Be careful critiquing Apple’s design decisions. In the next revision — out of spite — Apple might place the headphone jack on the bottom next to the power button.
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Apple's Much Smaller M4 Mac Mini Has All-New Thermal Architecture to Maximize Speed
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If you think that’s the more interesting question why not look at the power usage and acoustical performance specs for each machine where available on Apple website etc?
Acoustical performance at idle is available for the mini but not at max continuous power, only at idle.
Man.. I love Thunderbolt 5, their latest album is the s*it, and they always have the most hardcore bandwitches.
That’s a fricken INTEL processor. If you’ve not used a M series mini you’re talking out of turn. Silent. Cool.
I am in no hurry for Apple to change into working the same way as competitors. The result of doing that is evident in their products - if that’s what you want, there are plenty of those to go buy instead. If you develop anything and everything to see what sticks, you have less at stake and spend less development money for each part. If you want the company to bet the most resources and (more importantly) their best people on something, it has to be high stakes.
Look at how much Amazon has invested in what is essentially a glorified egg timer, simply because they believed in the future of an intelligent loudspeaker, and almost bet the company on it. Do you think they would have made that investment if they knew that the world would mostly use it as a timer?
I am not at all defending the trashcan as a product, and I do agree it took them way too long to admit defeat, but if they were going to hedge their bets and for instance release the trashcan alongside an upgraded cheese grater, they simply wouldn’t have put the same effort into the trashcan. And the subsequent products would be less good.
Good catch - presumably more efficient internally, but shows excellent design consistency.
You really shouldn’t be using the headphone jack to connect external speakers. Use USB with an interface.
It’s a headphone jack. Not an audio jack.
Edit: To be clear: Nothing will break if you do. But you can get better sound through USB. Also, speakers are moving toward USB-C for physical inputs anyway.
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Now I'm hoping for an even smaller, Mac Nano.
The new Mac Mini is impressive for its size (even if the location of the power button is utterly moronic), but to me its overkill for an entry level Mac.
Give me a pocket sized, USB-C powered device with the performance of a MacBook Air and I'll be first in line. It would be great for hybrid working, shove it in your pocket instead of lugging around a laptop, then plug it into your monitor when you get to work and it just starts up.
The new Mac Mini is impressive for its size (even if the location of the power button is utterly moronic), but to me its overkill for an entry level Mac.
Give me a pocket sized, USB-C powered device with the performance of a MacBook Air and I'll be first in line. It would be great for hybrid working, shove it in your pocket instead of lugging around a laptop, then plug it into your monitor when you get to work and it just starts up.
Macbook Air will be M4 in Q1, so the Mac Mini IS "the performance of a MacBook Air".
I don't think Apple wants to charge less than 600USD for a Mac, even if they could. And they are certainly not going to make a product now that can't support Apple Intelligence. Also, I think your use case description is very niche (and I'm saying that as a customer that is considering buying it for an even more niche use case!).
I think the point is that the MBA board in an enclosure could fit in a much smaller case than what they released yesterday. And it could be much cheaper.
Technically its the same processor, but given the power consumption of the Mac Mini is listed as up to 155W I'm assuming the MacBook Air with its 70W fast-charging has its performance limited somewhat to cope with the laptop form factor.
And you're probably right about the cost, but if they'd released what I described above I would have been ready to pull the trigger and buy it at that price.
Fair argument, although I'd assume that power consumption is for the Pro? Not sure why a Mini without a display would use that much power, you can't put that much into the chip. The Air is fanless, so yes it is thermally limited of course. Could be that the Air will be the same performance as the iPad Pro.
Yes, but as mentioned, I don't think Apple wants a Mac to be that cheap. There are many things that Apple COULD do, but don't. Not to say that it's not OK to begrudge it.
The PSU is powering more than just the SoC, it also has to provide power to all the ports...
This is why I upgrade my Mac on a 6 month schedule. Who has time to clean, just throw it away and get new shiny Mac. It’s disposable right?
Although, I will admit to a bit of upcycling. The bottom plate and backplate of the screen on recent Mac’s are superb oven trays.
We need a tear down. The pictured airflow doesn’t make much sense.
So really one of the USB-C or Thunderbolt 5 ports is used to plug in the speakers?
Seems a waste of a port just for the speakers...
Why is it more of a "waste of a port" than to use a port for some other component? It's using a port, not wasting it.
Because ports, particularly TB ports, are extremely limited on these and this usage is like hooking up an eye dropper to a fire hose
Then your complaint should be about the number of USB ports, not about the placement of the headphone jack. A headphone jack belongs on the front, since many people will be using the headphones for other things, so plugging and unplugging regularly. Which is probably why they put it there, too many people complained that it was on the back...
"It’s a headphone jack. Not an audio jack." You need to add a "/s" or a "😉" to the end of that. Otherwise someone may think you are being serious.
Worse, when some one attempts to push their 1/8th headphone jack in to a USB-C port they may be sending you the repair bill.