Advice Please: What To Do With Mac Mini mid2011???

[BeautifulWoman_1984]

To be honest, what I would actually recommend for you - given that you seem to need a lot of storage, and that Thunderbolt 1/2 is very expensive - is pay someone to install two new drives in your Mini: one small SSD to be your boot drive (128/256GB should suffice) and one larger HDD (1TB/2TB? up to you) for your data. Probably the easier and most sustainable solution.

I would not consider Firewire for a boot drive - I use it just for data storage and its ok for that, but probably not suitable for boot.

Thank you very much for your continuing to help me with my problem R6Mile!

I want to fix this problem myself as it's too expensive for me to get it repaired by a professional. It seems the 'dual internal 2.5" HDD' seems delicate and I'm worried about damaging my Mac Mini mid2011!

Just so it's clear in my mind: If I were to buy a Thunderbolt 1 external enclosure would I just need to connect a 2.5" or 3.5" internal HDD to it and it'd be ready for use or is there more work to it? I'd like to get my Mac Mini mid2011 running ASAP so I can use it as much as I can because the High Sierra security support ends soon... 😢

I'm leaning toward installing a single 2.5" internal HDD as I'm finding Thunderbolt 1 enclosures hard to find...

 

[Nedstah]

Reading your post, I made a long list of suggestions for you, some made by others in this thread:

• Look up the list of Big Sur supported macs on Mac Rumors. Big Sur may be the last Apple operating system for MacBooks, Mac minis or iMacs with Intel processors. Personally, I wouldn’t spend the money on a brand new machine, I’d wait for the Apple Silicon processors coming in 2021/2022 before buying new.

• Search for sellers of used Macs and buy something 2013 or newer - again checking a list of Mojave, Catalina and Big Sur supported machines. I’ve used Mac Of All Trades several times (I do not work for them) and they give you money for your old Mac. There are other companies that do the same thing.

• Keep your 2011 Mac mini and upgrade to a Solid State Drive (SSD) as others have suggested and stay on High Sierra. Purchase VMWare Fusion or Parallels, as others have suggested, and run a new MacOS in a virtual machine. I’d suggest increasing the RAM to 16GB if you do this . You can replace the RAM yourself or have it done with the hard drive upgrade. Increasing the RAM will allow your virtual machines to have more memory without starving High Sierra. I have a 2012 Mac mini running Catalina/Big Sur Beta as a dual boot virtual machine with 4GBs of RAM allotted to the vm out of 16GB. leaving 12GB for Mojave on the Solid State Hard Drive.

• Do any web work/surfing in the virtual machine. Stop getting on the internet with High Sierra. Make sure the firewall is on on any Mac you own. Get a good virus scanning software that runs in the background, Malwarebytes, ClamXAV, etc. so your Mac is constantly monitored. This will check web downloads and incoming mail attachments as well as the rest of your Mac. Purchase software like Little Snitch that monitors outgoing traffic from your Mac - firewalls and virus scans handle incoming traffic not outgoing. You’d be surprised how many applications phone home - looking at you Adobe : ) This will not impact your security but helps with privacy.

• Look into various web browsers re: security features - Safari is not necessarily the best. Check out Firefox, Brave, etc. Your choice may allow you to surf from High Sierra with minimized risks. And these browsers could be used in the virtual machine too.

• Take snapshots with the virtual machine software on a regular basis. This acts like Time Machine, keeping a record of your vm at a given time. If you get something bad in the vm you can go back to a time before the incident. Worst case, you can trash the virtual machine and start over without affecting your High Sierra installation.

• And speaking of Time Machine, backups of your High Sierra hard drive. Some choices for third party software are available for cloning. Again, going back to a time before a security breach.

• Use a patcher like DosDude1’s to upgrade your 2011 Mac mini to Mojave or Catalina. Caveat: these patched OSs don’t play well with the AMD Radeon version of the 2011 Mac mini. The patchers work well with the Intel 3000 graphics. I have used the patches on an early 2009 and two Late 2009 Mac minis to install Mojave and it runs great. There’s a lot of information on the patchers here in the MacRumors forum - check out whichever os on unsupported Macs in the forums.

• Consider a Virtual Private Network, VPN, for web surfing if you want to retain more privacy. Again there are many software/service choices out there with a lot of review to help you decide.

• And finally, as you know, don’t click on links in emails or on web pages. Probably the greatest cause of security problems. I have a 2005 G4 Mac mini that I sometimes surf the web with. It runs OSX 10.4.11 Tiger, unsupported by Apple for years. I use TenFourFox browser, a port of Firefox and never download anything with it. 15 years later, no viruses.

 

[BeautifulWoman_1984]

Wow, thank you very much for your advice Nedstah!

I want to get my Mac Mini mid2011 running again ASAP just so I can use High Sierra for a little while before Apple stops providing security updates.

I don't understand why there's no official Apple source of when security updates for High Sierra will end when Wikipedia still clearly says:
"Extended support ends in November 2020"

macOS High Sierra - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[BeautifulWoman_1984]

I'm reading the guide to replace the Mac Mini mid2011's internal 2.5" HDD with a new internal 2.5" HDD, but it seems hard to do and I also need to buy tools to be able to carry out the procedure: 😥 😓😓

Mac mini Mid 2011 Hard Drive Replacement

Use this guide to completely replace your mini's hard drive. Note that some of the connections in this Mac are more fragile to disconnect and more...

www.ifixit.com

Connecting a Thunderbolt 1 external enclosure with a 2.5" internal HDD and using it as the boot drive will make my Mac Min mid2011 as responsive as if it had a internal 2.5" HDD connected via SATA right?

I'm starting to think buying a Thunderbolt 1 enclosure with a 2.5" internal HDD might be my best option even though it's expensive...

 

[Boyd01]

How much will that cost? I still think it makes no sense to pour money into that 2011 Mini - especially just to make it boot from a slow external hard disk. Seems like you could sell it as-is and apply the money to the purchase of something newer - even a 2012 Mini that has fast USB 3.0 ports you could plug cheap external drives into.

 

[Nedstah]

Have you gotten quotes for replacing the hard drive? Doing it yourself is complicated if you're not mechanically inclined. You'd have to be able to format and install the OS as well, meaning a second computer. I wouldn't pay more than $100 labor, it takes about an hour to disassemble and reassemble. Then you'd have the cost of the new internal drive on top of that. Saw a good price on ebay today for a 2012 mini - 16GB RAM and 512 Solid State Drive (SSD) The 2012 is supported for Catalina 10.15 but not the newest come Fall, Big Sur. You could get a new to you mini and sell yours "as is".

 

[Mr_Brightside_@]

Have you gotten quotes for replacing the hard drive? Doing it yourself is complicated if you're not mechanically inclined. You'd have to be able to format and install the OS as well, meaning a second computer. I wouldn't pay more than $100 labor, it takes about an hour to disassemble and reassemble. Then you'd have the cost of the new internal drive on top of that. Saw a good price on ebay today for a 2012 mini - 16GB RAM and 512 Solid State Drive (SSD) The 2012 is supported for Catalina 10.15 but not the newest come Fall, Big Sur. You could get a new to you mini and sell yours "as is".

You don't need another computer. Get a $10 USB enclosure, install the SSD, clone Macintosh HD to it using Carbon Copy Cloner, and boot off it externally right away (of course this will be limited to USB 2 speeds) or install internally. I'm betting if that was done in advance, the store would charge less for labour (I charge $60 to do this for hardware install, and add $40 if they want data cloned as that's time consuming).

 

[Boyd01]

Get a $10 USB enclosure, install the SSD, clone Macintosh HD to it using Carbon Copy Cloner, and boot off it externally right away (of course this will be limited to USB 2 speeds)

IIRC the OP does not want a SSD, they want a large hard drive to increase storage capacity without spending much money. Or maybe I am mistaken, haven't followed too closely. But putting a SSD in a USB enclosure will limit it to about 35MB/sec which makes no sense to me. And it is certainly not what you would want for a boot drive (which, apparently, is what the OP is seeking).

 

[Mr_Brightside_@]

IIRC the OP does not want a SSD, they want a large hard drive to increase storage capacity without spending much money. Or maybe I am mistaken, haven't followed too closely. But putting a SSD in a USB enclosure will limit it to about 35MB/sec which makes no sense to me. And it is certainly not what you would want for a boot drive (which, apparently, is what the OP is seeking).

My point was just that you don't need another Mac to clone data.

And yeah, we're six pages in to a thread where the OP doesn't want to spend a cent on their Mac, but wants it completely future proofed. Hard to keep track of everything!

 

[Nedstah]

"The internal HDD that came with the Mac Mini mid2011 no longer works. I want to replace this broken internal HDD very soon most likely using a 2.5" HDD. However, I don't want to keep using the Mac Mini mid2011 running High Sierra past September 2020 because it won't receive any more security updates and security is my number one concern... "

Initial post which, if correct - dead hard drive - precludes any cloning. Basically the hard drive needs to be confirmed as dead and if that's the case, I would recommend removing it from the machine prior to resale. If one goes to that trouble, might as well put a new hard drive in.

 

[iAssimilated]

I'm reading the guide to replace the Mac Mini mid2011's internal 2.5" HDD with a new internal 2.5" HDD, but it seems hard to do and I also need to buy tools to be able to carry out the procedure: 😥 😓😓

Mac mini Mid 2011 Hard Drive Replacement

Use this guide to completely replace your mini's hard drive. Note that some of the connections in this Mac are more fragile to disconnect and more...

www.ifixit.com

Connecting a Thunderbolt 1 external enclosure with a 2.5" internal HDD and using it as the boot drive will make my Mac Min mid2011 as responsive as if it had a internal 2.5" HDD connected via SATA right?

I'm starting to think buying a Thunderbolt 1 enclosure with a 2.5" internal HDD might be my best option even though it's expensive...

It is not terribly hard to replace the main drive, just take your time and be careful.

Not sure how much an external TB1 enclosure and drive will cost, but you can get one of these (comes with an SSD and all the tools you need to do the replacement):

Mac mini Unibody A1347 (Mid 2010-Late 2014) SSD Upgrade Kit

Upgrade the storage and improve boot time and read/write speed in your Mac mini Unibody with this SSD upgrade kit.

www.ifixit.com

Also, you can pick different sized SSDs depending on your need. I would suggest the 250GB SSD for the OS and then buying something like the Samsung T5 for data:

SAMSUNG T5 1TB 2.5" USB 3.1 V-NAND Portable SSD - Newegg.com

Buy SAMSUNG T5 Portable SSD 1TB - Up to 540 MB/s - USB 3.1 External Solid State Drive MU-PA1T0B/AM with fast shipping and top-rated customer service. Once you know, you Newegg!

www.newegg.com

 

[twalk]

It is not terribly hard to replace the main drive, just take your time and be careful.

Not sure how much an external TB1 enclosure and drive will cost, but you can get one of these (comes with an SSD and all the tools you need to do the replacement):

Mac mini Unibody A1347 (Mid 2010-Late 2014) SSD Upgrade Kit

Upgrade the storage and improve boot time and read/write speed in your Mac mini Unibody with this SSD upgrade kit.

www.ifixit.com

Also, you can pick different sized SSDs depending on your need. I would suggest the 250GB SSD for the OS and then buying something like the Samsung T5 for data:

SAMSUNG T5 1TB 2.5" USB 3.1 V-NAND Portable SSD - Newegg.com

Buy SAMSUNG T5 Portable SSD 1TB - Up to 540 MB/s - USB 3.1 External Solid State Drive MU-PA1T0B/AM with fast shipping and top-rated customer service. Once you know, you Newegg!

www.newegg.com

While I'd recommend installing an internal SSD for a 2011 Mini, let's not pretend that working inside it is totally risk free. While it's not that hard if you take your time, these are laptop sized parts. A mistake can kill the board of the Mini. I've seen a 2010 Mini board in which the fan connector broke off when someone tried to work on it (not really worth repairing at that point). If she's worried about working on it, then she should find a Mac repair shop to do the work. Should be around $100 for doing the work and they'd be able to install both a small OS SSD (240G, $30 or so for a generic), plus a 2.5 in HDD ($70 or so for 2T, $100 or so for 4T, make sure it's thin enough)

 

[BeautifulWoman_1984]

How much will that cost? I still think it makes no sense to pour money into that 2011 Mini - especially just to make it boot from a slow external hard disk. Seems like you could sell it as-is and apply the money to the purchase of something newer - even a 2012 Mini that has fast USB 3.0 ports you could plug cheap external drives into.

Thank you for your reply Boyd!

I'm happy to keep this Mac Mini mid2011 running for a while and I'm confident it'll keep working for a while still so I don't want to buy a 2012 Mini.

 

[BeautifulWoman_1984]

You don't need another computer. Get a $10 USB enclosure, install the SSD, clone Macintosh HD to it using Carbon Copy Cloner, and boot off it externally right away (of course this will be limited to USB 2 speeds) or install internally. I'm betting if that was done in advance, the store would charge less for labour (I charge $60 to do this for hardware install, and add $40 if they want data cloned as that's time consuming).

Thank you for your reply Mr_Brightside!

I'm not wanting an SSD as a regular HDD is more than fast enough for me and I much prefer having extra storage capacity.

 

[BeautifulWoman_1984]

Have you gotten quotes for replacing the hard drive? Doing it yourself is complicated if you're not mechanically inclined. You'd have to be able to format and install the OS as well, meaning a second computer. I wouldn't pay more than $100 labor, it takes about an hour to disassemble and reassemble. Then you'd have the cost of the new internal drive on top of that. Saw a good price on ebay today for a 2012 mini - 16GB RAM and 512 Solid State Drive (SSD) The 2012 is supported for Catalina 10.15 but not the newest come Fall, Big Sur. You could get a new to you mini and sell yours "as is".

Thank you for your reply Nedstah.

I'm wanting to get my Mac Mini mid2011 running by myself without taking it to a repair place as I don't trust these repair shops with my data.

It is not terribly hard to replace the main drive, just take your time and be careful.

Not sure how much an external TB1 enclosure and drive will cost, but you can get one of these (comes with an SSD and all the tools you need to do the replacement):

Mac mini Unibody A1347 (Mid 2010-Late 2014) SSD Upgrade Kit

Upgrade the storage and improve boot time and read/write speed in your Mac mini Unibody with this SSD upgrade kit.

www.ifixit.com

Also, you can pick different sized SSDs depending on your need. I would suggest the 250GB SSD for the OS and then buying something like the Samsung T5 for data:

SAMSUNG T5 1TB 2.5" USB 3.1 V-NAND Portable SSD - Newegg.com

Buy SAMSUNG T5 Portable SSD 1TB - Up to 540 MB/s - USB 3.1 External Solid State Drive MU-PA1T0B/AM with fast shipping and top-rated customer service. Once you know, you Newegg!

www.newegg.com

Thank you for your reply iAssimilated, but I'm not interested in the SSD and I'm only looking to buy a regular HDD.

While I'd recommend installing an internal SSD for a 2011 Mini, let's not pretend that working inside it is totally risk free. While it's not that hard if you take your time, these are laptop sized parts. A mistake can kill the board of the Mini. I've seen a 2010 Mini board in which the fan connector broke off when someone tried to work on it (not really worth repairing at that point). If she's worried about working on it, then she should find a Mac repair shop to do the work. Should be around $100 for doing the work and they'd be able to install both a small OS SSD (240G, $30 or so for a generic), plus a 2.5 in HDD ($70 or so for 2T, $100 or so for 4T, make sure it's thin enough)

Thank you for your reply Twalk.

If I go the route of installing an internal HDD into the Mac Mini mid2011 I'll be very careful with it!

"The internal HDD that came with the Mac Mini mid2011 no longer works. I want to replace this broken internal HDD very soon most likely using a 2.5" HDD. However, I don't want to keep using the Mac Mini mid2011 running High Sierra past September 2020 because it won't receive any more security updates and security is my number one concern... "

Initial post which, if correct - dead hard drive - precludes any cloning. Basically the hard drive needs to be confirmed as dead and if that's the case, I would recommend removing it from the machine prior to resale. If one goes to that trouble, might as well put a new hard drive in.

Yes, this is correct! However, I used Time Machine to backup my data to an external USB HDD before the internal HDD that came with the Mac Mini mid2011 died.

Very important EDIT:

Mac Mini mid2011 Firmware:
I was just doing some browsing and I came across this, but I'm not sure what it means? Once I've got my Mac Mini mid2011 running again, do I need to install this firmware?

It's from Apple so it's an official source:
Link: https://support.apple.com/en-au/HT201518#macmini

This is the direct link to my Mac Mini mid2011 firmware: https://support.apple.com/kb/DL1823?locale=en_AU

 

[Mr_Brightside_@]

Unless the Mac mini hasn't been used since 2015, you likely have that firmware installed already.

 

[BeautifulWoman_1984]

Unless the Mac mini hasn't been used since 2015, you likely have that firmware installed already.

Thank you Mr Brightside!

How do I install this firmware update? I've never installed a firmware update to a Mac before...

I just want to get this Mac Mini running again as soon as possible.

 

[BeautifulWoman_1984]

These are my final two options I'm trying to decide between:

1. Opening up the Mac Mini mid2011 and installing a new 2.5" internal HDD inside

2. Buying an external Thunderbolt 1 enclosure and inserting a new HDD into this Thunderbolt 1 enclosure and connecting it to the Mac Mini mid2011's Thunderbolt 1 port: I'm just worried about there being slowness by using the Thunderbolt 1 port instead of installing a new 2.5" internal HDD inside the Mac Mini mid2011 as this would be my boot drive and my only HDD

I'm still trying to find an official Apple source for when the Mac Mini mid2011 will stop receiving security updates, but I just can't find anything... 😓 😢

 

[Mr_Brightside_@]

Thank you Mr Brightside!

How do I install this firmware update? I've never installed a firmware update to a Mac before...

I just want to get this Mac Mini running again as soon as possible.

Download this while the Mac is running and install it.

These are my final two options I'm trying to decide between:

1. Opening up the Mac Mini mid2011 and installing a new 2.5" internal HDD inside

2. Buying an external Thunderbolt 1 enclosure and inserting a new HDD into this Thunderbolt 1 enclosure and connecting it to the Mac Mini mid2011's Thunderbolt 1 port: I'm just worried about there being slowness by using the Thunderbolt 1 port instead of installing a new 2.5" internal HDD inside the Mac Mini mid2011 as this would be my boot drive and my only HDD

I'm still trying to find an official Apple source for when the Mac Mini mid2011 will stop receiving security updates, but I just can't find anything... 😓 😢

Open up the Mac. Buy the right tools, use the iFixit guide, and take your time. Make a USB installer of macOS if you can.

You will not find any official Apple source on when security updates will stop arriving. They don't announce this. Given that High Sierra is the highest it (officially) supports, security updates will likely slow/stop this fall when Big Sur is released.

 

[Kaida]

If you are in Singapore, I will do it for you for free

 

[BeautifulWoman_1984]

Download this while the Mac is running and install it.

Thank you again Mr_Brightside!

The link you gave for the firmware of the Mac Mini mid2011 is from February 2012 and is only 4mb in size, but the Apple Firmware link I gave is from June 2015 and is much bigger in size at 105mb.

Link: https://support.apple.com/kb/DL1823?locale=en_AU

 

[Mr_Brightside_@]

They are not both firmware.

Mine is, and yours is a security update. You are welcome to download and attempt installing both, but you can check if the firmware from my link is already up to date in System Profiler. Both installers should check that they can be installed on your system, they may not proceed with the install if they are already installed.

 

[ElitistWhiner]

Hey guys,

Sorry to be making a new thread, but I know MacRumors is the community which has the most experts on Macs on the internet. I searched the forums and I couldn't find a previous thread related to my severe problem.

My biggest fear has come true: Apple will stop giving security updates to my Mac Mini mid2011 in September 2020... 😓

The internal HDD that came with the Mac Mini mid2011 no longer works. I want to replace this broken internal HDD very soon most likely using a 2.5" HDD. However, I don't want to keep using the Mac Mini mid2011 running High Sierra past September 2020 because it won't receive any more security updates and security is my number one concern...

I just want to hear the advice of this community as I'm sure there are things I can do that I'm not even aware of...

Any ideas or a possible options would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you so much!

No panic - never sweat. Mac mini late 2009 here, runs on OSX 10.11.6ver. flawlessly. Mac's just keep on chug'n. The first wonky bits emergent were Bluetooth that are a bit outdated with newer accessories. But software-wise, I've found it to be completely usable, adding new software apps monthly and just a handful of choice applications that are now Big Sur dependent.

I will update to AMD Mac mini when available and buy-in to the  sandbox with new iPad and iPhone for when AMD is real. You've got both hardware and software to meet 95% of your needs until AMD before panic sets-in. Albeit, you may lose a few critical apps crucial to your profession but I've found iPad versions an easy crutch until AMD day arrives.

 

[Mr_Brightside_@]

No panic - never sweat. Mac mini late 2009 here, runs on OSX 10.11.6ver. flawlessly. Mac's just keep on chug'n. The first wonky bits emergent were Bluetooth that are a bit outdated with newer accessories. But software-wise, I've found it to be completely usable, adding new software apps monthly and just a handful of choice applications that are now Big Sur dependent.

I will update to AMD Mac mini when available and buy-in to the  sandbox with new iPad and iPhone for when AMD is real. You've got both hardware and software to meet 95% of your needs until AMD before panic sets-in. Albeit, you may lose a few critical apps crucial to your profession but I've found iPad versions an easy crutch until AMD day arrives.

What is the AMD you keep referencing? Do you mean Apple Silicon?

 

[ElitistWhiner]

>Twalk advise: I think that some things need to be pointed out in this thread:
>
>1) Security is a probability. There is no such thing as a 100% secure system
>2) Older systems can be more secure than newer systems. Older systems can be fully patched up for all known issues while >newer systems can have new issues pop up
>3) For home computer users, OS security is usually radically less important than browser & email security. Upgrading your OS >does NOT automatically make you more secure with your browser & email
>

Security can be thought logically. You are not trying to put a lock on every drawer, encrypt every StickyNote, every cupboard and every door inside your house. Who would want to live that way? No?

Security begins with stopping them at the front door. That's where you want to put the strongest locks to prevent intrusion. First principles: Firewall. Invest in securing your computer behind a good firewall, paid updates to keep it secure and have it installed by a professional.

Best Practices: email and browser mentioned have been well covered

Relax. You have an incredible piece of hardware, running state of the art software which_is_security updated. That security will live into the future. MacStrategy.com posts update packages and instructions how to further secure Mac's AFTER they have been deprecated from Apple Security updates.

No need to run off installing brandX software, unfamiliar OS'n and 4th party hacks to keep running your <FAV> computer.

I live with a partner who pays $$$$ yearly on branded security packages for several machines. She can't live without their warm sear sucker suit updates. So many complications ensue, complexities added and time. Time alone spent updating, fixing and waiting on support HOLD is simply not worth the heartache. Not when a simple backup is hours away from restoring full functionality in her case. Mostly, corrupted data, files and 3rd party software idiosyncrasies with installed branded security packages.