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Apple's M4 Mac Mini Hits $499 Low Price on Amazon

An M4 mini is an insane deal at $399 or $499.

A tip on storage, if you are ok with external storage, find a Western Digital D50 Thunderbolt 3 dock. You can find the version without an SSD pre installed for USD$100 or less, but the empty nvme slot is still there and will take any drive you want to slot in. Whatever you put in will not be as fast as a larger Apple or other built-in SSD, but will be just as fast or faster than the base 256GB Apple SSD. Biggest drawback is that you will not be able to use Apple Intelligence when booted to an external drive, but some may call that a feature.
 
turbineseaplane said:
Agree!
I have a 2TB in mine and I just can't believe the amount of computing power for the price.

It's the best deal in all of tech right now if you ask me.
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I agree.

I think it makes more sense to purchase a Mac mini instead of an iMac. Someone can buy both a Mac mini and a third-party display that is both bigger and has a higher resolution than any iMac’s internal display, for less than the cost of an iMac.
 
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DEMinSoCAL said:
It's a special SSD that some companies are making and they are very expensive (relative to SSD's for Windows PC's). Many are of questionable quality and reliability. The SSD in the M4 Mini is socketed but is not a normal SSD. It's a lot of work and not for the faint of heart tech person.
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It's not all that special... If anything, it is simpler than a normal SSD. What's different is that the nvme controller on Apple Silicon is part of the processor SoC. So the drive module is basically just the NAND and power circuitry. If you've never taken any tech apart though, I would YouTube up on all the steps and really take your time.

ThomasJL said:
$499 is the original price from when the Mac mini first went on sale 21 years ago, in January 2005. Since inflation makes things higher priced over time, and since computer parts get lower priced over time, it makes sense for the same tier of computers to stay at a similar price or get lower priced.

Tim Cook is a greedy corporate scumbag though, which is why he has priced the Mac mini, as well as many other Apple products, at a higher price than when Steve Jobs was CEO.
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The price of the base mini has fluctuated between $599 and $699 basically since launch. Only the first G4 model and the 2014 models started at $499, and both where extremely underpowered at the time of release. And it was not Tim Cook. The 1st Intel based Mac mini, which Steve Jobs released and was the first major release after the original, started at $599 for a single core Intel processor. $599 has been the base price for the mini more often than not over the years. The price of the 2018 went up to $799 because Apple targeted a different demographic, quite successfully, of power users with them. The price came down to $699 for the M1, and then to $599 for the M2 and M4. And the M4 offers more value vs. capability at the base model at its time of release than any other mini by a large margin.

tomtad said:
if you’ve got a display knocking around just buy it
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Even if you don't... use your TV... or set it up as a headless box you can jump into with Jump Desktop from an iPad or use it as a more capable NAS. Setup Docker. Shoot, VMWare fusion is free these days so you could run a linux VM with docker or NAS software, an ARM version of Windows... Install LM Studio and run a local LLM/AI, though 16GB RAM is a little limiting on how crazy you can go with that last one.
 
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I wonder what the margins on these really are, for large retail orders. Amazon might be willing to sell these at cost for the traffic, but Micro Center's been selling (out) at ~$400, and I'll bet they aren't willing to take a loss on them for very long.

DEMinSoCAL said:
WOW. $380 for a 2TB from this company. And, they're backordered! Just as soon get a TB4 enclosure and put my own SSD in it and make it primary and not have all the issues. Wait...that's exactly what I did! For half the price and no DFU process needed! 🙂
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Are there any weird drawbacks from running off an external, besides losing Apple Intelligence? Alternatively, can you boot from internal, but have the userspace on the external?
 
Buying an M4 makes no sense with the M5 just around the corner. Do you really want a machine only good for 4 more years to save a little $?

It would be different story if Apple were less greedy and less into forced obsolescence, but they aren’t so you’d have to be a fool to buy anything with an M4 now unless your existing machine died and you have to have a new one.
 
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Macaholic868 said:
Buying an M4 makes no sense with the M5 just around the corner. Do you really want a machine only good for 4 more years to save a little $?

It would be different story if Apple were less greedy and less into forced obsolescence, but they aren’t so you’d have to be a fool to buy anything with an M4 now unless your existing machine died and you have to have a new one.
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We don't know for sure the Mac mini will get an M5 upgrade, it and the Studio were both skipped by M3... It could be sitting until M6...

Juggernaut510 said:
Pssssh! Why when you can just wait for the M7? I’m holding out for the M9…..
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The neural cores in the GPU are a big deal for M5. For certain workflows that use machine learning based tools, like all the enhancements their promising for the Creative Bundle version of FCP... The M5/M6 could be worth holding off
 
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I find it odd how some people are updating computers yearly now! I bought a M4 Max Studio, 16 core CPU and 40 core GPU. Now yes the M5 is powerful with those AI accelerators on its GPU but Apple forgot to mention loudly the M4 has ML accelerators on the M4, on the CPU and GPU, and both M5 and M4 also have a neural engine.

The M5 has more more power and better bandwidth but its still 3nm. Updating from 3nm to 3nm seems pointless for a spec bump you may or may not need each year, unless your company is paying for it or you have unlimited disposal income. Also Apple this year are rumoured to split CPU and GPU on the Studios, maybe on the Mac Mini too, it would make sense to rake in more revenue. More choice for us and more cash to pay for sure. Clever but it means Apple style prices for a CPU and GPU!

Maybe grab a M4 now and just be happy with it, its a good chip, and it will last years. If you can get one at a bargain price or wait for a M5 I would get it at a bargain price, because even with AI Apple speak on the GPU cores the M4's ML accelerators work well, Its no slouch. Just my thoughts on this chasing the next best thing all the time, as many companies are cutting back on build quality including Apple to make more profit, and that's worth taking into consideration.
 
GRT89521 said:
My son grabbed a base model version the other day and we put an 1TB SSD upgrade in it. What a little hot rod.
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turbineseaplane said:
Agree!
I have a 2TB in mine and I just can't believe the amount of computing power for the price.

It's the best deal in all of tech right now if you ask me.
Click to expand...

I’m thinking about buying the Mac Mini and would love to upgrade the SSD but I just saw that they’re soldered on. Are they easy to replace with higher capacity SSDs? Did you guys get them installed by a service? Are the RAMs also replaceable with the new Mac Minis?
 
sevoneone said:
It's not all that special... If anything, it is simpler than a normal SSD. What's different is that the nvme controller on Apple Silicon is part of the processor SoC. So the drive module is basically just the NAND and power circuitry. If you've never taken any tech apart though, I would YouTube up on all the steps and really take your time.
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The fact that it's design is unlike any other SSD on the market, I'd say that makes it pretty special. It sounds like you confused special with simple. I understand there isn't much to it but a NAND chip and some supporting electronics, which makes the outlandish price even worse.
 
artifex said:
Are there any weird drawbacks from running off an external, besides losing Apple Intelligence? Alternatively, can you boot from internal, but have the userspace on the external?
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I've not had any issues booting off the external. Since it's the primary drive, there are no weird user folder issues like there are if you move your user folder to the external when booting from internal. In this instance, I could not use OneDrive properly with my user folder external. But now I can! 🙂
 
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Dark_Omen said:
Executive: "Tim, I think we forgot the Mac Mini exists. It's a great value for the money."

Tim: "What? We can't have that! I have to milk the cow a little bit more for my shareholders, so lets raise the cost to $999."
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Huh? The mini went down in price when it was redesigned. Do a tiny bit of research and you’ll see that all Macs have steadily dropped in price over the past 20+ years. And it’s not like SJ was exactly averse to high prices either 🙄
 
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I'm as critical of Apple as likely seems possible to many folks....but...

I'm sorry, I can't support any criticism at all of the pricing on the Mac Mini M4.

The thing is BONKERS level value for the performance it offers.
 
Fantastic deal on a nearly useless 256GB storage option - it’s essentially a bait and switch. Apple needs to stop making this base configuration! MacOS alone needs about 50GB, install any pro app (many perform much better to be installed on internal drive), and you are wiping out all storage, and have no choice but to buy slower external drives. If you do pro audio, video or gaming - forget about it. 1TB should be the minimum base, sell that for $499 and you will dominate marketshare.
 
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