Is the 2.6 GHz i7 upgrade worth the cost? (2012 Mac mini)

[Exodist]

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So based on Intel's current product line and prices, it seems like the majority of chips they get off the line work as 2.3GHz parts, and a much smaller percentage function at 2.6GHz at a voltage low enough to meet the specifications for the chip used in the Mini.

So instead of thinking of a 2.3GHz chip as somehow substandard or defective, you could think of the 2.6GHz chips as the ones that just barely work at the low specified voltage.
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While I dont disagree, I cant fully agree either. There is no difference other then clock multipliers on all of the Ivy Core i7 CPUs other then over all quality of production. But being that the i7-3770 runs at 3.4Ghz, its a safe bet any CPU slower then 3Ghz is just as good and of same quality as the other. So to say that intels 2.3, 2.6 and 2.7Ghz CPUs offered in Minis are better then the other isnt accurate at least now. Believe it or not they will actually lower clock speeds on CPUs and sell them at lower speeds just to meet market demands. Overclockers love this and often buy CPUs advertised lower then ramp them back up to what they can actually run at and save on cost.

The only production quality issue is that many of the i7 desktop CPUs made in Malay had cheap thermal compound under the heat spreader. However those made in the Costa Rica facility had much better compound and do run cooler. I know I got lucky and got a Costa for my system and its run cool ever overclocked to 4.2Ghz. Not sure were the mobile cpus were made for the minis, but I can say mine (i7-3720QM 2.6Ghz) runs very cool.

But to answer the OPs question is it worth it. I thought it was to me. 4 real cores at 2.3 -vs- 2.6. That 1200Mhz more power when not in turbo mode. One way of looking at it is thats a half a core more power. Since you cant upgrade it later on, it seemed logical to go with the 2.6. They did offer a 2.7Ghz model for 250 USD more. Now that IMHO was NOT worth the money. The chips themselves barely cost 250. I only gave 299.00 for my i7-3770 in my gaming rig. So IMHO 2.6 is the best value in the long run. Its only a hundred bucks, so if you keep the system for 2 years before upgrading. Then your only looking at $4.16 more per month for the investment. If $4 a month doent hurt your financially, then I would go for it.

 

[motrek]

While I dont disagree, I cant fully agree either. There is no difference other then clock multipliers on all of the Ivy Core i7 CPUs other then over all quality of production. But being that the i7-3770 runs at 3.4Ghz, its a safe bet any CPU slower then 3Ghz is just as good and of same quality as the other. So to say that intels 2.3, 2.6 and 2.7Ghz CPUs offered in Minis are better then the other isnt accurate at least now. Believe it or not they will actually lower clock speeds on CPUs and sell them at lower speeds just to meet market demands. Overclockers love this and often buy CPUs advertised lower then ramp them back up to what they can actually run at and save on cost.
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Indeed, Intel doesn't adjust their product line and pricing model depending on what's coming off the manufacturing line that day, so if they make a bunch of parts that are capable of 2.6 but have orders for 2.3 parts, they will downclock chips to satisfy demand. This will happen further into the production run when they've got any manufacturing kinks worked out.

Basically there may or may not be quality differences between various parts, but that's irrelevant unless you're into overclocking. Anything Intel sells you will be made well enough to work to specifications.

As for some i7s running at 3.4GHz, you're not taking into account voltages. Those are desktop parts. It's entirely possible that a 2.6GHz mobile i7 of the kind in the Mac Mini needs to be made to higher specifications than a 3.4GHz desktop part...

 

[DinoMac]

Since no one has really mentioned the Fusion drive upgrade, I can assume that is a waste of money, eh?

 

[paulrbeers]

Since no one has really mentioned the Fusion drive upgrade, I can assume that is a waste of money, eh?

Not necessarily. If you can afford it, and are leery about tearing apart your Mac Mini and playing with terminal commands, then buying that from Apple is just fine. Memory can be easily upgraded so that's silly to buy from Apple.

The point about whether to go 2.3 vs 2.6 is simply that the average person has no need for this. The extra power will go unused. It also won't really extend the usable life of your computer because the 2.3 vs 2.6 of the same generation chip will both (most likely) be "unusable" around the same time. The other argument is that it will give you a higher resale value is fairly silly as well because when it comes to selling Macs, you rarely get even half the upgrade value back when you go to sell (i.e. if you pay an extra $100 for the upgrade you will be lucky to be able to sell it for $50 more).

Now if you need the power or just have boat loads of cash sitting around unused, then go for it. No reason in this case to go ahead and get the upgrade since you can't upgrade it later.

 

[motrek]

Since no one has really mentioned the Fusion drive upgrade, I can assume that is a waste of money, eh?

Quite the contrary, the Fusion drive upgrade will give you a huge, extremely noticeable performance boost whereas I think most people would be hard pressed to notice any difference between the 2.3 and 2.6 clock speed upgrade.

If you are comfortable managing your own files between drives (i.e., offloading music, videos, photos, etc. to a hard drive) then you can get SSD performance easier and cheaper than the Fusion upgrade though. Personally I bought a cheap SSD ($80) and a cheap external USB 3 drive enclosure ($15) and use that as my main drive and it works great.

 

[eizen]

Now if you need the power or just have boat loads of cash sitting around unused, then go for it. No reason in this case to go ahead and get the upgrade since you can't upgrade it later.

$100 upgrade is equal to having a boat load of cash?
Makes me feel bad about getting the 2.6 when you put it like that lol
Isn't it simmilar to why buy banna republic clothing rather then walmart clothing when your essentially just covering your self up. Yeah but you feel better also. Hmm not sure if that analogy is that great.

 

[paulrbeers]

$100 upgrade is equal to having a boat load of cash?
Makes me feel bad about getting the 2.6 when you put it like that lol
Isn't it simmilar to why buy banna republic clothing rather then walmart clothing when your essentially just covering your self up. Yeah but you feel better also. Hmm not sure if that analogy is that great.

Since I guess you missed my point, most will not use the extra power and therefore if you have boat loads of cash just sitting around then go ahead and spend the money for it. Those of us trying to be fiscally responsible in this time of economic distress can find much better uses for our money (yes even $100 long term invested is better spend than a useless upgrade).

 

[53x12]

Since I guess you missed my point, most will not use the extra power and therefore if you have boat loads of cash just sitting around then go ahead and spend the money for it. Those of us trying to be fiscally responsible in this time of economic distress can find much better uses for our money (yes even $100 long term invested is better spend than a useless upgrade).

Useless upgrade? Hey, at least you can look at your geekbench score and smile.

 

[entzoe05]

I ordered the 2.6. I use VMware Fusion and run a Windows VM for working when I'm home and that takes a lot of CPU so every little bit helps. I ordered the Fusion drives too because VMware Fusion has to work sweet on a Fusion drive, right? Its like Fusion squared. I'm surprised they're not suing each other over the name...

Hi Chrise2. I'm planning to get a VMWare Fusion. Got the same specs with your Mini. Just wondering, when you use your vmware fusion, is your fan rpm going full speed? How about the cpu temperature? Thanks!

 

[paulrbeers]

Useless upgrade? Hey, at least you can look at your geekbench score and smile.

And that's why it's useless. Great you can run geek bench all day and look at the numbers. If that makes you feel good by all means. I still use a 2006 Mac Pro and I run about 2-3 VMs on it at any given time. It's more than enough power for what I do which is a lot more "hardcore" then most people. My geek bench score is less than 10k, but I'm not upgrading.

 

[braddman]

I don't even have to type a paragraph to justify why of course it is worth the money.

 

[paulrbeers]

I don't even have to type a paragraph to justify why of course it is worth the money.

Wow, thanks Newbie... Glad you registered to enlighten us! So if someone is doing word processing, surfing the internet, or even gaming (because the GPU will be the bottleneck log before the processor), it's still $100 well spent? How about VM's? Nope probably not because 4 cores vs 4 cores still wouldn't matter. Unless you are doing some serious video encoding, extensive number crunching, massive renderings, or other CPU intensive tasks, the GPU will be your bottleneck. Glad you took the time to enlighten us....

 

[paulrbeers]

One further comment on this, is that you can usually pick up "base" configurations on sale. For Example, last generation Mid-Mini's often went for around $750 at retailers like Amazon. Amazon (nor most other retailers) do not sell the BTO/CTO Apple computers so you are stuck usually buying from Apple directly which means you have to pay Apple's price + 100 which equates now to a difference of $750 vs $900 so the upgrade actually costs you $150.

Just something to chew on....

 

[BingClawsby]

One further comment on this, is that you can usually pick up "base" configurations on sale. For Example, last generation Mid-Mini's often went for around $750 at retailers like Amazon. Amazon (nor most other retailers) do not sell the BTO/CTO Apple computers so you are stuck usually buying from Apple directly which means you have to pay Apple's price + 100 which equates now to a difference of $750 vs $900 so the upgrade actually costs you $15

wait... macmall sells pretty much any configuration

i plan on getting a 2.6 i7, fusion, 4gb ram and upgrade to 16 myself. they sell that config.

granted they'll all be only around 50 bucks cheaper than the apple store but you're never going to find bigger discounts on new machines till they are replaced and being blown out

 

[paulrbeers]

wait... macmall sells pretty much any configuration

Again I said most retailers AND most retailers charge more for the "upgrade" than Apple does. Macmall and MacConnection both sell them but the cost of the "upgrade" is more than $100 (Macmall is just over and MacConnection is $106) and their starting prices are rarely discounted more than $10-15. However, many places like J&R, Amazon, BestBuy, etc. do not and those are usually the places that offer the biggest discounts on Apple computers. Even Macmall's black friday only offered a "deal" on the lowest end Mini and that was only $25! Many other retailers offer greater discounts on a daily basis and not just black friday. So again my original statement is true, that if you buy the Mid-Mini with the upgrade you are still going to have to pay roughly 900 (even from Mac Mall or MacConnection).

 

[53x12]

wait... macmall sells pretty much any configuration

i plan on getting a 2.6 i7, fusion, 4gb ram and upgrade to 16 myself. they sell that config.

granted they'll all be only around 50 bucks cheaper than the apple store but you're never going to find bigger discounts on new machines till they are replaced and being blown out

Right. Unless you also save on sales tax with Amazon/Macmall over Apple.com which could be another $80-90.

 

[paulrbeers]

granted they'll all be only around 50 bucks cheaper than the apple store but you're never going to find bigger discounts on new machines till they are replaced and being blown out

Also this is not true. I bought my base Mini 2011 from Amazon for $560 brand new only about 4 months after they were released (they were released in July 2011 and I bought mine in October 2011). It wasn't on sale, this was just the going price at Amazon. In a month or two you will see the same prices at Amazon as this. Right now they are going for regularly around $58 and $785.

 

[BingClawsby]

Again I said most retailers AND most retailers charge more for the "upgrade" than Apple does.

yeah, my bto config from macmall is only $10 cheaper than apple (1139 vs 1149 respectively). i thought it was a bit more. its probably contractual as apple has its stores as opposed to many other items you can buy that have big discounts from dealers than buying from the manufacturer directly.

Right. Unless you also save on sales tax with Amazon/Macmall over Apple.com which could be another $80-90.

yeah, those days are mostly over unfortunately. they both charge sales tax no matter what state. too bad newegg isn't a mac reseller (except for a few refurbs). they still don't charge out of state taxes

 

[53x12]

yeah, those days are mostly over unfortunately. they both charge sales tax no matter what state. too bad newegg isn't a mac reseller (except for a few refurbs). they still don't charge out of state taxes

What are you talking about Willis? Macmall doesn't charge sales tax unless you are in CA, IL, TN, NY I believe.

Currently Amazon only charges sales tax to the following states, however I know a few more states have been/will be added to the list this upcoming year (MA?): CA, KS, KY, NY, ND, PA, TX, WA.

But Macmall and Amazon definitely don't charge sales tax in every state.

 

[BingClawsby]

What are you talking about Willis? Macmall doesn't charge sales tax unless you are in CA, IL, TN, NY I believe.

Currently Amazon only charges sales tax to the following states, however I know a few more states have been/will be added to the list this upcoming year (MA?): CA, KS, KY, NY, ND, PA, TX, WA.

But Macmall and Amazon definitely don't charge sales tax in every state.

lol... they both charge in mine, so it just as well might be all states! hehe

 

[53x12]

lol... they both charge in mine, so it just as well might be all states! hehe

Ok. Well that is significantly different than "they both charge sales tax no matter what state."

 

[chrise2]

Hi Chrise2. I'm planning to get a VMWare Fusion. Got the same specs with your Mini. Just wondering, when you use your vmware fusion, is your fan rpm going full speed? How about the cpu temperature? Thanks!

Just seeing this now. I run a Windows 8 VM w/ Office 2013 for work. The mac has 8 GB total RAM, 4 for the Windows VM, leaving 4 for OS X. It runs fine. 16 GB would have given me more breathing room though I suppose. Performance wise, it works great. CPU stays very low. I gave the VM 2 vCPU and the mini handles it very well. The i7 allows hyper-threading and combined with the quad core, it works well. Basic tasks keep the CPU and the fan low. Obviously CPU intensive tasks in the VM causes the fan to kick in.

 

[braddman]

Wow, thanks Newbie... Glad you registered to enlighten us! So if someone is doing word processing, surfing the internet, or even gaming (because the GPU will be the bottleneck log before the processor), it's still $100 well spent? How about VM's? Nope probably not because 4 cores vs 4 cores still wouldn't matter. Unless you are doing some serious video encoding, extensive number crunching, massive renderings, or other CPU intensive tasks, the GPU will be your bottleneck. Glad you took the time to enlighten us....

I had typed this long boring reply but why bother.

Get the base model and downgrade the RAM to 1gb.

 

[CraigJ]

solid 10% increase

According to all the tests I've seen, geekbench, etc, you can count on a solid 10% performance increase. So a 12.5% increase in price for an extra 10% performance. I will be running dual monitors, parallels and photoshop, so it's worth it to me. I will also be replacing the stock HD with an OWC 6G pro SSD, and putting in a Scorpio Black 7200RPM 750GB drive for a home build fusion setup, + 16GB RAM. This setup will cost me $1,570 all-in, delivered. Plus an extra monitor when I get around to it.

I was originally going to get the iMac, but this is more cost effective for me and pretty close in performance to the iMac - 11600 geekbench vs 12700, and I can rotate the mini to the living room in a year or two and buy a new one.

 

[CraigJ]

Just because you have a bunch of stuff running doesn't mean you're making full use of even one core. Most of the stuff you list only takes a tiny fraction of one core's time--listening to music in iTunes, for example. That doesn't even take 5% of one core on my Mini. Ripping a DVD--that's just copying data from the USB port to the hard drive at a relatively slow rate. I'm not going to rip a DVD to check, but that can't take much CPU either. Running VMs doesn't matter unless you're actually *doing* something in the VMs.

Basically you have to check Activity Monitor to see how much CPU time you're actually using. I have a dozen programs open and at least a dozen web pages (including some with Flash) and according to Activity Monitor I'm using less than a third of one core, so I would expect that if I did anything CPU intensive then I would get almost the full benefit of single-core turbo boost.

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Whoops, forgot the rest of your post.

As for software always requiring more resources--that's true most of the time but certainly not all the time. Snow Leopard ran faster and used less memory than Leopard, for example. I can think of half a dozen examples off the top of my head of newer versions of software using less resources, but I guess that's academic.

I don't think getting a CPU that's 10% faster is going to make your computer last longer before it becomes obsolete. It means that a 10 second operation will take an extra second. I doubt anybody will think that extra second is a deal-breaker... as in, "I would have been happy if this took 10 seconds but instead it took 11 and now I'm going to throw this piece of junk out the window..."

YOu don't get an upgrade like this for average utilization. You get it so when you're processing something in Photoshop and running a VM the machine is still usable, if marginally so. My CPU cores hover around 25%, but every once in a while when doing something intense they get pegged at 100%. That's when you want an upgraded CPU.

While there are exceptions, it is generally the case that new software has new features that need more cycles. Snow Leopard is one of those exceptions. Nonetheless, it's essentially a 10% increase in performance for a 12.5% increase in price.

It's worth it to some, not to others. for me @ $100 it's a no brainer. Especially in light of all the stupid crap I spend well over $100 a month on...