Recently added a small cabinet to my home office, and I've placed it in there closed out of the way along with my external hdds, there aren't any performance issues, but should I be worried about anything else? It's about 2 metres from me.
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Anyone keep their mini in a cabinet or wardrobe?
- Thread starter Sarah Hamilton
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Only concern would be heat buildup in the cabinet. I did something similar with a Mini, bunch of drives, and a Synology, along with all my networking gear. Added a muffin to the cabinet to get some airflow. Didn’t take much airflow to keep it at a reasonable temperature.
It’ll be just my Mac mini M1, 2x2th hard drives in their enclosures, and a small dock that lets me connect usbs etc which will be connected to the mini. The hard drives abs the mini are the only two things that have power supply. The hdd enclosures have no fans or heating management built in.
What’s a muffin? There’s quite a fair amount of space in between. Maybe I should get a mini fan?
My 2014 Mini is a media server and lives behind closed doors in the bottom of the small cabinet that has a stereo on top. Has been running fine like this 24/7 for about 3 years and I had a 2012 Mini in the same place for 4 years before that. It has a 4tb external SSD with all my media and a 5tb hard drive that is only mounted for automatic nightly backups with Carbon Copy. No problems at all.
The Mini itself does not get very hot since all it does is silenty serve video and audio with iTunes. But this room is not air conditioned and gets above 80 degrees F frequently in the summer. The big caveat here is, although the cabinet doors are closed, I removed the back so there's plenty of airflow.
Now, the M1 runs much cooler which should help in your case although you may push it harder than my media server and having two hard drives constantly spinning will also generate some heat. I'd want some sort of ventillation inside a small cabinet, either passive or perhaps a fan and exhaust port to create some circulation.
The Mini itself does not get very hot since all it does is silenty serve video and audio with iTunes. But this room is not air conditioned and gets above 80 degrees F frequently in the summer. The big caveat here is, although the cabinet doors are closed, I removed the back so there's plenty of airflow.
Now, the M1 runs much cooler which should help in your case although you may push it harder than my media server and having two hard drives constantly spinning will also generate some heat. I'd want some sort of ventillation inside a small cabinet, either passive or perhaps a fan and exhaust port to create some circulation.
It's a thin square shaped fan. Usually seen in desktop power supplies. They come in 12v and 120v versions.
The two Sata drives are not always running. One is time machine and I do manual backups, the other just contains files and documents and I just move them over from my macs storage once I’m done dealing with them or won’t be needing them for a long time. Do you think I could get a plug-in usb desk fan and put it somewhere in the cabinet or near the Mac mini? Would that cause any issues?
You mean a desk fan those mini ones? Do you have a pic dude?
I don't think a fan will make any difference by itself, it willl just blow the hot air around. The point is, you need to provide a way to let cool outside air into the cabinet and let the hot air out - an intake and exhaust port, for example. Most fans are going to make some noise and also suck dirt inside the cabinet. That's why I just removed the back of my cabinet, which was easy since it was just a piece of thin plywood. That allows plenty of air circulation without anything mechanical. Since the cabinet is against the wall, you can't tell that the back is open.
I know the M1 is supposed to run pretty cool, so I suppose you could just put it in the cabinet and see how warm it gets. Don't know if that would be a problem or not.
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This one?
I bought one with a 120v power brick. Has a rheostat to control the speed. Here is the model. Plenty of airflow at mid-speed setting and fairly quiet.
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I've kept my 2012 mini in a large desk drawer for as long as I've had it. I did drill holes into the back of the drawer to increase airflow, but it's usually a little warm in there, not hot. If I do something like work in FCP or Logic it can get hot so I open the drawer to cool things off.
I'm sure it's not wise to do this, but it ended up not causing a problem in my case. It's still in that drawer right now working fine.
I'm sure it's not wise to do this, but it ended up not causing a problem in my case. It's still in that drawer right now working fine.
I don’t have my mini in a cabinet, but I have a router, cable modem, and Caldigit TS3+ in a small cabinet — three feet deep, three feet high, and two feet wide.
I installed this at the back to exhaust:
www.coolcomponents.com
and this in the front for intake:
www.coolcomponents.com
temperatures inside remain at about 15 degrees above ambient. I run the fan on its lowest setting.
Have used their products for years. They work well, but admittedly are very expensive for what they are.
I installed this at the back to exhaust:
VS-CV/SV: Cabinet/Slim Vent for Cooling & Venting Electronics in a Cabinet or Enclosure
and this in the front for intake:
Plastic Surface Mount Vent Grill for Venting Cabinets or Enclosures
temperatures inside remain at about 15 degrees above ambient. I run the fan on its lowest setting.
Have used their products for years. They work well, but admittedly are very expensive for what they are.
How noisey is it?I don’t have my mini in a cabinet, but I have a router, cable modem, and Caldigit TS3+ in a small cabinet — three feet deep, three feet high, and two feet wide.
I installed this at the back to exhaust:
VS-CV/SV: Cabinet/Slim Vent for Cooling & Venting Electronics in a Cabinet or Enclosure
and this in the front for intake:
Plastic Surface Mount Vent Grill for Venting Cabinets or Enclosures
temperatures inside remain at about 15 degrees above ambient. I run the fan on its lowest setting.
Have used their products for years. They work well, but admittedly are very expensive for what they are.
Just finished my new data closet in my basement. Bought an old entertainment cabinet from our local Habitat for Humanity ReStore. I didn't have to make any significant modifications for it, just some new holes in the back for cables and the two fans I installed. Rheostat for fans is on left side. At half speed I can barely hear them.
