
46
0
Hi,

With the arrival of the new slimmer Macbook Pro retina and iMac 2012 I cant stop thinking that the Mac Mini will also become much more thinner.

It MAY be highly likely that eventually the Mac Mini will have the RAM soldered to the logic-board and also have the same type of blade flash storage as the retina.

Would you still purchase a Mac Mini with the RAM soldered to the Logic board and / or with propriety flash storage ?

Do you think that Apple will eventually cut off the aftermarket upgrade paths whereby your only option of upping the specifications of a machine is at the point of purchase directly from Apple?
 

blanka

macrumors 68000
Jul 30, 2012
1,551
4
They should have done already, but they were lazy, so the Mini now eats into Pro/iMac/MacBook sales. Dumb if you ask me, but I like it.
Hope they keep it still the same size and stuff a 20nm version of the Nividia GTX980M into the next one together with a 16nm 3 ghz quad Rockwell.
 
Last edited:

duervo

macrumors 68020
Feb 5, 2011
2,465
1,232
Hi,

With the arrival of the new slimmer Macbook Pro retina and iMac 2012 I cant stop thinking that the Mac Mini will also become much more thinner.

It MAY be highly likely that eventually the Mac Mini will have the RAM soldered to the logic-board and also have the same type of blade flash storage as the retina.

Would you still purchase a Mac Mini with the RAM soldered to the Logic board and / or with propriety flash storage ?

Do you think that Apple will eventually cut off the aftermarket upgrade paths whereby your only option of upping the specifications of a machine is at the point of purchase directly from Apple?

That would almost be a souped-up Apple TV if they did that. It's possible, but if it happens, they can kiss my butt good-bye as a future Mini owner. I place a high priority on the ability to upgrade with minimal effort when I purchase a computer of any type. If I can't upgrade very easily, for minimal cost to me, then I simply won't consider the product as a viable choice. YMMV.
 

turtlez

macrumors 6502a
Jun 17, 2012
977
0
yeah and if they do go soldered for their whole consumer line up people will just go back to PC (I would) and Apple won't even realise it is happening.

Things are going backwards as you can see with the mini not having a discreet card anymore. It almost feels like Apple is making cheap low quality alternatives like what you used to see chinese companies doing when they imitated apple design. Sad to see Apple fall to the depths since Steve passed. Johnny Ive puts out great designs but a farrari is only as fast as its engine. Apple is already on the decline with their phones vs competitors and soon people will start to see the worth in PCs again now that it seems MS has pulled its head out and started making semi decent OS.
 

TjeuV

macrumors 6502
Dec 14, 2011
306
4
Belgium
yeah and if they do go soldered for their whole consumer line up people will just go back to PC (I would) and Apple won't even realise it is happening.

Things are going backwards as you can see with the mini not having a discreet card anymore. It almost feels like Apple is making cheap low quality alternatives like what you used to see chinese companies doing when they imitated apple design. Sad to see Apple fall to the depths since Steve passed. Johnny Ive puts out great designs but a farrari is only as fast as its engine. Apple is already on the decline with their phones vs competitors and soon people will start to see the worth in PCs again now that it seems MS has pulled its head out and started making semi decent OS.

I still don't understand why they pulled the discrete graphics card :confused:
If there'd be a discrete graphics card in there with 500 vram that 2012 would've been mine but now I'm just waiting what the mac pro update is going to give.

I surely hope they can reduce the price and even maybe a fully customisable tower. I don't need those xeon processors so how cool would it be if we could fit a mac pro with a processor alike the iMacs.
 

benwiggy

macrumors 68020
Jun 15, 2012
2,370
179
If there'd be a discrete graphics card in there with 500 vram that 2012 would've been mine but now I'm just waiting what the mac pro update is going to give.
What do you do with your Mac? I've got a 2012 Mini, and it absolutely flies. It runs OpenGL games flawlessly, drives two monitors and handles heavy Photoshop work. What do you need that GPU for, and how do you know that the HD4000 (with 768Mb of RAM) isn't good enough?
There may be faster GPUs out there, but the 4000 is fine for most uses. If there is any shortfall in graphics processing, the CPU is powerful enough to take up the slack.

As for predictions about future minis: your guess is as good as mine. And mine is that the next mini will be 28 nanometers thick. :p
 
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turtlez

macrumors 6502a
Jun 17, 2012
977
0
What do you do with your Mac? I've got a 2012 Mini, and it absolutely flies. It runs OpenGL games flawlessly, drives two monitors and handles heavy Photoshop work. What do you need that GPU for, and how do you know that the HD4000 (with 768Mb of RAM) isn't good enough?
There may be faster GPUs out there, but the 4000 is fine for most uses. If there is any shortfall in graphics processing, the CPU is powerful enough to take up the slack.

As for predictions about future minis: your guess is as good as mine. And mine is that the next mini will be 28 nanometers thick. :p

Well right now I am heavily involved in Cinema4D so viewport needs to be quick and my 5870 outperforms the HD4000. I run other pro apps but Cinema calls for the most GPU intense tasks so I won't bother listing the other ones :p

We send our files off to render farms but I still need to upgrade this 2008 Mac Pro and ram upgrades are ridiculously expensive ($1200 for 32GB of ram) which I desperately need. Mini would be instant buy if it had a good GPU(in terms of pro apps). By the way that 768mb chews into the RAM and my RAM would be pretty much all used at the same time for other reasons so it would bottleneck hard in my workflow.

Sucks to have no other option but turn to a PC...
 

Liquinn

Suspended
Apr 10, 2011
3,016
57
Well right now I am heavily involved in Cinema4D so viewport needs to be quick and my 5870 outperforms the HD4000. I run other pro apps but Cinema calls for the most GPU intense tasks so I won't bother listing the other ones :p

We send our files off to render farms but I still need to upgrade this 2008 Mac Pro and ram upgrades are ridiculously expensive ($1200 for 32GB of ram) which I desperately need. Mini would be instant buy if it had a good GPU(in terms of pro apps). By the way that 768mb chews into the RAM and my RAM would be pretty much all used at the same time for other reasons so it would bottleneck hard in my workflow.

Sucks to have no other option but turn to a PC...
I thought a Mac is technically a PC? :p
 

Acorn

macrumors 68030
Jan 2, 2009
2,642
349
macrumors
they have already transitioned the imac graphics chip to a mobile gpu. if you look at the mini at what it is, its basically a laptop without the screen. What i want to see is full mac air like blade design. utilize the 11 inch air technology motherboard and cram everything into a ultra sleek design. its well known you can build a better faster pc then a mac mini, but its the design of the mac mini that attracts people. so i want to see that design pushed to the limits and see something insane like the external ssd blade case owc released only an entire computer like that.

yes its weird. but i am weird.
 

theRAMman

macrumors regular
May 6, 2012
168
0
The Moon.
yeah and if they do go soldered for their whole consumer line up people will just go back to PC (I would) and Apple won't even realise it is happening.

Things are going backwards as you can see with the mini not having a discreet card anymore. It almost feels like Apple is making cheap low quality alternatives like what you used to see chinese companies doing when they imitated apple design. Sad to see Apple fall to the depths since Steve passed. Johnny Ive puts out great designs but a farrari is only as fast as its engine. Apple is already on the decline with their phones vs competitors and soon people will start to see the worth in PCs again now that it seems MS has pulled its head out and started making semi decent OS.

I laughed so much what I saw that :p please tell me your being sarcastic.
https://www.macrumors.com/2012/12/2...tphone-market-android-holds-strong-in-europe/
 

53x12

macrumors 68000
Feb 16, 2009
1,544
4
they have already transitioned the imac graphics chip to a mobile gpu. if you look at the mini at what it is, its basically a laptop without the screen. What i want to see is full mac air like blade design. utilize the 11 inch air technology motherboard and cram everything into a ultra sleek design. its well known you can build a better faster pc then a mac mini, but its the design of the mac mini that attracts people. so i want to see that design pushed to the limits and see something insane like the external ssd blade case owc released only an entire computer like that.

yes its weird. but i am weird.

How many people leave their mini on the top of their desk? I read a lot of threads with people trying to hide their mini or tape it upside down to bottom of desk?
 

Mojo1

macrumors 65816
Jul 26, 2011
1,244
21
By 2014 the Mac Mini won't be slimmer.. it won't even exist.

All computing will be done in The Cloud. We won't need computers on our desks any more because all the software and data will be floating in the clouds. Input devices such as keyboards and mice won't be necessary because we will communicate telepathically with The Cloud. The final transition began at midnight on December 21... That is the true meaning of the Mayan calendar event yesterday.

Apple has known this for a number of years and has been slowly evolving toward the inevitable transition. The primary goal is to gradually do away with all the computing devices that people have come to depend upon in their everyday lives. Unlike most other PC companies, Apple is very concerned that its customers not be too freaked out when the ultimate destination is reached. (It is no accident that Apple is located in central California, a place that is well-known for being open to New Age ideas. Microsoft has always been way behind Apple in this regard in part because it is located in Seattle, which is far away from any energy vortexes.)

The first step was to remove floppy drives from Macs. Optical drives were next; that process is almost complete. SSDs were created so people would become accustomed to using a data storage device without moving parts.

Apple introduced Macs that gradually became lighter and thinner so that consumers wouldn't notice that the hardware was really disappearing, slowly but surely...

Bluetooth devices freed us from cables that will no longer be necessary because The Cloud doesn't have any ports. Apple's Thunderbolt technology is the final step: it is extremely fast and the name was carefully chosen so that computer users wouldn't be frightened when the release of OS 10.10 (Sky Cheetah) turns all of our Macs into organic pumpkins. (I have a great recipe for pumpkin pie if anyone is interested...)

So try to enjoy the waning of computer hardware. Soon the days of speculating about the release of the next Mac, arguing about the importance of a discrete vs. integrated GPU and posting videos of box-openings will only be a distant memory, experiences we can share with our grandchildren when they ask us for stories about how life was before The Cloud.
 

53x12

macrumors 68000
Feb 16, 2009
1,544
4
^ On a serious note, isn't that what the Google laptop has accomplished?
 

Hexley

Suspended
Jun 10, 2009
1,641
504
As Intel, Samsung, WD, Seagate and other vendors release newer more compact parts it is inevitable that Apple will design a smaller Mac mini. Other than using smaller parts Apple would need to use SoC and solder parts together in the Minis.

An example of what could be done today would be Intel's "Next Unit of Computing Kit". The dimensions of the "NUC" and current Mac mini can be found below. Also included are the iPhone 4S, Apple TV and WD TV Live.

2012 Intel NUC: 4.59" x 4.41" x 1.55"
2012 Mac Mini : 7.7" x 7.7" x 1.4"
2012 Apple TV: 3.9" x 3.9" x 0.9"
'12 WD TV Live: 3.9" x 4.9" x 1.2"
2011 iPhone 4S: 4.5" x 2.31" x 0.37"

As for dedicated vs integrated GPUs it makes sense for Apple to use whatever Intel has included in their Core i5 and Core i7s so long as it is fast enough to push pre-installed OS X.

What I would like to see is the return to a $499 Mac mini. Would be nice to see a Mac mini being offered even lower at $399 or even $299. It would make for a great 4K UHDTV box.

They should have done already, but they were lazy, so the Mini now eats into Pro/iMac/MacBook sales. Dumb if you ask me, but I like it.
Hope they keep it still the same size and stuff a 20nm version of the Nividia GTX980M into the next one together with a 16nm 3 ghz quad Rockwell.

Last year, Apple sold 18 million Macs, including 13.5 million MacBooks and 4.6 million desktops (iMacs, minis and Mac Pros). Only the Mac Pro and mini sell fewer than 1 million per year, and the Mac Pro is considerably heavier and more expensive to ship

Source: http://tech.fortune.cnn.com/2012/12/08/apple-mac-pro-made-in-us/

I am unsure whether you were being sarcastic or not but posted above is the sales figures of Mini/Pro/iMac/MacBook
 

DakotaGuy

macrumors 601
Jan 14, 2002
4,226
3,791
South Dakota, USA
Replaceable components like RAM are nice, however lately Apple feels that most people value how thin a desktop is over expandability or serviceability.
 

Hexley

Suspended
Jun 10, 2009
1,641
504
Replaceable components like RAM are nice, however lately Apple feels that most people value how thin a desktop is over expandability or serviceability.

Apple started soldering the CPUs onto the logicboard since 2009 so it isn't impossible they will do this with the RAM.

This trend is not isolated to Apple alone. Intel's Broadwell (the microarchitecture that will replace Haswell that in turn replaces the current Ivy Bridge) is reported to be soldered to the logicboard.

Apple's compact and elegant design partially allows them to price their products above commodity PC prices.

I have to concur that most customers value it over user upgradeability. They probably buy a whole new Mac every 3-6 years.

This year's Mac mini made me realize that upgrading my 2007 iMac beyond $200 worth of upgrades isn't worth doing. What would make more sense would be to sell it as is and add $200 towards getting a 2012 Mac mini Core i5.
 

53x12

macrumors 68000
Feb 16, 2009
1,544
4
so i want to see that design pushed to the limits and see something insane like the external ssd blade case owc released only an entire computer like that.

I can understand making something thinner and lighter that is meant to be portable and carried around everyday; iPhone, iPad, iPod, MacBook Pro, MacBook air, but I fail to see the purpose or point of making an iMac or even a potential mac mini lighter and thinner for the user? I think the design as it is is fine, just make it faster and cheaper.
 

Mojo1

macrumors 65816
Jul 26, 2011
1,244
21
...just make it faster and cheaper.

Why must computers always be faster and cheaper? Aren't modern CPUs and SSDs fast enough for you? Will you be unsatisfied until the computer anticipates your input and responds before you think of it yourself?

Macs already suffer from the "cheaper is always better" paradigm. Look where that has gotten us... I can remember a time when Mac hardware was much more reliable and yes, more expensive. I gladly trade money for higher quality when it is available; in my experience higher-quality consumer goods tend to last longer, perform better and provide a more satisfying user experience. And they are often a better long-term value...

You want cheaper? There are some really cheap PCs out there...
 

53x12

macrumors 68000
Feb 16, 2009
1,544
4
Why must computers always be faster and cheaper? Aren't modern CPUs and SSDs fast enough for you? Will you be unsatisfied until the computer anticipates your input and responds before you think of it yourself?

Macs already suffer from the "cheaper is always better" paradigm. Look where that has gotten us... I can remember a time when Mac hardware was much more reliable and yes, more expensive. I gladly trade money for higher quality when it is available; in my experience higher-quality consumer goods tend to last longer, perform better and provide a more satisfying user experience. And they are often a better long-term value...

You want cheaper? There are some really cheap PCs out there...


Yes focus on making it faster and cheaper rather than thinner and lighter.

Faster will do more good on a day to day basis than being 1mm thinner. Especially for those who don't want an iMac, don't want a MBP and can't afford a Mac Pro.

Yes a cheaper mac mini in regards to entry price. Say something like a $499 intro mini. I did not mean making the quality of the mini to be made more cheaply. There is a difference.
 

blanka

macrumors 68000
Jul 30, 2012
1,551
4
They missed their chance to slim it down.
If Apple wanted to do it, they had to do it last months update. They didn't, they were lazy (they even left the FW port accidentally in which is great off course). With the move to Haswell there is no room for shrinking as it only demands more room for heat. Ivy probably left a bit of space for extra GPU power in Haswell, but if that is not the case, Apple can only turn down the CPU speed to accomodate the newer GPU. And making the CPU too slow, would be very strange, and result in a EOL for the Mini I guess.
 

Hexley

Suspended
Jun 10, 2009
1,641
504
Faster and cheaper is what Dell, HP, Lenovo, et al know how to do. And yet Mac sales has outpaced PC sales for the past 6 years and Apple sells the #1 notebook and desktop.

Screen-Shot-2012-01-11-at-6.05.19-PM.jpg


Apple's bill of materials for the $600 2009 Mac minis tend to cost about $377. So they could cut prices but I doubt they will.

Don't get me wrong. I want to see $400 and $500 Mac minis

Yes focus on making it faster and cheaper rather than thinner and lighter.

Faster will do more good on a day to day basis than being 1mm thinner. Especially for those who don't want an iMac, don't want a MBP and can't afford a Mac Pro.

Yes a cheaper mac mini in regards to entry price. Say something like a $499 intro mini. I did not mean making the quality of the mini to be made more cheaply. There is a difference.
 
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