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Hands-On With Apple's New 2018 Mac Mini

Hodar1 said:
USB C has a bandwidth of about 5-10 Gbps (depending upon Generation); which is more than adequate for external drive speeds.
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It has Thunderbolt, not USB (well, it also has USB and Thunderbolt also does USB). USB-C is the format of the connector, Thunderbolt and USB are the protocols. The USB-A connectors (standard USB ports) are USB 3.1 and the USB-C connectors are Thunderbolt 3, which includes USB 3.1, but Thunderbolt itself is 40Gbps.
 
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picaman said:
I know I’m in the minority on this thread, but I’m putting this out there nevertheless: I purchased a new mini, i7, 16GB, 1GB SSD and the Ethernet upgrade. It absolutely hit the sweet spot for my use case and after using it for a week or so, I have absolutely no complaints. I’ve been watching iStat Menus and haven’t seen any overheating. No throttling I can see. Here’s my Geekbench:


View attachment 804051
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That's the configuration I am considering.
 
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wdwpsu said:
Why not spend the $ on an external SSD (i.e. T5) instead?
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I am thinking at least 512GB. I am really not a fan of the soldered storage but I've come to accept it. But since I have decided on the $200 for the 512GB, stretching it to $600 doesn't seem too out of line. That's the genius of Apple's pricing. That next little bit isn't too much, until you reach 2TB pricing.

The X5 is already $699 on Amazon as I write this. That's more than the 1TB upgrade. The T5 and USB storage is also an option and I will no doubt use them, or a competitor.

When I go with a TB3 solution, it will probably be an enclosure with one or two PCI-E to M2 NVMe adapters. To me, an enclosure is a smarter choice. Especially if I can get one that will provide an eGPU and storage.
 
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For my needs as a sysadmin having to support MacOS and Windows I would like to get one. I've always used some sort of 2012 or 2014 Mac Mini for running VM's under Fusion or doing tasks that I can keep running without bogging down my laptop. Now that the new systems have all the ports I would need it makes sense to upgrade.

Looking at the Windows or Linux alternatives, my work has many small form factor PC's. NUC's, HP elitedesks, Acer, Dell Optiplex Micro Form factors. They all have foibles about that them but mainly the fan noise once they start to get stressed.

I don't like the price of memory and ssd's along with the rest of you but having tried the PC alternatives, what choices are there?
 
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MultiMan said:
That was back when Apple was adamant not to use any fans whatsoever in their products. I remember it well. It was nice with the silence but limited the products in other ways. It really goes all the way back to the Apple ][ which had one of the first switching power supplies (runs cooler) but without a fan, which could lead to overheating, especially since it didn't have any other fan either and could be expanded with 8 internal cards which could draw a lot of power.

The cube was to use convection cooling only, but that only goes so far.

Still, it was wonderful times with an innovative and playful Apple firing on all cylinders.
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The Cube actually had room for a fan in the base (it was prepared for a fan). You could add one and have it run very slow (e.g. give it 5V instead of 12V). The effect was negligible noise and far better cooling. I had such a beast with an upgraded GPU after I started going deaf from the large PowerPC 'windtunnel' machines. Half the power, 0% of the noise.
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picaman said:
I know I’m in the minority on this thread, but I’m putting this out there nevertheless: I purchased a new mini, i7, 16GB, 1GB SSD and the Ethernet upgrade. It absolutely hit the sweet spot for my use case and after using it for a week or so, I have absolutely no complaints. I’ve been watching iStat Menus and haven’t seen any overheating. No throttling I can see. Here’s my Geekbench:
View attachment 804051
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This was my main worry: overheating, especially with the 6-core i7.

How hard did you drive it?
 
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Sabelonada said:
I am thinking at least 512GB. I am really not a fan of the soldered storage but I've come to accept it. But since I have decided on the $200 for the 512GB, stretching it to $600 doesn't seem too out of line. That's the genius of Apple's pricing. That next little bit isn't too much, until you reach 2TB pricing.
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9591F7AF-5CCF-48DD-BCCD-39C13212DF0D.jpeg


I posted this elsewhere and not sure you saw it. The higher the capacity, the faster the SSD. Perhaps a factor to consider :)
 
BigBoy2018 said:
Well, after 4 years with no update, this trillion dollar company certainly had time to come up with a slightly different design (dare i say slightly thicker? Oh heresy!!!)
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During the keynote, Apple mentioned being in contact with a company called MacStadium, which offers Mac mini colocation. They were likely told that a form factor change would be problematic with the existing mounting equipment.

To be honest, I can't figure out whether or not Apple has decided to abandon the server market completely. On the software side they have certainly acted that way, but on the hardware side this Mac mini is a decent offering.

I would just buy something cheaper running Linux at this point. The software is what made Mac servers worthwhile.
then they could have offered an option for a dedicated video card - that they could overcharge for, but that I would certainly buy.
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They offer two, iMac and Mac Pro. The problem is that Apple doesn't consistently refresh these products like they should, and both are out of date. The iMac still using 2017 processors is something there isn't any excuse for.
And. before you say like so many others ‘get an egpu’, those are clunky, dont work with all software, and dont work at all in bootcamp, so those arent appealing to me.
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They are clunky, but can offer much better desktop-class performance than a built-in dGPU, can be replaced if they fail, and are actually upgradable instead of soldered to the board.

As for the software issues you mentioned, please point me to an article or review which talks about that. I remember issues being mentioned with a MacBook Pro + eGPU setup, but with the Mac mini the display is being fully driven through the eGPU.
 
"Was it worth the wait?"

NO. Not at all.
After 4 years, delivering a computer with entry specs 8gb and 128SSD is kind of insulting in 2018.
The internal SSD is not upgradable. So if it fails, you need to take it to Apple. Another Apple marketing scam to rip more money out of customers.
It is $300 dollars more than the original Mac mini, a 70% increase.
Way overpriced for the entry specs. Way expensive for an entry level machine.
And the upgrade prices are ridiculous. A fully loaded Mac mini is 4.2k?
By the time you upgrade the mini to a usable configuration, I rather buy an iMac.

Apple greed and lack of innovation, is taking the entire computer line up down the drain. So sad.
 
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I am looking to buy two. One as a replacement for a 2010 iMac i7 with 1TB SSD and one as a replacement for my Mac mini 2010 that is used as server (macOS Server). The latter doesn't need to be powerful and I'm waiting for Apple to release the docs for moving Mail services away from what macOS Server offers. I've been waiting for a Mac mini that has Thunderbolt 3 as I don't want to invest in old peripherals anymore (though I will have to invest in a Thunderbolt 3 to FW 800 to attach a RAID I'm using for backups).

Currently, I have a monitor that s on a KVM switch that is used to switch the monitor between either "monitor of the server" and "second monitor on the iMac". I'm planning to buy two 4K monitors, but I'm looking for a way to get these on a KVM that does 60Hz on the 4K displays. Can someone tell me if there are good KVMs that can handle 4K @ 60Hz and if so, what adapters are good to go from the Thunderbolt 3 on a Mac to the KVM switch. I'm worried that it will be hard to get a smoothly working chain.

I also am worried about the heat thing and what that means for noise of the system when it is working hard. Though there is one report in the thread now that the i7 works fine, it would be nice if there was some real world testing.
 
I'll be interested in how the Mini performs with Final Cut Pro, since that's a lot of what I do. I know I'd have to get an external GPU to make it work well, but curious as to how it compares with my 2013 Mac Pro.
 
wdwpsu said:
Why not spend the $ on an external SSD (i.e. T5) instead?
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That's a reasonable solution if you don't need the much higher performance of Apple's internal SSD. To get close to that level of performance you'd need to go with an external Thunderbolt 3 NVMe SSD. They're still a bit rare, and pricey.
 
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iReality85 said:
Does that mean Apple can't be criticized for designing it as such with the T2?
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No criticism here. Apple's T2 chip provides on the fly SSD encryption and decryption, Secure Boot, and other robust security features. Glad Apple went that way.
 
mnott said:
What do you do to sync your data?
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Basically nothing. It all happens in the background without any action on my part via iCloud.

For example... I use Apple's Notes app to keep track of all of my projects, meetings, photos of this and that, brainstorm ideas, and on and on.

Any Notes entries I make to my iPhone automatically appear in the Notes app in my Macs and iPads. And vice-versa. It just happens and it just works.
 
The numbers don't really add up, but I probably would've bought this a few years ago when I was outgrowing my old Mac Mini and wanted to step up to something that would support 4K resolution.
 
partsofspeech said:
‘Forcasting’ would be a more precise term to describe my the numbers.
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It is not forecasting. It is reality.
Macbook Pro prices raised by $500, Mac Mini 65% increase, Macbook Air 20%.
What is worse is that with the price increases, there was not really much of an increase in innovation and internals.

The way Apple has been ridiculously increasing its prices, we do not expect any less for the Mac Pro.

Sadly, overpriced underspeced is the new Apple moto.
 
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Freida said:
mac mini, keyboard + lg 5k monitor is $1000 more than 27 iMac.
strange
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It's not "strange".

The 27" iMac is an incredible bargain and has been since the first 5K retina display.
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DLPc said:
was going to give one a shot.... went in to buy at the apple store, and took a couple of mid size work files with me to test out. just as my theory went... this thing throttles like crazy. i was never able to see the cpu hit the max turbo speed (except for maybe a split second at the beginning of a crunching run)

gauging from the reaction im seeing online... apple (once again) has a massive heat dissipation issue. the longevity of this machine is going to be NIL due to excessive heat.
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And if that is a legitimate issue, Apple will, once again, fix it in an update.
 
I have to say that Apple has lost its touch when it comes to esthetics. Why can't they develop an Apple branded display that would complement the Mini and Mac Pro?

It really would not be difficult for them to do. At all. Literally one person could get it done.
 
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