Intel's New Core i9 and Coffee Lake Chips Pave Way for Quad-Core 13" MacBook Pro, Mac Mini Refresh, and More

Too many wishful thinking posts = irrelevant the real world anything. Tech kids on youtube all gushing over this topic making hundreds of hours of landfill videos wishing for quadcore and octacore this and that, all crammed inside a tiny gum packet size laptop? Maybe when they are 400 years old.
 
compete12 said:
Just one question to cover the last 2-3 years of these message boards:

What's so great about the Mac Mini that everyone is always whining about Apple not refreshing it?

Seriously. By the time you add the monitor and peripherals, why not just buy an iMac?

Am I missing something here?
Click to expand...

The 2 generic monitors and one keyboard and mouse I would like to use on Windows, MacOS, and Linux at the same time.

And I can put the Linux and Windows boxes under my desk. An iMac not so much.
 
compete12 said:
Just one question to cover the last 2-3 years of these message boards:

What's so great about the Mac Mini that everyone is always whining about Apple not refreshing it?

Seriously. By the time you add the monitor and peripherals, why not just buy an iMac?

Am I missing something here?
Click to expand...
Cost.
 
compete12 said:
Just one question to cover the last 2-3 years of these message boards:

What's so great about the Mac Mini that everyone is always whining about Apple not refreshing it?

Seriously. By the time you add the monitor and peripherals, why not just buy an iMac?

Am I missing something here?
Click to expand...

I avoid all-in-one products. After seeing friends and co-workers having to deal with the loss of an entire unit because of problems with one thing inside it, I just generally avoid them now. Having to do without the whole unit due to a display issue is not a compromise I’m willing to make. That’s my primary issue with the iMac.

The soldering of internal components in the recent Mac mini has decreased the attraction to that device for me somewhat, but there is still the fact that you can use any display you want with it, and if the display dies, you don’t go without the whole unit until it’s repaired, or replaced (at a much higher cost if out of warranty.)
 
HailstormX said:
yea I miss the early intel/apple days where Apple was getting first pick on processors. Its been sad how slow Apple has been to up date machines. Mac Pro 5 years or so and the Mac mini. For a company this size I think they can afford to throw a updated chip into an existing design. And Keep this stuff user serviceable too.
Click to expand...
Intel broke the cadence when they had yield issues with the 14nm Broadwell debacle. Apple drove a lot of innovation in those first 5-7 years of partnering with Intel, but at some point, the relationship may have soured. It could be Apple, if they drove Intel as hard as they drive some of their other partners. It may have been Intel who pushed back...who knows. I have to agree though that the lack of at least some update to the 2013 Mac Pro was just laziness because the market is so small and the lack of Mac mini updates is completely inexcusable given the strategic position the mini played in gaining switchers. However, after watching the media event last week, Apple is still trying to lead with the iPad as a solution completely at the expense of desktop and mobile computers, which tells me they still aren't getting it.
 
OldSchoolMacGuy said:
There have been plenty of other processors in recent years that have been passed over. And how often has a processor been announced by Intel and then Apple adds it in a new laptop 2 months later? Not gonna happen with this round of refreshes.
Click to expand...

(warning, this comment might include sarcasm, read at your own risk): Lol, ya it's not like Apple has had any time preparing for this refresh
 
dgdosen said:
So I see Apple only putting 4 cores in a TB MBP to induce people to buy touchbars. What do you think?
Click to expand...

Totally the kind of d... move Apple would pull. I'm willing to bet they'll never introduce the non-touchbar version for 15" either. And no chance we'll see a 17".
 
compete12 said:
Just one question to cover the last 2-3 years of these message boards:

What's so great about the Mac Mini that everyone is always whining about Apple not refreshing it?

Seriously. By the time you add the monitor and peripherals, why not just buy an iMac?

Am I missing something here?
Click to expand...
The advantage of Mac mini was that you could use existing monitors and peripherals. For example, when my mother bought her Mac Mini, I was able to give her a mouse, keyboard, and old 1080p monitor I wasn't using. With an iMac, you have to re-buy everything.

Also, the cost of entry is much lower because you don't have to buy an expensive 4 or 5k display. You can save money and by a nice 1080p display if you so desire.

I do think that the value of the Mac mini has gone down with the 2014 refresh. With the 2012, it was also easy to upgrade the RAM and hard drive space along with the option of a quad core processor. Now that everything is soldered and you have the thing as is, it forces the mini to become more expensive than it's worth if you want extras.
 
duervo said:
I avoid all-in-one products. After seeing friends and co-workers having to deal with the loss of an entire unit because of problems with one thing inside it, I just generally avoid them now. Having to do without the whole unit due to a display issue is not a compromise I’m willing to make. That’s my primary issue with the iMac.

The soldering of internal components in the recent Mac mini has decreased the attraction to that device for me somewhat, but there is still the fact that you can use any display you want with it, and if the display dies, you don’t go without the whole unit until it’s repaired, or replaced (at a much higher cost if out of warranty.)
Click to expand...

I see your point. However, in my experience....my 2009 27-inch iMac is still motoring on. I just replaced my 2008 MacBook (unibody, that been uncased in a backpack for the past few years. Still works, though) with a 2017 MBP.

Especially now with everything being solid state, it seems like if it's not a factory/manufacturing defect, you have even less chance of anything "going bad". Not saying all electronics are perfect, but Apple obviously knows more about the system that the user. I was SO resistant to upgrading to my new MBP because of all the trash-talking about it on these message boards, and as it turns out....I love it! The keyboard is amazing and it's definitely a worthy successor to previous model that hadn't changed that much (physically) is many years.

Back to the Mini, a few others responded with multi-booting other OSes. Couldn't you just throw Windows/Linux on a Thunderbolt external drive on an iMac and wouldn't that still outperform a Mac Mini?

I just never realized that the Mac Mini had such a user base.
[doublepost=1522783789][/doublepost]
TechZeke said:
The advantage of Mac mini was that you could use existing monitors and peripherals. For example, when my mother bought her Mac Mini, I was able to give her a mouse, keyboard, and old 1080p monitor I wasn't using. With an iMac, you have to re-buy everything.

Also, the cost of entry is much lower because you don't have to buy an expensive 4 or 5k display. You can save money and by a nice 1080p display if you so desire.

I do think that the value of the Mac mini has gone down with the 2014 refresh. With the 2012, it was also easy to upgrade the RAM and hard drive space along with the option of a quad core processor. Now that everything is soldered and you have the thing as is, it forces the mini to become more expensive than it's worth if you want extras.
Click to expand...


You could also jump into a iMac for $899 on a Black Friday deal at Best Buy and you'd be right in the ballpark, too. My mom also has a Mac Mini, and I'd much prefer the cleaner look of and iMac with one power cord and wireless devices than her scenario with a Dell monitor and my old iMac peripherals where nothing matches and there are cords going everywhere. As far as upgrading yourself....those times are long gone.
 
compete12 said:
I just never realized that the Mac Mini had such a user base.
Click to expand...

It has a strong following on Mac tech forums. That it doesn't have wider appeal to Apple's customer base is why Apple has not made updating it a priority.

I can't blame them.

My 2012 Mini does a fine job for my home automation and security system.
 
Mike1984 said:
1) Then Need to reintroduce the 17 inch laptop, for people who actually do work on their laptops, as their desktops.
2) They really need 32 Gig of Ram.

There are 17 inch laptop's out with 32GB ram:


Https://System76.com

the KUDA line looks awfully close to a Mac Book Pro 17 inch:


7th Gen Intel® Core i7-7700HQ: 2.8 up to 3.8 GHz – 6 MB cache – 4 cores – 8 threads

Display
17.3″ 1920 × 1080 LED Backlit, Matte

Graphics
Intel® HD Graphics 630

Memory
Up to 32 GB Dual Channel DDR4 @ 2400 MHz

Storage
M.2 SSD, 2.5″ SATA II. Up to 6TB total.
Click to expand...
Two problems with that is that Apple is never going to ship a 17" MBP with a non-Retina display, the other is that to drive that 3840x2400 (1920x1200@2x) 17" Retina display, the HD Graphics 630 isn't going to cut it for Pros, so they have to find a decent AMD Vega chip that can drive the laptop display and at least 2 5K external displays and not consume so many watts that battery life goes to crap. Hopefully, Apple has a new 17" in the works, but I think it is entirely dependent on a GPU that can drive the 9.2 million pixels of the internal display at decent frame rates and still get 10 hours of battery life before it happens.
 
Gata said:
I think what might have changed is the fact that, spec-wise, the 17 inch laptop wasn't any different than the 15 inch. They've said that they're running into limitations on logic board/battery size when upgrading to DDR4, so releasing a meaningfully more powerful 17" with either better battery life, improved components, or both would fill a niche that people are looking for.
Click to expand...
Except that Apple has to find an energy efficient LCD panel at 3840X2400 resolution and an energy efficient discrete GPU that can drive those 9.2 million pixels and get decent battery life...for a market share of 5-7% of it's existing MBP customers. I miss my 17", but I don't think it's going to happen. I hope I'm wrong.
 
I love how this announcement broke a day right after rumors of Apple making their own Mac chips.
 
alphaod said:
I have two 13" PC laptops both quad-core processors (i7-8550U & i7-8650U); it's pathetic that Apple is this far behind. They used to be on top of things like this when it came to updating to the latest processors and such.

And these laptops are as thin and light as my Macs and they all last 10+ hours a day on one charge.
Click to expand...

Apple waits for the iris version of graphics which lag first versions of the intel chips by about 6 months - they aren't behind based on the same chip.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Back
Top