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Thinking About a Mini

S

sird28

macrumors member
Original poster
Jan 16, 2012
88
65
Hello Everyone,

Looking for some incite here. I have been building PC's for years now, but when I was in my 20's I was a huge PC gamer. But now in my low 30's not so much. I have been interested in Mac's for awhile but hard for me to pull the trigger on the higher price tag of the iMacs. When I could build the same hardware for less, but I do know it would not be as pretty :)

So I was thinking of replacing my old desktop which is an AMD X64 Dual Core 3.0Ghz with 6GB Ram and 500GB Harddrive and ATI 4870 Graphics card.

I have a montior keyboard mouse and speakers and thinking a mini would be a good solution. I have 2 Apple Tv's, iPad, and Iphone 5 thinking the integration would be a beautiful thing.

My only problem is I would still like to game a little, mostly games like League of Legends, maybe one day a return to World of Warcraft but doubtful. With 16GB ram would the HD 4000 be able to run LoL without lag and dropped FPS.

Thanks for the help
 
xlii

xlii

macrumors 68000
Sep 19, 2006
1,867
121
Millis, Massachusetts
The 2012 mini is a great machine. I like mine a lot. I can't speak for how well it plays modern games. The only modern game I play is Starcraft II and it plays that just fine on medium settings.

That said... if you don't need a machine right now... the mini should be getting a refresh between now and the end of 2013. We don't know when it will come. It will have a much better GPU.

It's also the perfect wife machine. While you and I might judge a machine on how well it runs our programs... a wife (mine anyway) rates it on how good it looks and how quiet it is.
 
Last edited:
S

sird28

macrumors member
Original poster
Jan 16, 2012
88
65
Thanks for the info, my fiance love macs and I would most likely duo boot the machine as well. But I have been a computer science major and I like to tinker with other OS. I haven't been on a mac in at least 6 years so I want to try it out.

I really dont do modern gaming so I am not playing Crysis or anything like that, the most im doing would be LoL Starcraft, and WoW.

Thanks!
 
M

mlody

macrumors 68000
Nov 11, 2012
1,592
1,220
Windy City
I am also considering a mac mini (again), but as a secondary computer, not primary. I already had one - 2012 base i7 and i wasn't happy with it as i was trying to replace my powerfull i7-3770k desktop. Since i built myself a brand new haswell i7-4770 system few weeks ago, my mac needs are more reasonable , and i think the base mini will cut it for me this time around. Since I am not in the rush to get one, i am definitely going to wait for haswell based mini and it they are any decent, i will pick one up, or get 2012 refurb and call it a day.
 
T

tuxon86

macrumors 65816
May 22, 2012
1,321
477
I recommend you get a mac keyboard instead of keeping your old one. The key mapping is different than on a pc. You can use your old mouse.
 
AQUADock

AQUADock

macrumors 65816
Mar 20, 2011
1,049
37
tuxon86 said:
I recommend you get a mac keyboard instead of keeping your old one. The key mapping is different than on a pc. You can use your old mouse.
Click to expand...

Its hardly different, but i would also recommend an apple keyboard anyway due to them being one of the best keyboard I've used.
 
M

minifridge1138

macrumors 65816
Jun 26, 2010
1,175
197
I use several Macs and am very pleased with my Mini. It is a base model and I don't game on it; I just use it for Software Development.

I'm really not sure how well it will game on ultra settings, so maybe someone else can chime in on that.

tuxon86 said:
I recommend you get a mac keyboard instead of keeping your old one. The key mapping is different than on a pc. You can use your old mouse.
Click to expand...

As for the keyboard, there are a few times when the PC keyboard will confuse you but eventually you get used to it.
 
T

tuxon86

macrumors 65816
May 22, 2012
1,321
477
AQUADock said:
Its hardly different, but i would also recommend an apple keyboard anyway due to them being one of the best keyboard I've used.
Click to expand...

It is if you are using a non english keymap.
The ponctuations and accents are mapped differently than on a windows machine. I was speaking from my personnal point of view.
 
fig

fig

macrumors 6502a
Jun 13, 2012
916
84
Austin, TX
xlii said:
That said... if you don't need a machine right now... the mini should be getting a refresh between now and the end of 2013. We don't know when it will come. It will have a much better GPU.
Click to expand...

It might, trying to predict when new Minis come out is pretty hit or miss.

And the GPU difference isn't really that significant, for a game like LoL the dual i7 will handle it just fine.
 
DrakkenWar

DrakkenWar

macrumors 6502
Nov 7, 2010
272
0
San Antonio,Texas
I cannot speak for gaming on the 2012..

But on my 2011 mac mini, I have played EvE online, which is pretty demanding of a computer and more recently Star Trek Online. Neither have really been all that great, but all were playable. I did have to lower all settings to medium, and with the wine wrapper issues with STO is still is not all that good. But it is a game that I love to play, so I am looking to work with the dev that wrote the wrapper to make things better.

Overall? I have to mini's, the one in my sig and another 1.83 core Duo with 2.5 gigs of ram running 10.6. They are both great machines for anything that I throw at them. But I am also the guy that is on my PB G4 1.5 at the moment. So take it as you will.
 
Fishrrman

Fishrrman

macrumors Penryn
Feb 20, 2009
28,348
12,464
"Its hardly different, but i would also recommend an apple keyboard anyway due to them being one of the best keyboard I've used."

I beg to disagree.

Apple has not made a decent keyboard since the ADB days. Aside: I feel the same way about their mice -- if you like the mouse you have now on the PC, it's easy to "move over" to the Mac.

I simply cannot type on the new "flat" aluminum keyboards. My fingers can't "find the right keys".

To the original poster:
If you currently use a "tradtional" styled keyboard -- that is to say, one with "shaped" keys that are well-defined and fit under your fingers easily -- you may find the Apple aluminum keyboards very difficult to adjust to.

There are traditionally-designed keyboards with a key layout designed to work with Macs. That's what I use. MacAlly sells them, as do others.
 
AQUADock

AQUADock

macrumors 65816
Mar 20, 2011
1,049
37
Fishrrman said:
"Its hardly different, but i would also recommend an apple keyboard anyway due to them being one of the best keyboard I've used."

I beg to disagree.

Apple has not made a decent keyboard since the ADB days. Aside: I feel the same way about their mice -- if you like the mouse you have now on the PC, it's easy to "move over" to the Mac.

I simply cannot type on the new "flat" aluminum keyboards. My fingers can't "find the right keys".

To the original poster:
If you currently use a "tradtional" styled keyboard -- that is to say, one with "shaped" keys that are well-defined and fit under your fingers easily -- you may find the Apple aluminum keyboards very difficult to adjust to.

There are traditionally-designed keyboards with a key layout designed to work with Macs. That's what I use. MacAlly sells them, as do others.
Click to expand...
It was just based on my opinion, I prefer chiclet styled keyboards however I can understand if you prefer mechanical type keyboards it may make chiclet keyboards seem bad.
 
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