Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
2018 MacBook Air and Mac mini Hands-On: Long-Awaited Updates Don't Disappoint
- Thread starter MacRumors
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
AND it has drag and drop! If he was going to complain about the iPad, he should have stuck to features not in the OS already.
But even then, it appears his biggest complaint is that the iPad Pro is not a windows laptop.
Not from me!
My complaint is Apple claims it has a desktop class processor and that it is pricey but they hobble it with a limited UI and arbitrary limitation. Yes, I know it shouldn't surprise me because we are talking about Apple.
I was hoping they would update the form factor of the mac mini, especially after 4 years of totally doing nothing and a substantial price increase. Very little effort for the new version from Apple.
The cooling is still not good enough in this design and no ability to nicely add an air filter like in the first gen mac mini designs (a third party made a beautiful effective air filter base). It maybe fine for air-conditioned and clean environments, but not when the ambient temp is approaching 35C (95F). And stackable mac mini's? Unless the ambient temp is 10C (50F), they are going to fry.
The cooling is still not good enough in this design and no ability to nicely add an air filter like in the first gen mac mini designs (a third party made a beautiful effective air filter base). It maybe fine for air-conditioned and clean environments, but not when the ambient temp is approaching 35C (95F). And stackable mac mini's? Unless the ambient temp is 10C (50F), they are going to fry.
I'm happy with the new Mini specs, even though they still rip us off with RAM and SSD prices. All models should already come with 16Gb RAM, IMO. No PC is sold with less standard.
So, to get what I want it will cost me $1199 which is basically the same as the current model but with a better chip.
256Gb SSD should also be standard. I guess Apple will never get over their high margins at any cost mentality.
I'd get the $799 model with the 256Gb SSD Drive and 16Gb RAM
So, to get what I want it will cost me $1199 which is basically the same as the current model but with a better chip.
256Gb SSD should also be standard. I guess Apple will never get over their high margins at any cost mentality.
I'd get the $799 model with the 256Gb SSD Drive and 16Gb RAM
Last edited:
The extra $100 for the MacBook does get you double the storage. The 256gb Air costs $1400
The reason they kept it they same size and form factor was more than likely due to the fact that so many mini's are used in server and render farms. The racks that all these places use would basically become useless if they changed the mini.
Your right, they always rip us off with the RAM. At least this time the RAM is upgradeable and you can get it for half the price on your own. You do get more upgrades than just the CPU (2 cores to 4 cores) as well. Better versions of Bluetooth, HDMI and Thunderbolt is now Thunderbolt 3. I am guessing the HD will be faster as well but won't know until we start looking inside.
Where is the MacBook Pro 2018 with a matte 13" display, a scissor switches keyboard, user-upgradeable RAM and storage, Type A USB port, and WITHOUT touch id and touch bar ???
I don't use any biometrics. Strong MacBook PW and never use iCloud. Nothing is on my iPhone that I care about, so 4 digit is enough.
To be fair they've already started with ignoring Moore's Law - "but it's 10x more powerful than 10 years ago". I should bloody well hope so.
I don't think 128Gb is enough though, and 8Gb RAM these days on a Mac is really limiting. I just don't see a large population of people buying the base model as a desktop.
For HTPC, those days are really over, with Apple TV 4K and the gazillion other streaming devices being 90% of the market.
For arcade machines, Raspberry Pi is king.
I just don't see it. Apple always has been expensive, but they are getting more expensive, and competition is much closer these days.
I think you are comparing apples to oranges. That $499 Mini was 4gb RAM and 1tb HDD. If you bumped it to 8gb RAM and 256gb SSD I believe it was right about the same $799 (actually was $899 I think) as the new one with those same specs (edit:turns out it’s just 128gb). And the new mini is WAY more powerful.
Last edited:
Ive reduced my Apple footprint and am phasing out most of it, but the Mac mini is a welcome update (at least there IS a Mac mini now that is up to date). However the price is already uncompetitive, given it's the size of a micro-PC and will be inevitably throttled to cope with obvious heat limitations. I was about to go ahead and buy one today to keep one system going but when I did up a shopping list for getting a Hackintosh specced out price-for-price the margin was around 50% by my calculations (plus the Hackintosh would give me close to 'Mac Pro' theoretical performance). So I think that's about normal for Apple these days in terms of premium costing but for something that I can easily hide behind the monitor and never set eyes on, I am happy to replace my current Mac mini's with something home-brew this time around.
Great that they have done the update, I hope they do regular spec upgrades and price drops and when the price is right I will buy one.
Great that they have done the update, I hope they do regular spec upgrades and price drops and when the price is right I will buy one.
An extra $800 for a 1TB SSD in the Mini is over the top. IT's a $277 retail part. 1 TB Samsung NVME is $277 on Amazon and essentially a top of the line SSD. That's a $500 markup. Insane.
I get that they charge extra for upgrades because they aren't part of the standard config.
But it doesn't magically cost them more money over and above the cost of the part to put in a 1TB ssd compared to putting in a 512gb ssd. They already charging an extra $250 to upgrade to 512gb over what a really good 512gb SSD NVME cost at retail.
But yes this is how Apple works. They really milk those who can afford it or have to afford it.
The rest just plug in an external ssd if they want 1tb. And have a messier setup.
It does make iCloud storage look cheap though. Unless you're a pro, you might as well just pay for iCloud at $10/mo for 2tb storage. 1tb ssd on a new Mini is nearly 7 years of 2tb iCloud storage and even longer if buy iTunes card at a discount.
I get that they charge extra for upgrades because they aren't part of the standard config.
But it doesn't magically cost them more money over and above the cost of the part to put in a 1TB ssd compared to putting in a 512gb ssd. They already charging an extra $250 to upgrade to 512gb over what a really good 512gb SSD NVME cost at retail.
But yes this is how Apple works. They really milk those who can afford it or have to afford it.
The rest just plug in an external ssd if they want 1tb. And have a messier setup.
It does make iCloud storage look cheap though. Unless you're a pro, you might as well just pay for iCloud at $10/mo for 2tb storage. 1tb ssd on a new Mini is nearly 7 years of 2tb iCloud storage and even longer if buy iTunes card at a discount.
Last edited:
Do you understand that in the world of technology, outside of today's Apple, that capacity and performance increases over time whilst prices reduce?