eMac or Mac Mini ?

[sonofmof]

with the proposed upgrades to the mac mini coming any time soon, should I purchase a mac mini or an emac as a main computer for my wife.

We are selling our remaining PC's after having a 1.25 eMac for around 12 months and falling in love with it , so to speak.

which performs better ? does the faster HDD and the 64MB GPU on the eMac really make that much difference ?

we have to buy a monitor keyb and mouse so there is not much price difference.

is a possible emac upgrade to 1.5Ghz or 1.67Ghz G4 with a 128mb GPU a realistic possiblity ???

Can't wait to hear your thoughts !

 

[DeSnousa]

With update only time can tell, the eMac doe have it's advantage in 7200rpm hardrive and better graphics. However will you need this performance as the mini has some grunt. In any case i would wait to see the mini updates before making the purchase.

 

[Lord Blackadder]

Currently the eMac is the more powerful computer, so unless you want a flat panel LCD display the eMac is probably the way to go due to the faster (and cheaper to upgrade) hard disk and the Core Image-compatible Radeon 9600.

There are some strong rumors that the Mini will be upgraded very soon, possibly as early as tomorrow, so you might want to wait a week or so to see if these rumors pan out, since they may make a difference.

Both machines are not too far apart in performance, I'd say that the eMac's better HD and video card will probably give you as much as a 10% average increase in performance over the Mini, all other things being equal. So it isn't night and day.

 

[sonofmof]

thanks for the quick reply guys,

the flat panel is not really very important as we both like the screen on the eMac anyway, somehow it just seems sharper, clearer and more alive than the monitors on our pc's, which have supposedly "superiour GPU's"

I guess we will wait for the updates but it was nice to have you guys kind of confirm my gut feeling that the eMac was probably a better option.

my current 1.25 eMac was upgraded to 1GB ram around 6months ago and I plan to do the have the same ram in the new system, whether it is an eMac or a mini.

how much difference will the updated GPU and the 1.42 CPU make when compared to my current 1.25 mac. ?

 

[combatcolin]

Not that much, maybe a few extra FPS in games.

RAM is much more important, the more the merrier.

 

[Lord Blackadder]

my current 1.25 eMac was upgraded to 1GB ram around 6months ago and I plan to do the have the same ram in the new system, whether it is an eMac or a mini.

how much difference will the updated GPU and the 1.42 CPU make when compared to my current 1.25 mac. ?

Whichever Mac you end up buying be sure to buy any extra RAM from a 3rd party vendor (like Other World Computing ) since Apple overcharges big time for RAM.

The new eMac will probably feel a little faster in all actions, but you'll notice the biggest difference when stressing it - playing newish games like Call of Duty, making a DVD of family pictures with iDVD, things of that nature. But they are pretty close hardware-wise. Basically the new eMac has a 14% faster CPU and a much better video card.

 

[Xeem]

Not that much, maybe a few extra FPS in games.

I disagree. The 9600 is a full generation ahead of the 9200, and more powerful to boot. But don't take my word for it; take MacWorld's.

http://www.macworld.com/news/2005/05/23/iemacbenchmarks/index.php

 

[sonofmof]

thanks for all the replies guys, i guess i'll be making a purchase of the new 1.42 eMac pretty soon now.

the 1.25 eMac ram was bought from crucial and didn't cost all that much, i think i'll use the same for the new eMac

 

[chucknorris]

thanks for all the replies guys, i guess i'll be making a purchase of the new 1.42 eMac pretty soon now.

the 1.25 eMac ram was bought from crucial and didn't cost all that much, i think i'll use the same for the new eMac

Good luck! I would personally love an eMac (along with a Mini, an iMac, a PowerBook, and a PowerMac), but don't have the funds at the moment.

 

[johonew]

eMac or Mac Mini?

After seeing the Mac Mini upgrade, I decided to get the eMac to join my iMac G5 Rev.1. It will replace my trusty iMac 333 which will still serve as a back up to both machines. Now, my son & wife can't complain about how their iMac (the 333) is so much slower than my iMac G5!

 

[AJ Muni]

get the mac mini, the emac is so ugly...