I'm still holding out hope that they won't hold off until the summer. I'm in need of a new machine and I have the money burning a hole in my pocket. If they delay too much longer I very well may end up with a MacBook Pro.
That would basically be an iPad Pro with the footprint of the current mini. So a 5.9 mm high cuboid. (The current mini is 36 mm high, more than 6 times as much).
Jepp, but they (1.55 cm) are still half as thin as the Mac mini (3.6 cm). So If you remove battery, speakers, hinges, keyboard and trackpad it should be fairly easy to fit this in the current mini enclosure.