New Intel Mac mini

[sunfast]

pro: its cool
con: its expensive.

Thats it.

That's Apple!

 

[bosrs1]

As much as we'd LOVE a media center mini the new Intel model is obviously not it. Just accept the mini for what it is and move on. If it meets your needs great. Personally I think the mini makes a great music server, and if you've ever priced music servers like the Escient you'll recognize what a great value the mini can be.

The good news is that I don't think the rumors of a media center mini are false. Microsoft has already announced that it's media center software will be baked into most of Vista's home versions. Clearly Apple is not going to cede the world's living rooms to M$. Watch for Front Row 2.0 to become integrated into 10.5, and from that I think we will see the first genuine Mac media center.

But what is "it"? Seriously it's really got no market w/o the media center slant on the marketing. It's too expensive to be entry level, to underpowered to be mid-level, it's overpriced...

 

[jer2eydevil88]

Sorry, I don't know how to tag a link in this forum. Here's the URL:

http://www.apple.com/quicktime/guide/hd/recommendations.html

Before the Intel's came out that page said 720p for 1.67ghz G4 chips and for the most part I can get a steady 20fps on my 1.67ghz g4 laptop... so its hyped up to 1.83ghz Intel on that and I wouldn't be suprised if these mac mini's play it just fine...

Oh but one other thing, the 2.0ghz macbook i played with could play one 720p and one 1080p video without so much as a drop in fps on either.

That gives you an idea as to how powerful the new intel chips are in comparison.

 

[Hattig]

No. At least not based on Apple's published specs...it is either 9% too slow or needs to be 10% faster, depending on how you look at it. Keep in mind that these are minimum specs. Having other stuff open (apps, background services like Bonjour, etc.) will likely require more RAM and perhaps even a bit more CPU power.

Here's a cut-and-paste from the page to which I linked earlier:

For 1280x720 (720p) video at 24-30 frames per second:

1.8 GHz PowerMac G5 or faster Macintosh computer; 1.83 GHz Intel Core Duo or faster
At least 256MB of RAM
64 MB or greater video card

It depends on whether or not Apple accelerate decode on the graphics hardware or do it all in software on the CPU.

The GMA950 is meant to have facilities to aid decode, so it may be able to help the processor decode, and thus enable 720p on this hardware.

 

[bosrs1]

Before the Intel's came out that page said 720p for 1.67ghz G4 chips and for the most part I can get a steady 20fps on my 1.67ghz g4 laptop... so its hyped up to 1.83ghz Intel on that and I wouldn't be suprised if these mac mini's play it just fine...

Oh but one other thing, the 2.0ghz macbook i played with could play one 720p and one 1080p video without so much as a drop in fps on either.

That gives you an idea as to how powerful the new intel chips are in comparison.

Well as powerful as they are I'd still like a dedicated graphics card. I'm selling my G5 2.7 Tower next week and I'm going to hold the money in trust for the first Intel tower rev which I'm sure will be bangin. Unfortunately I'll have to limp along til WWDC on my PB, but it could be worse I suppose.

 

[BWhaler]

ok so after all my moaning last night over the rip off price of £449 i gave in and bought the Mac Mini Solo stock

🙄

I did the same thing.

slammed apple all night.

then bought a fully loaded duo today. 1,200 bucks for a mini... woo hoo...

 

[g.x]

What?? These specs are outrageous for 720p content playback. I thought that H.264 decoding/encoding was fully supported by the ATI Radeon x1600 card including with the MacBook Pro. So H.264 content should be fully playable on any processor as long as the Graphics card supports it. As for 720p in MPEG2 or whatever other format, I guarantee you that VLC or mplayer will give you better results then QuickTime, better meaning faster decoding and possibly better picture quality. If you don't beleve me, then try it for yourself. QuickTime is a pig when it comes to resource requirements.


Also, integrated graphics is a bad idea on any system, but even worse on Mac OS X, since a lot of OS level stuff is rendered in OpenGL and Quartz. I pitty the fool who buys a Mac without a decent graphics card.

I wouldn't get too upset by the MacBook Pro (except the name, of course). Even w/o its ATI card, the specs are up to speed (now that they've bumped everything up). The ATI card just helps w/ decoding the H.264, so it will deliver better performance.

But I would (and did) get upset about the mini.

1. Apple pushes hi-def. Great.
2. Apple pushes mini into living room. Wrong form factor, still fine.
3. Apple sells a mini that can't do hi-def. Makes absolutely no sense at all.

Me fears that Apple just doesn't understand the living room. It involves a couch, a TV and a remote. It does not involve a desk. Having HD on a laptop, iMac or massively large, loud and expensive PowerMac just doesn't solve the issue. It must be on the mini. Or on a next-gen wide-chassis mini (a maxi?). Yes, a maxi. The maxi moniker should of course incorporate the "i" as well as the Mac, per recent Apple suggestions. And an iPod dock since that is the sun 'round which all things Apple now revolve.

Yes, Apple. Please bring on the iMaxiMacPodDocker as soon as possible. Oh, and don't forget to try to convince us that it has audiophile-quality separation and imaging...'cause that really what MP3s are for.

Anyone who uses "separation" and "MP3" in the same sentence should be shot.

 

[g.x]

The GMA950 is meant to have facilities to aid decode, so it may be able to help the processor decode, and thus enable 720p on this hardware.

I would LOVE to know the answer to this. If correct, I would even take back some of the bitterness from my last post.

See? I'm a fair guy.

 

[Dragonmaster Lo]

By the way... and sorry if someone's already beaten me to it, but this MacMini is not the first Mac to have integrated graphics. Some prior models are:

Mac IIsi
Mac IIci
PowerMac 6100

for example. Yes, it's the first Mac in a long time to have integrated graphics, but it's hardly the first ever.

 

[pawnstar]

according to intel:

http://www.intel.com/products/chipsets/gma950/

whilst it doesn't seem to have built in support for h.264, it does have support for HD & 10.6GB/sec bandwidth

Up to 10.6 GB/sec memory bandwidth with DDR2 667 system memory

...

High Definition Hardware Motion Compensation to support high definition hi-bitrate MPEG2 media playback

Up and Down Scaling of Video Content

High Definition Content Decode - up to two stream support

5x3 Overlay Filtering.

just have to wait and see how it performs.

 

[kangaroo]

IMHO, this announcement was nothing more than Steve selling refreshed product (nothing innovative here). The next time he does this people's expectations will be justifiably lower.

If Steve would like to capture the home media hub market with the second coming of the iPod (iHub--whatever), (i.e., if he'd like lightening to strike twice) then he'll need a lot more than a speed bumped mini.

 

[gama-go]

apple add-on dvr

after perusing lacie's latest offering for the mini:

http://tinyurl.com/ofb5p

it struck me that apple might very well want to enter this accessorizing space for the mini as well.

Why not offer a dvr that connects seamlessly to the mini, plugs into the firewire port, and includes a tv tuner?

Offer it in a variety of storage sizes, make it fast, make it look perfect & bundle it with your new front row dvr integration module at the same time. Charge between $200 - $400 depending on the drive configuration & call it a day.

 

[bosrs1]

By the way... and sorry if someone's already beaten me to it, but this MacMini is not the first Mac to have integrated graphics. Some prior models are:

Mac IIsi
Mac IIci
PowerMac 6100

for example. Yes, it's the first Mac in a long time to have integrated graphics, but it's hardly the first ever.

I think the issue everyone has is that it's the first in the modern era to have it (ie: Post Steve and NW Rom).

 

[NatronB]

no shame....

This is pretty shameless, but if I could get some answers, well... I'd be very happy.

After all, the conversations WAS going south....

Thanks,

-N

I'm thinking about buying a mini, some questions...

1- first off, I'm assuming the mini can push out 5.1 Surround Sound, is this true?

2- next, I have an 80GB 7200RPM external Firewire HD, would it be a good idea to boot the OS off this guy?

3- right now I span my PB G4 12" Rev A onto my Dell 26" LCD TV, with the DVI connector, should I expect better graphics (and in what way?)?

4- as an addendum to 3, what's the DV output? My LCD supports 1080i. Am I looking at this the wrong way?

5- lastly, will it play the Sims 2 reasonably?

Thanks,

-N

 

[matticus008]

It looks like a DVI-I connector which carries audio. DVI-D only carry the video. They lack the 4 connectors that are above and below the horizontal dash

Whoah there! DVI-I does NOT carry audio. DVI-I carries integrated analog and digital signals. There's enough confusion already on this thread.

And to those people that keep saying that this is a low end machine. No, an $800 machine isn't low-end. That is mid-range and you can do MUCH better elsewhere.

What pisses me off the most is that Apple could have increased the size of the mini by 1" cubed and then put a 3.5" drive in. They would have saved themselves about $100. Spend 40 of that savings on a decent card, 20 on the bigger case, and then take the last 40 and take it as more profit. Everybody would be happy.

This IS a low-end machine. It's Apple's entry hardware, and in the Mac market, it's the equivalent of a crappy $400 Dell box. Many of Dell's $700 computers have integrated graphics, too, so it's not like even equivalently priced computers necessarily have a leg up. You always could do better elsewhere--Apple has rarely led the rock-bottom price war.

It's not just the space, it's the heat. The additional heat and power draw of the larger drive is significant (also, 2.5 to 3.5 inch format is a deceptive figure...desktop hard drives are about 4 times the volume of notebook drives). The size increase would also be more than 1" in two directions, because if you look at the inside of a mini, you can see that the hard drive is nestled in an area where it can't expand outward, so it would have to be moved on top of the optical drive, making the unit at least 1.2" taller. Just think of an external hard drive case...try squeezing the majority (say 70%) of that inside a mini. There's always more to consider when you take it upon yourself to be an armchair engineer.

Maybe they too got confused by all their marketing speech and couldn't remember what the hell Core Image was supposedly doing.

Core Graphics in this case indicating the inclusive superset of Quartz2D, CoreImage, and CoreVideo, I think it's more like MacRumors readers not remembering what the hell is going on and trying to find something else to whine about the integrated graphics, which are indeed IMPROVEMENTS over the 9200. It's not a huge step forward and it's okay to be irked about that, but it's certainly not a step backward or sideways.

...
And for the love of God, it's integrated, not intergrated.

 

[lorien]

Not the first time Apple contradicts itself

Thanks to Google caching here is a screen grab from the PPC Mac Mini page telling just how terrible Intel Integrated graphics is, as far as playing 3D games is concerned anyway. And the Apple games page clearly shows this too.

 

[DougTheImpaler]

That's so page 11. 🙄 😀

 

[lorien]

That's so page 11. 🙄 😀

Hell sorry.... gave up after page 10! 😀

 

[JAT]

yeah... I know it sucks... but good HDMI cables are so expensive and I had no choice. I had to buy it at that length to reach my back wall with my home theater projector. This was 2 years ago - I suspect the price has since dropped and will continue to as more devices use it.

Maybe you don't want to see this....

Monoprice is where I bought my 25' HDMI cable for $34 late last summer. Works perfectly. Buy a DVI/HDMI adapter from them and calm down. They are under $5 before shipping.

Might add that last year I planned to buy a Mini for around $600 (before extra RAM, keyboard, etc.) plus an audio in/out add-on for $150. (never quite got there due to finances) The digital audio in/out included in the Intel Mini makes this one cheaper for me. I want this for what it is purposed: an HT/living room computer. Will be used to stream audio and perhaps video, also likely to transfer analog audio to digital, but I haven't used Garageband or others yet, have to see if it works like people say. I want it a bit cheaper, but by this summer it likely will be.

 

[g.x]

LMAO !!

And for the love of God, it's integrated, not intergrated.

I think we all now that the ultimate affect is that we have to much to loose bye letting Apple decide who's intergrated graphics to use.

 

[DougTheImpaler]

Hell sorry.... gave up after page 10! 😀

Can't blame you...lol...there's only so much whining I can take and then I quit reading. 😉

However, it's a good point that the RDF swallowed the 9200 into its black abyss. I"m still going back and forth over whether or not the Mini is a worthwhile upgrade for me. I have a Sawtooth upgraded to 1GHz, so it's definitely a great CPU...but the integrated graphcis bother me a bit. Maybe I'll buy a stock 1.5 and use it, then upgrade the RAM later on.

 

[jenkij]

I too am disapointed that Apple went to Shared memory on the video card, to me that's a step backward but all I wanted in a mini was for it to be wireless and be used strictly to hook up to my entertainment center for media purposes only. Before the upgrade, it would have been $599 to do this and I wouldn't have had front row or the remote. Conclusion: It sucks that apple resorted to using shared video memory but for what I want to use it for it really doesn't matter and the price isn't any more so I'm getting one as soon as the stores around here have them in stock (probably weeks).

 

[Synapple]

Can't blame you...lol...there's only so much whining I can take and then I quit reading. 😉

However, it's a good point that the RDF swallowed the 9200 into its black abyss. I"m still going back and forth over whether or not the Mini is a worthwhile upgrade for me. I have a Sawtooth upgraded to 1GHz, so it's definitely a great CPU...but the integrated graphcis bother me a bit. Maybe I'll buy a stock 1.5 and use it, then upgrade the RAM later on.

Don't do that.

512 less whatever needed for video tasks less Rosetta = No system memory.
I guess you would really screw your experience.

 

[Yvan256]

[...] it struck me that apple might very well want to enter this accessorizing space for the mini as well.

Why not offer a dvr that connects seamlessly to the mini, plugs into the firewire port, and includes a tv tuner?

Offer it in a variety of storage sizes, make it fast, make it look perfect & bundle it with your new front row dvr integration module at the same time. Charge between $200 - $400 depending on the drive configuration & call it a day.

Well, if it's an external box with hardware encode/decode, they better make it work with even a 1.25GHz G4 Mac mini too.

 

[Romanesq]

$400

yeah... I know it sucks... but good HDMI cables are so expensive and I had no choice. I had to buy it at that length to reach my back wall with my home theater projector. This was 2 years ago - I suspect the price has since dropped and will continue to as more devices use it.

Yeah I would be upset to spend hundreds on just a cable. You could get these cables now from Ram Electronics for very little now in comparison. I think I spent $25 for one and was looking at a 23 footer for like less than a hundred.

There's a lot of places still taking advantage. Most of them are brick and mortar. If you notice they also run the same scam with USB cables and the like.

But $400? Whew.