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High-End 'M1X' Mac Mini With New Design and Additional Ports Expected to Launch in the 'Next Several Months'
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What’s in the current chip that makes it inadequate to run iMovie in your opinion? FCP runs buttery smooth.
I don't think Apple really considers the Mac Mini to be their "entry-level Mac" even if it is priced like one. Their entry-level Mac is the base iMac. I think Mac Mini is really more their server product and Amazon is buying up a ton of them for their in the cloud Mac OS service, that's why they introduced 10 gig ethernet to the Mac mini as well for servers.
As I see it, all m1 macs are the entry level, just in different form factors.
We’ll have to wait for the rest of the line to transition in order to have a clearer picture, though.
Hopefully the new Mini model supports more than 2 monitors so I can switch back from my Windows PC.
(NB: There's no point placing too much weight on what the chip will be called - ultimately, the M2 is whatever chip Apple decides to stick an "M2" label on, or they might still decide to create a separate "branding" for the "Apple Silicon Pro" chips. However, taking the usual understanding that "M1X" is the "pro" version of the M1, whereas "M2" is the next generation of core designs...)
Last I looked, the M2 is expected to debut in the all-new MacBook Air sometime next year whereas the M1X was expected to debut in the 14/16" MacBook imminently (...and may have been held up by component shortages).
When it does arrive, the M2 in the 2022 MacBook Air will, like the M1, be configured primarily for ultrabooks and tablets in terms of number of cores, balance of performance/economy cores/GPU cores, clock speeds etc. and may well have similar limitations on RAM and display support to the M1 - which is perfectly sensible for the target market of 'general computing'. It's likely to be all-round incrementally faster and more power-efficient than the base M1 - maybe 15%.
The M1X, on the other hand, is going to be the M1 souped up for higher-end applications (which in Apple terms usually means graphics, video and audio production). Exactly how depends on which rumours you read* - but a significantly souped up GPU (probably too power hungry for Air/iPad use) is most likely, also supporting more displays, maybe with double the number of cores, probably at least 12 CPU cores, maybe with a higher performance:economy core ratio etc... They'll also have support more than 2 LPDDR4 chips worth of RAM to be credible. For the applications in question - which typically support multi-threading and GPU-accelerated computing - the benefits of the "X" could be far more significant than the relatively small across-the board improvement of M2 over M1.
So, really the 14/16" MBP, 5k+ iMac and high-end Mac Mini couldn't just wait for the M2 say, early next year, they'd need some sort of "M2X" which is probably a lot further down the pipeline.
(* Of course, Apple are not infallible, and the M1X could turn out to be a pathetic warmed-over version of the M1 that doesn't meet the needs of higher-end users, but we can burn that bridge when we come to it...)
I run my entire studio setup including outboard gear on a Mac Mini M1. It can handle more audio channels than my 12-core Mac Pro could. I thought the 2 TB ports would be a problem, but I've got multiple Thunderbolt 3 devices daisy chained and it works absolutely fine. Never have I had a kernel crash related to the IO I'm running, unlike the daily T2-chip drama on my previous 2018 i7 Mac Mini. (glad I got rid of that piece of ****)
So no, the 2020 Mac Mini is practical, and it does meet my ''Pro'' needs.
The i3 mini was a joke they overcharged for considering the mini stated at $499 when it debuted.
the i7 was good when it was well below a $1,000 when it first came out. The only reason apple has those price points is because it can. The components of a mini are identical yet can go from $699 to over a thousand because of the price of hard drive and ram apple charges. Redesigning their computers was something they used to do for free all the time but after the iPhones came out they started calling them new names and charging more for them instead. We will soon find out if m1x will be the $1,000-$2,000 chip or if it will go in ANY sub $1,000 computer at all. Apple likes to have their tiers and m1x is just middle of the road. They haven’t come out with their $3k and $6k and above chips yet.
As I recall, Apple has always had several "levels" of its machines. Two processor choices two or more graphics choice, storage choices, memory choices, etc.
Ya pays ya money and ya takes ya choice.
Ummmm sorry? I do believe an i7 is higher end than an i3.....
And 64GB if RAM is higher end than 16GB.....
So yes, Apple did offer a higher end Mac mini. Which the M1 does not replace.
I am glad nothing much happened at WWDC this year. Hopefully that means the next operating systems on all products will be more stable than their track record the last few years have been.
When I last looked at Synology, they did not have DAS (Direct Attached Storage) like QNAP and Drobo. Has this changed? The USB ports on my NAS are only for external drives and things NOT to connect to a computer unfortunately.
I could really go for a mini refresh. Wife and I realize we need to get all our photo libraries out of Aperture soon before our old macs start dying. I would have been happy with the M1, but something stronger sounds even better.
I felt that the Mac Mini was a dying breed when you can pick up a MacBook Air that has a lot of oomph, but seems many consumers are really into the Mac Mini because of the affordability, power, and ability to just plug things in without having to have dongles!
Now, with the upgraded processor as an option with more ports, this little machine is certainly a power house! Apple seems to understand this market very well and willing to give it what it needs.
Now, with the upgraded processor as an option with more ports, this little machine is certainly a power house! Apple seems to understand this market very well and willing to give it what it needs.
Depending on the pricing I think I might pick up an M1X Mac Mini plus an M1 MacBook Air for the price of a 16”MBP.
Hopefully we get an HDMI 2.1 port supporting eARC, Dolby Atmos/Spatial Audio and 120Hz refresh (which should have come in the last one).
A15 is based on the M2, and has already taped out. (The M2 is not based on the A15. It’s reversed.)