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Neutered Mac Mini
- Thread starter EvilZef
- Start date
Uh, there are USB adapters but I heard they suck.
Your best bet is to get an airport card/bluetooth card on ebay. I was actually planning on upgrading the airport card to wireless N (the 2006 was A/B/G), but have decided it's not worth the hassle as it needs 3 antennae and I don't even have a wireless N router.
Just google some installation manuals for installing it. It's not very hard, though getting into the Mac Mini is annoying.
Yous hould also upgrade the processor and the hard drive to an SSD if possible.
Get the T7200 or T7600 processor ($25, and $65 respectively) with the former at 2.0 Ghz Core 2 Duo, and the latter at 2.33 Ghz Core 2 Duo.
When you max the ram out to 4 GB (3.3 GB usable), an SSD, and a 2.0 or 2.33 Core 2 Duo, you'll end up with a computer that is faster than the 2009 and 2010 models lol.
Total cost of ugprade would be around $100-150 if you play your cards right and that's A LOT of bang for the buck.
Here are some links to get you started:
http://www.xlr8yourmac.com/systems/mac_mini_core_2_duo_swaps.html
http://rickhartley.com/posts/2011/mac-mini-macmini11-processor-upgrade-from-t2300-to-t7200/
http://www.o0o.it/mini/
http://www.123macmini.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=20069
http://macstack.net/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=10746
http://macstack.net/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=10689
http://www.maclife.com/article/upgrade_your_imac_core_2_duo_processor
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Also this is the research I compiled for getting the airport-N card. It's fairly cheap, but you need to find an antenna for it that is compatible.
AR5BXB72 = NETWORK CARD I NEED
http://reviews.ebay.ca/802-11n-Airport-Extreme-upgrading-your-duo-core-mac?ugid=10000000003517164
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3197882?start=0&tstart=0
http://macmanusnl.wordpress.com/2011/06/15/upgrading-airport-to-wifi-n-on-mid-2007-mac-mini/
http://www.ifixit.com/Guide/Installing-Mac-mini-Model-A1176-AirPort-Extreme/1112/1
http://www.hardmac.com/articles/74/
http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=416307
820-1918 A <--- antenna needed
Don't invest a lot of money on a six uyear old "Mini". Wired Eithernet is faster than Wireless. Use a cat-5 cable. As for BT there are $25 USB dongles that work.
The airport card often goes for $5-6 on ebay. It's cheaper, and more effective than the USB dongles which have had compatibility issues with OS X.
An ethernet cable is ideal obviously, but if he doesn't want to be wired, then that's the next best thing.
I would say $100-150 is a solid amount to invest in the 2006 model. You will get a significant amount of bang/buck because of its upgradability that makes it even more powerful than the 2009 and slightly less than the 2010 stock Mac Mini.Only downside is the much weaker video card, but it is more than adequate for playing HD 1080p video with the better processor. Heck, I think even counterstrike would work on the GMA950, but mac minis were never really gaming computers to begin with, so this is mainly a trivial issue.
If he spends $25 for the T7200 processor, $25 bucks for 2x2GB RAM modules, and $100 for a 128GB SSD, he'll be doing pretty well.
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I forgot to mention but the airport card I listed can only work with your computer if you upgrade to the 64 bit processors (T7200 or T7600) as it needs a Core 2 Duo processor.
Here's a listing for one: http://www.ebay.com/itm/Apple-Macbook-PRO-15-4-A1211-Airport-Wireless-WIFI-N-Card-AR5BXB72-TESTED-/230760063815?pt=US_Internal_Network_Cards&hash=item35ba5f2347
And you can get antennas here. You need at least two antennas for this one to work properly.
Total cost would be about $15 bucks I would say.
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It's not a G4 mini. And I use a mac mini wirelessly and it's much more convenient than a wired connection. He already knew he could use an ethernet connection, which is why he asked what his options were for a wireless connection.
Because he probably got a hell of a deal and they make excellent media/itunes servers....
They're also quite modern if you upgrade them. Prices for CPU, ssds, and ram have fallen so much that you can spend $150 and get a tremendous amount of bang/buck. If you did these upgrades a few years ago, it would have cost you at least $1000 if not more to a $600 computer.
It's also fun and relatively easy to upgrade, like you're giving it new life.
It's also fun and relatively easy to upgrade, like you're giving it new life.
Depending on what you want to use it for, keep it cheap being such an old machine. Search Tigerdirect, they have some inexpensive ($20 or less) micro adapters for either.
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=6367152&csid=_61
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=1883613&Sku=U12-41943
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=6367152&csid=_61
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=1883613&Sku=U12-41943
If you need an airport extreme card (not sure if that model had the integrated card or the removable one), drop me a PM. I have a couple laying around from dead iBooks.
Mountain Lion is overrated. It should have been a software update (10.7.4 to 10.7.5) if anything.
All Mountain Lion does is add useless notifications, airdrop, and airplay but that only works with really brand new comptuers. I actually prefer Snow Leopard and I dislike how Apple is increasingly trying to control what you can do.
Don't fall into the deceit that Apple manipulates its customers that it needs a new computer every 2-3 years. It's all dishonest business practice. Besides, for 95% of users, they don't need all these new features. They could have provided support for many older computers, but they chose not to. It wasn't a hardware issue, it was simply because they did not want to write the drivers for the older ones. It's Apple's new direction in planned obsolescence. Preventing you from upgrading components (everything is soldered) even BATTERIES and pressuring you to buy their new product. Of course, you can buy a battery from them, for like $300, but then you ask yourself, you could sell your computer for $500 + $300 = $800, and only $200 for a new computer.
If you have money to throw away, or are just financially reckless, then you could say that a used car is bad and only brand new is good.
