First Mac Mini Benchmark Surfaces Ahead of November 7 Launch

[citysnaps]

@citysnaps
(" Though I believe future Mini updates will be more frequent, now.

That may only be if Apple gets it's 30% ++ profit margins from it, and also that it doesn't cut into sales of their other popular desktop: the iMac.

I hope so. I wouldn't want Apple to get less than their 38%, otherwise it will definitely be a no go. As it should be. But really, that margin is already built-in. So no worries on that.

By the way...38% GPM is well within industry norms and less than Samsung's. As an aside, at a large semiconductor company I used to work at, if I wanted to get a project off the ground I had to make a case for 80% GPM, and, that there would be enough sales volume for decent revenue.

What WILL drive frequent updates is loads of customers purchasing the Mini. Without that, there's little motivation to update. Unfortunately, I'm not confident there's enough volume to make that case.

 

[MacKarmaTech]

@citysnaps


True....unless the 2018 Mini is too popular, like the 2012 Mini was, and steps on the sales (and profits) of their other, more profitable desktops. Perhaps that's why they priced them so much higher this time around - figuring that you're probably not going to save any real $$$ going with the 2018 Mac Mini and your own peripherals over one of their entry to mid-level iMac's.

 

[citysnaps]

@citysnaps


True....unless the 2018 Mini is too popular, like the 2012 Mini was, and steps on the sales (and profits) of their other, more profitable desktops. Perhaps that's why they priced them so much higher this time around - figuring that you're probably not going to save any real $$$ going with the 2018 Mac Mini and your own peripherals over one of their entry to mid-level iMac's.

I haven't seen any evidence the 2012 Mini was taking sales away from other Apple computers in any substantive amount.

The Mini was developed to steer people from the Windows camp with a low cost of entry to the Macintosh world (Windows users already having a display, keyboard, mouse, printer, etc.). It also attracted some techies and people who hang out on tech forums looking for an interesting headless computer - which is what I used them for. But compared to Apple's regular customer base of non-technical users just wanting an all-in-one computer to do their work, that would be a tiny percentage. Thus the lack of frequent updates.

 

[mmomega]

I am actually selling my 2013 6Core Mac Pro to replace it with the 6Core Mini.

I already use a water-cooled Vega64 eGPU and an external Thunderbolt 2 10Gbit NIC.

My normal workloads are 100% CPU for about 3-4 hours at a time.

If it can even hold the same performance over that amount of time it is an upgrade for me.

I get smaller space, less power, don't need an external SFP+ NIC now, quicker internal storage (I am using a Samsung EVO960 in my mini now so the newer Mini internal should be somewhere in the range of double that speed of the Mac Pro) and DDR4.

I do lose ECC RAM, but most of my work isn't extremely critical in that sense. My real headless Xeon servers that aren't used as workstations are the one's I won't touch until they start costing me money.

This Mac Pro and now Mini swap is a blurred line of want/need.

I don't need to upgrade, the Mac Pro could continue doing it's job for a few more years. But as long as this mini even has slightly quicker performance plus AppleCare for 3 years more. This is where I am leaning. At the moment.

So if you want a 6Core D500 machine...wink, wink.

 

[MacKarmaTech]

@citysnaps
("I haven't seen any evidence the 2012 Mini was taking sales away from other Apple computers")

The 2012 Quad-Core MacMini was a big seller for small and mid level businesses. Probably even outsold the now long discontinued X-Serve. They were being used ( and many still are well employed) as servers and lower cost desktops. Many of my clients had 6 or more 2012 Mini's in-house in lieu opting of the more expensive AIO iMac. Though Apple doesn't really breakout their numbers on desktops. I still believe that's the primarily reason why Apple then suddenly dumbed them down in their next iteration. They were just too powerful & versatile for their own good at the time.

 

[citysnaps]

@citysnaps
("I haven't seen any evidence the 2012 Mini was taking sales away from other Apple computers")

The 2012 Quad-Core MacMini was a big seller for small and mid level businesses. Probably even outsold the now long discontinued X-Serve. They were being used ( and many still be well employed) as servers and lower cost desktops. Many of my clients had 6 or more 2012 Mini's in-house in lieu opting of the more expensive AIO iMac. Though Apple doesn't really breakout their numbers on desktops. I still believe that's the primarily reason why Apple then suddenly dumbed them down in their next iteration. They were just too powerful & versatile for their own good at the time.

If that were the case, and again I've yet to see evidence as that's a tiny slice (as is the Mac Pro) of Apple's customer base pie, then Apple would be just as happy from a GPM perspective.

 

[Peepo]

These are not actual issues anymore. They figured that stuff out a long time ago - even for Mac Mini farms.

Yup but it is not really mainstream..

https://www.macobserver.com/cool-stuff-found/macstadiums-mac-mini-server-farm/

 

[PickUrPoison]

@citysnaps
("I haven't seen any evidence the 2012 Mini was taking sales away from other Apple computers")

The 2012 Quad-Core MacMini was a big seller for small and mid level businesses. Probably even outsold the now long discontinued X-Serve. They were being used ( and many still be well employed) as servers and lower cost desktops. Many of my clients had 6 or more 2012 Mini's in-house in lieu opting of the more expensive AIO iMac. Though Apple doesn't really breakout their numbers on desktops. I still believe that's the primarily reason why Apple then suddenly dumbed them down in their next iteration. They were just too powerful & versatile for their own good at the time.

I don’t think they sold nearly well as you think they did. Apple’s never been afraid of cannibalization, they priced the quad mini SKU where they did to sell the quantity they expected. They wanted to sell them as servers—they had a server SKU after all.

If they had stolen profits from another model to any real degree, Apple would have raised prices on subsequent models to take advantage of that market opportunity. But they didn’t; in 2014 they cancelled the quad and the Server line in general because of poor sales, not due to selling too many. Apple’s never cancelled a successful product line afaik.

They dropped prices and re-focused on the home/consumer market in an attempt to increase sales. It still sold poorly and was pretty much ignored by Apple and left to languish as a result.

But the landscape has changed, and Apple has tacked back to the pro market; that’s obvious when you read the marketing copy. The main opportunity Apple perceives for the mini is not the home consumer, although it is a secondary market—and they’re happy to sell as many to that segment as possible.

 

[trifid]

Thanks. It seems promising. I’ll definitely check it out. Still wish there were a natively supported plug and play solution though.



Well I've gone down that road. I've owned an iMac, Macbook Pro's, Macbook Airs and now am on a Hackintosh. Will be going to to the Mini now. When I built my Hackintosh back in 2011, I poured over forums and made sure I had the most compatible components of the time. And still, over the years I've come to realize that despite whatever might say, is still a headache to maintain. Every major update can become a pain. And major OS releases can become nightmarish. Even with small issues one is never sure whether it's an issue with your rig, or the Hackintosh work-around in general, or an actual Mac OS bug. People in the Hackintosh community are generally helpful, but finding solutions is still difficult. There are just too many variables. In the end, it's definitely an enthusiast hobby.

If you a bachelor playing around with technical stuff and have time on your hands, it's a great hobby. Building a rig that works perfectly is fun. But eventually, with every OS release you will need to invest time to maintain it. And as the rig becomes old, the time needed to keep it up grows. Many enthusiasts on forums keep upgrading their motherboards and CPU's. So the basic install instructions may not work for you. You'll need to be aware of which kext is for you and which is not. And every few years apple switches from NVidia GPUs to AMD GPUs and so on. Your 'golden build' will not remain golden 3 OS's down. Till now folks with Nvidia GPU's cannot install the latest OS, cause they are waiting for drivers.

My point is - know what you are getting into. If you have the time and inclination it's great. I now have a toddler and between a busy job, and family commitments I wouldn't dream of building a Hackintosh again.

As a long time hackintohs user, your summary is quite on point, and I was quite ready to jump into mac mini until I started researching eGPU, and it sounds a lot like hackintosh, there are a lot of variables to consider, size, noise, reliability, some apps aren't compatible depending on what eGPU (Final cut doesn't seem to work), Windows may not work, etc etc. Factor in pricing, and I'm not sure if it's a better route.

And then I see this kind of video and it's luring me back to stay hackintosh:

I think Apple severely crippled the mac mini without a discrete GPU, and I don't understand really what kind of pro user would want a 8700 CPU without a proper GPU, and many of the pro apps even a mundane illustrator or photoshop now rely quite a bit on GPU, and even to run 4k displays smoothly you will need it.

What we needed was a headless iMac, the xMac we've been asking for decades. Mac Mini is close, and yet so far.

 

[MacKarmaTech]

I don’t think they sold nearly well as you think they did. Apple’s never been afraid of cannibalization, they priced the quad mini SKU where they did to sell the quantity they expected. They wanted to sell them as servers—they had a server SKU after all.

If they had stolen profits from another model to any real degree, Apple would have raised prices on subsequent models to take advantage of that market opportunity. But they didn’t; in 2014 they cancelled the quad and the Server line in general because of poor sales, not due to selling too many. Apple’s never cancelled a successful product line afaik.

They dropped prices and re-focused on the home/consumer market in an attempt to increase sales. It still sold poorly and was pretty much ignored by Apple and left to languish as a result.

But the landscape has changed, and Apple has tacked back to the pro market; that’s obvious when you read the marketing copy. The main opportunity Apple perceives for the mini is not the home consumer, although it is a secondary market—and they’re happy to sell as many to that segment as possible.

 

[criticasm]

No way. All these models are fantastic updates, coming in cheaper than the 2011 and 2012 quads with loads more expected performance.

Only the i7 2012 minis were quad core & started at $799US, but they also came with 1TB HDD. Yeah yeah SSD woohoo, but we're talking 128gb 1/8 the capacity. Now to get the same 1TB it costs $1600, who cares that it's faster when it's twice the price. Apple should have made new generation Fusion drives with Intel's Optane for more affordable storage options. The previous entry model was $500US with 500GB, now it's $799US with 128GB a 60% price hike & 70% capacity reduction. Update, yes, "fantastic" get outta here.

 

[PickUrPoison]

Only the i7 2012 minis were quad core & started at $799US, but they also came with 1TB HDD. Yeah yeah SSD woohoo, but we're talking 128gb 1/8 the capacity. Now to get the same 1TB it costs $1600, who cares that it's faster when it's twice the price. Apple should have made new generation Fusion drives with Intel's Optane for more affordable storage options. The previous entry model was $500US with 500GB, now it's $799US with 128GB a 60% price hike & 70% capacity reduction. Update, yes, "fantastic" get outta here.

The 2014 dual-core 8GB/256GB model was priced at $899. The new models are quad-core, 8GB/128GB & 8GB/256GB for $799/$999.

The new minis are priced around the same price as the previous model when configured similarly. Comparing cost of a 1TB HDD to that of 1TB SSD is ridiculous. Few wanted 4GB or HDD/Fusion SKUs at all, and Apple cancelled them. That’s what caused the elimination of the $499-699 cheaper models.

There was a very modest price increase price increase—from $899 to $999—for an impressive increase in performance. Yes, it was a fantastic update.

 

[thunng8]

Only the i7 2012 minis were quad core & started at $799US, but they also came with 1TB HDD. Yeah yeah SSD woohoo, but we're talking 128gb 1/8 the capacity. Now to get the same 1TB it costs $1600, who cares that it's faster when it's twice the price. Apple should have made new generation Fusion drives with Intel's Optane for more affordable storage options. The previous entry model was $500US with 500GB, now it's $799US with 128GB a 60% price hike & 70% capacity reduction. Update, yes, "fantastic" get outta here.

I have that very machine. Running the OS on a HDD sucked big time. I think the last Mac OS X version that ran decently on a HDD was Mavericks (10.9). I opened it up an replaced the HDD with a 512GB SATA SSD.

Although an update for me looks tempting - the price is just way too high.

 

[MacKarmaTech]

@PickUrPoison

But they did raise their prices by dumbing the Mini down in 2014 so that they were not only poorly spec'ed out, they were also locked down with soldiered everything and security screws. To anyone paying attention, it certainly seemed that they were purposely trying to kill the mini off. And they almost succeeded - except for the growing demand for a bonified Mac Mini update, or at least, a statement from Apple that they intended to discontinue it because, according to you:"poor sales".

And as for apple "tacking back" to the "Pro" market, alot of that "tacking" by Apple is more PR & marketing than actual substance.

Apple is king when it comes to slapping on a "Pro" moniker onto everything it wants to charge an arm and a leg for. I don't think that most Pro's were clamoring for a 5K+++ thermally throttled Xeon AIO Workstation that's glued shut, or another thinner, lighter (again, thermally throttled) MacBook Pro that didn't even have a discreet GPU until late 2017, or a ridiculously delayed Mac Pro that Apple claims has to be totally re-thought out and re-engineered - even though the majority of actual working pro's just want a basic, but expandable and up-gradable machine like the old "cheese grater" Mac Pro.

And if Apple really does think that releasing a totally bolted down (except for ram-maybe?) Mac Mini that starts at a ridiculous price for it's configuration, is again, tacking back" to the "Pro" market, then they are more out of touch with what the HEDT using demographics really want, verses what Apple decides to release as it's definition of "Pro" lately.

In the end, it's still all about the phone - which is at least 3/4 of Apple's revenue. As with their iPad 'Plus' that can't even use a simple mouse or really manage a true, accessible file system, it's just a matter of time before they convince everyone to behold the dawn of a glorious new iPhone "Pro" XS2, or whatever moniker they "tack" on it ...

 

[markovchain]

I am actually selling my 2013 6Core Mac Pro to replace it with the 6Core Mini.

I already use a water-cooled Vega64 eGPU and an external Thunderbolt 2 10Gbit NIC.

My normal workloads are 100% CPU for about 3-4 hours at a time.

If it can even hold the same performance over that amount of time it is an upgrade for me.

I get smaller space, less power, don't need an external SFP+ NIC now, quicker internal storage (I am using a Samsung EVO960 in my mini now so the newer Mini internal should be somewhere in the range of double that speed of the Mac Pro) and DDR4.

I do lose ECC RAM, but most of my work isn't extremely critical in that sense. My real headless Xeon servers that aren't used as workstations are the one's I won't touch until they start costing me money.

This Mac Pro and now Mini swap is a blurred line of want/need.

I don't need to upgrade, the Mac Pro could continue doing it's job for a few more years. But as long as this mini even has slightly quicker performance plus AppleCare for 3 years more. This is where I am leaning. At the moment.

So if you want a 6Core D500 machine...wink, wink.

I am wondering if consumer i7 CPU could sustain long hours of run! Last time I computed hundred of thousands of prime numbers on Macbook Pro 15", it stopped in the midnight!!!

If this 2018 mini could do the job, it could saves many hours for those who need Xeon Linux backebd.

 

[citysnaps]

@PickUrPoison

But they did raise their prices by dumbing the Mini down in 2014 so that they were not only poorly spec'ed out, they were also locked down with soldiered everything and security screws. To anyone paying attention, it certainly seemed that they were purposely trying to kill the mini off. And they almost succeeded - except for the growing demand for a bonified Mac Mini update, or at least, a statement from Apple that they intended to discontinue it because, according to you:"poor sales".

And as for apple "tacking back" to the "Pro" market, alot of that "tacking" by Apple is more PR & marketing than actual substance.

Apple is king when it comes to slapping on a "Pro" moniker onto everything it wants to charge an arm and a leg for. I don't think that most Pro's were clamoring for a 5K+++ thermally throttled Xeon AIO Workstation that's glued shut, or another thinner, lighter (again, thermally throttled) MacBook Pro that didn't even have a discreet GPU until late 2017, or a ridiculously delayed Mac Pro that Apple claims has to be totally re-thought out and re-engineered - even though the majority of actual working pro's just want a basic, but expandable and up-gradable machine like the old "cheese grater" Mac Pro.

And if Apple really does think that releasing a totally bolted down (except for ram-maybe?) Mac Mini that starts at a ridiculous price for it's configuration, is again, tacking back" to the "Pro" market, then they are more out of touch with what the HEDT using demographics really want, verses what Apple decides to release as it's definition of "Pro" lately.

In the end, it's still all about the phone - which is at least 3/4 of Apple's revenue. As with their iPad 'Plus' that can't even use a simple mouse or really manage a true, accessible file system, it's just a matter of time before they convince everyone to behold the dawn of a glorious new iPhone "Pro" XS2, or whatever moniker they "tack" on it ...

If Apple really wanted to kill the Mini, they would. Just like that. Gone.

No need to engage in a charade to make the Mini less desireable in order to get people to stop buying it. That’s just a lot money unnecessarily wasted down a rat hole.

 

[MacLC]

Nothing has really changed - the Mini is yet again the makings of a pretty good server (or an entire farm), but not a particularly good computer for normal people. It's just way too expensive for anything else. Once you add an eGPU you probably should just buy an iMac.

I bet the colocators are loving these numbers though...

For my uses, there are two to three days a month where I need performance of a dGPU. The Intel 630 doesn't cut it.

Sadly, it's all too true that by the time a new Mini is configured to decent performance, you're already knocking on iMac pricing, except the iMac has a dGPU (Radeon 555 or 560) and a 4k monitor. Spending $1400 on a desktop computer and only getting an iGPU is pretty sad.

 

[PickUrPoison]

@PickUrPoison

But they did raise their prices by dumbing the Mini down in 2014 so that they were not only poorly spec'ed out, they were also locked down with soldiered everything and security screws. To anyone paying attention, it certainly seemed that they were purposely trying to kill the mini off. And they almost succeeded - except for the growing demand for a Mac Mini update, or at least a statement from Apple that they intended to discontinue it because, according to you:"poor sales". And as for apple "tacking back" to the "Pro" market, alot of that "tacking" by Apple is more PR & marketing than actual substance.

Apple is king when it comes to slapping on a "Pro" moniker onto everything it wants to charge an arm and a leg for. I don't think that most Pro's were clamoring for a 5K+++ thermally throttled Xeon AIO Workstation that's glued shut, or another thinner, lighter (again, thermally throttled) MacBook Pro that didn't even have a discreet GPU until late 2017, or a ridiculously delayed Mac Pro that Apple claims has to be totally re-thought out and re-engineered - even though the majority of actual working pro's just want a basic, but expandable and up-gradable machine like the old "cheese grater" Mac Pro.

And if Apple really does think that releasing a totally bolted down (except for ram-maybe?) Mac Mini that starts at a ridiculous price for it's configuration, is again, tacking back" to the "Pro" market, then they are more out of touch with what the HEDT using demographics really want, verses what Apple has decides to release to "Pro's" of late.

In the end, it's still all about the phone - which is at least 3/4 of it's revenue. As with their iPad 'Plus' that can't even use a mouse or really manage a file system, it's just a matter of time before they convince everyone to behold the dawn of a glorious new iPhone "Pro" XS2, or whatever...

Your conspiracy theory doesn’t hold up. If Apple wanted to discontinue the mini they would, they wouldn’t have to implement an elaborate plan to sabotage it. The $499 price was deliberate to try to drive volume, aimed at the home/consumer market, not pros.

The 2014 mini was a repackaged 13” MBP, and the memory was LPDDR3, which must be soldered. Apple has gone to soldered storage for all their products.

As I said in post #137 above, the price of the mini is about the same as the previous model when configured similarly. It doesn’t “start out at a ridiculous price for its configuration”. For pros that use external storage, RAID arrays or network storage, a 128GB boot drive is more than sufficient. For certain uses the quad will be more than adequate; the $799 base config is a valid pro config. For those that need more it’s available.

The mini has a 65W CPU—it isn’t targeted and doesn’t attempt to play in the HEDT space. It’s basically an iMac without the monitor. Those that want a headless machine have a legitimate alternative now.

The new mini doesn’t offer 4GB and HDD/Fusion models in the $499-699 price range anymore, but that doesn’t mean the SSD configs are overpriced. It means the new model’s been re-targeted, away from low-end home consumers. With a 6C/12T i7, four TB3 ports and a $100 optional 10 GbE port, it’s hard to see the mini targeted at anything but pros; whether you understand that—or think it’s “pro enough”—isn’t relevant.

 

[ElectronGuru]

At $999 CAD for the entry-level Mac mini, I'll be buying zero of them. Sorry Apple. Not a budget computer. Try again?

I’m curious, would you be tempted by a $600 (usd) dual core version with SSDs at a quarter or sixth the speed?

 

[mmomega]

I am wondering if consumer i7 CPU could sustain long hours of run! Last time I computed hundred of thousands of prime numbers on Macbook Pro 15", it stopped in the midnight!!!

If this 2018 mini could do the job, it could saves many hours for those who need Xeon Linux backebd.

This is where my hopes are at. From what it looks like it is an i7 8700.
https://ark.intel.com/products/126686/Intel-Core-i7-8700-Processor-12M-Cache-up-to-4-60-GHz-

Now I'm normally within reach of my computer for the most part and even with the Xeon I've had hiccups and had to restart some things.

Right now there is a tad piece of hope. Now if that comes to be truth, is remained to be seen but I am not one to try and expect my carriage will be in front of the horse until I see it for real.

But I promise I will know within the 14 day grace period if that Mini lives up to my expectations of my current 6 core Mac Pro.
If not, I will probably drop a 12 core in it and let it ride it out for the next several years.

 

[Spectrum]

Only the i7 2012 minis were quad core & started at $799US, but they also came with 1TB HDD. Yeah yeah SSD woohoo, but we're talking 128gb 1/8 the capacity. Now to get the same 1TB it costs $1600, who cares that it's faster when it's twice the price. Apple should have made new generation Fusion drives with Intel's Optane for more affordable storage options. The previous entry model was $500US with 500GB, now it's $799US with 128GB a 60% price hike & 70% capacity reduction. Update, yes, "fantastic" get outta here.

The 2011 also came in a quad configuration. I have it. And I think it was about £1000 for a 2Ghz quad core i7 with 4GB RAM and a pair of 256 SSD + 750GB SSD. So yes, the new model is underspecced in terms of storage...and unlike the 2011 the internal storage is not upgradeable. However...I use it day in day out (at work), and for the first 4 years of its life, i didn't use the 750 GB HDD for anything. It was only after finally running out of space a couple of years ago that I replaced it with a 512GB second SSD for my DropBox partition.

For me, I'll most likely opt for the 256GB config and add external 1TB of TB3 storage for my DropBox volume. This will still be faster than my current set up and very flexible.

Other people in my group have barely anything stored locally. It is all on a network drive. For them 128 gb of ultra fast boot storage paired with a fast quad core is cost effective and ideal!

I think this config would be ideal in an student/academic environment, where hotdesking is used and all files are on a fast network. Performance will be better than an iMac with slow HDD, with the added benefit of being able to reuse LCD monitors from previous models that are being replaced.

I have a lot of my group running MBPros tethered to a screen the whole day. For them, they would probably be better served by keeping their laptop at home for when working at home and travelling and having a base config mini for work use, syncing relevant files via Dropbox or using our network.

 

[Shiro_Simba]

I haven't seen any evidence the 2012 Mini was taking sales away from other Apple computers in any substantive amount.

The Mini was developed to steer people from the Windows camp with a low cost of entry to the Macintosh world (Windows users already having a display, keyboard, mouse, printer, etc.). It also attracted some techies and people who hang out on tech forums looking for an interesting headless computer - which is what I used them for. But compared to Apple's regular customer base of non-technical users just wanting an all-in-one computer to do their work, that would be a tiny percentage. Thus the lack of frequent updates.

Evidence that you will not see one way or the other, as only apple has that data. People are making the assumption it was taking sales from the iMac , cause of the state if intel CPU’s at that time any the price it was offered at, it was great value , And Apple went out of their way to cripple it , where the 2014 was slower than the 2012 .

The lack of frequent updates is due to the iPhone and I-devices becoming the cash cow and apple makes for a decision to stop being a computer company - as the whole Mac range suffered . Only one thinks is certain , a new iPhone each year .
[doublepost=1541234300][/doublepost]

For my uses, there are two to three days a month where I need performance of a dGPU. The Intel 630 doesn't cut it.

Sadly, it's all too true that by the time a new Mini is configured to decent performance, you're already knocking on iMac pricing, except the iMac has a dGPU (Radeon 555 or 560) and a 4k monitor. Spending $1400 on a desktop computer and only getting an iGPU is pretty sad.

The iMac Pro is a much better option in my opinion , given the fully spec’d mini is £3859, an entry iMac Pro is an actual “pro” and not a paint job. Though Apple more considers space grey as a pro part which is sad.

I do really like the new mini , though very happy I got the iMac Pro and still using my Mac mini 2012. If storage was upgradable in the 2018, I would be getting one .

 

[MacKarmaTech]

@PickUrPoison,
"Your conspiracy theory doesn’t hold up. If Apple wanted to discontinue the mini they would, they wouldn’t have to implement an elaborate plan to sabotage it. The $499 price was deliberate to try to drive volume, aimed at the home/consumer market, not pros."

Perhaps, but just like the 2014 Mac Pro, Apple has been purposely dragging their feet on anything that is either reasonably priced "to drive volume", or providing anything really worth and while concerning the "Pro" segment of the market."

"The 2014 mini was a repackaged 13” MBP, and the memory was LPDDR3, which must be soldered. Apple has gone to soldered storage for all their products."

So! That didn't mean that Apple then had stay with that configuration for the next 4 years because a 2014 rev of the MBP was also configured that way. This is nearly a trillion $ company were talking about here. As we all see with the iPhone, iPad and Apple Watch, they have zero problems regularly upgrading devices that make then 40% profits. I guess their enthusiasts & Pro computer customers aren't as ripe for the pikin' as there mobile bling segment is - even though the former used to be Apple's base supporters.

As I said in post #137 above, the price of the mini is about the same as the previous model when configured similarly. It doesn’t “start out at a ridiculous price for its configuration”. For Pros that use external storage, RAID arrays or network storage, a 128GB boot drive is more than sufficient. For certain uses the quad will be more than adequate; the $799 base config is a valid pro config. For those that need more it’s available.

No it's not. In 2014, a spinning HD and 4gb's ram were fairly common in the market. A 500GB HD then, was probably more expensive than the paltry 128GB NVMe Apple put into the MM is now. And although the Mini finally has a Quad-core i3 in the entry level option, it's still one of the cheapest i-core CPU's that's can be had from Intel. Very few actual "Pro's" are going to invest $800+ in a Mac Mini 'starter' kit, and then go out and add several hundreds, or even thousands more on necessary peripherals.

"The mini has a 65W CPU—it isn’t targeted and doesn’t attempt to play in the HEDT space. It’s basically an iMac without the monitor. Those that want a headless machine have a legitimate alternative now."

Yes, they most certainly do! But it will come at a rather high entrance fee.

"The new mini doesn’t offer 4GB and HDD/Fusion models in the $499-699 price range anymore, but that doesn’t mean the SSD configs are overpriced. It means the new model’s been re-targeted, away from low-end home consumers. With a 6C/12T i7, four TB3 ports and a $100 optional 10 GbE port, it’s hard to see the mini targeted at anything but pros; whether you understand that—or think it’s “pro enough”—isn’t relevant."


So which is it - IS Apple really trying to "re-target" the "pro's", or is it that Apple "doesn't attempt to play in the HEDT space" where a good majority of the "pro's" users live?

 

[Shiro_Simba]

Alas I waited so long for the update , I got an intel hades.

 

[SeaFox]

Good thing they marked the results "MacMini 2018late". We might have gotten confused which machine they were referring to, there's been so many updates to this computer lately.