I5 2012 mini still ok?

[mellofello]

I just ordered a 2012 Mac mini that has been upgraded to 16gb of ram, and 1 tb SSD.

I'm just a little nervous that it will be slow. I don't do anything too intensive, but the spinning hd on my iMac was killing me.

 

[EightyTwenty]

It won't be slow at all. That thing will scream.

 

[wickedpapercut]

You have nothing to worry about. For anything other than hardcore video editing or conversions, the i5 mini will be blazingly fast. The SSD is what will really bring the noticeable speed improvement over anything with a spinning disk. It also has plenty of processor for normal operations. Enjoy.

 

[Santabean2000]

You'll be sweet for all 'everyday' tasks; I'm writing this on a 2012 2.5Ghz mini. [16GB RAM, 2.5Tb home-built Fusion!]

The only time it fires up for me (as a home, family machine), is when I import snaps into Photos, or the occasional Handbrake rip.

 

[macgeek18]

It'll be insanely fast. I can't tell the difference between my 2.3 i5 2011 Mini and my quad core PC. My Mini is as fast I want it to be for everyday tasks. I don't even notice a slow down with Windows 10 and Fedora running in VMs at the same time.

 

[mellofello]

Good to hear!

 

[MRrainer]

It's only slow for VMWare running demanding VMs with lots of cores.

It will be a very nice machine for everything else, provided you're OK with its (limited, from todays point of view) GPU capabilities.

 

[mellofello]

It's only slow for VMWare running demanding VMs with lots of cores.

It will be a very nice machine for everything else, provided you're OK with its (limited, from todays point of view) GPU capabilities.

Yeah I was really weighing all my options. I was going to get the 2014 refurb with 1 tb fusion for $850 refurb. I am really over spinning disks though, and the only official SSD was around 250 GB which is too small for my use.

There is now a whole cottage industry of guys who sell upgraded minis on eBay. Got this one with the TB SSD for only $650. Seemed to be a good balance.

 

[Boyd01]

Gave my base 2012 mini to my daughter's family for Christmas after upgrading to 16gb with an external Samsung T3 SSD as the boot drive. Feels very fast and they are thrilled with it.