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New Mac Mini Announced! [MERGED]

saikyan said:
I see the iPhone halo effect is working its magic on the Mac Mini. If you're confused about the price increase... It has nothing to do with the specs. It has everything to do with Apple leveraging its brand to get higher margins from everything they sell.

This Mac Mini is very weak in terms of value. But Apple customers aren't going for value, they're going for style, packaging and integration.
Click to expand...

That equals value.
 
MacModMachine said:
where have you been ?

the power brick on the mini now does not even get slightly warm under load on mine (newest gen) , even sandwiching it in there wont create much more heat...considering components on the new one have even less power consumption.

i dont think heat will be much of an issue, the fan is bigger then the older mini also, air flow is going to be better by its design.
Click to expand...


Have you felt an Apple TV lately? The concept is close to the new Mini with an internal transformer. They're so hot you could make a grill cheese.
 
Already at 17 pages of comments

I won't read the 660 comments, so I'm probably repeating what a lot of people said, but:

The good:
- Faster Core 2 Duo
- nVidia 320M
- SuperDrive (I'm still stuck with a Combo Drive on my Mac mini)
- Easier to open
- Supports up to 8GB
- FireWire 800 still present
- power supply is built-in
- SD slot

The bad:
- SD slot is on the back :confused:
- Lost one USB port: not really a problem, five ports wasn't enough for me anyway
- Bigger footprint: uh-oh, all the Mac mini accessories will have to be re-made (let's take the CinnaMount mini as a completely random example) ;)

Overall, an excellent Mac mini update IMHO!
 
Again the ridiculous SD slot instead of ExpressCard which is what is really needed.
 
whatever said:
Blu Ray is dead. The way of the future is to make HD content available via streaming and download. The average user could care less about the quality of Blu Ray (just like the average user did not care about the superior quality of the compact disc over MP3).

As bandwidth increases the higher quality will be made available.
Click to expand...

I have to respectfully disagree--if you've seen any great Blu-ray transfers, streaming and downloaded HD content can't even compare (because of the compression). And it remains to be seen if 3D will take off, but that will need Blu-ray too.

Plus I think we're still far away from the bandwidth requirement of streaming of Blu-ray quality video. Think about this: in 2008 40% of U.S. households were still not on broadband internet.

http://www.strategyanalytics.com/default.aspx?mod=PressReleaseViewer&a0=4748
 
clank72 said:
Have you felt an Apple TV lately? The concept is close to the new Mini with an internal transformer. Their so hot you could make a grill cheese.
Click to expand...

Same as the replacement to the replacement to my toasted Time Capsule.

Nice in winter though. ;)
 
For £649, I would honestly expect to see a Mouse of Keyboard in the box. But not even the Apple remote? Come on... Absolutely gorgeous machine, but when it was introduced the low price was the pulling factor. Steve Jobs himself said in the Keynote; Now there's no excuse for not buying a Mac. Well, its 2010 and I have to disagree. But thats just the road Apple have gone down.

Its laughable the way people still moan about the i5's not being included - are you forgetting how much heat they dissipate? Even the MacBook Pro's only got the Dual-Core variants - if Apple bumped up the chipsets this much, there would be less incentive for customers to pay more for higher-end products. I get the impression that Apple is starting to like the cash they make...

Even the Dell machines which are the comparison-type product (I forget the name, sorry) are totally better value. Sure, most Dell products are a plastic mess but when you're getting so much more for your pounds, Apple have no-one to blame if people look the other way. This is especially the case with the whole 'Blu-Ray' saga. It would fantastic to see Blu-Ray on Mac, but at the end of the day this would only cannibalise their iTunes sales. And since it has not been included on this Mac Mini, I doubt we'll see it on the next iMac or Mac Pro, unless the Mini was simply not big enough to house a Blu-Ray drive.

Great machine, but at this price its a no for me. Bad enough that they value their new iPhone at £499 - the same price the Mini used to be!
 
Comparing this to the competition, the Dell Zino HD, I couldn't help but laugh.

Bravo, Apple. As the owner of a 1st Gen Mini (my first and current Apple desktop) I see some wonderful improvements in this redesign. HDMI out, easy RAM access, SD reader, unibody, built-in PS yet even smaller, 320M... pretty good redesign indeed.

Performance-wise it's not much of an improvement, aside from the expected 320M. For home users it will be plenty, but for me, I have my sights set on the high-end iMac once it is updated.
 
mags631 said:
The mini display port is there and I think it can drive that resolution.
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A great many 30" displays don't have Display Port. Including this one:
http://store.apple.com/us/product/M9179LL/A
You need to buy a $100 adapter that is from reviews, junk.

Buy your "fairly powerful desktop" and hook it up to your beautiful HD TV. Sit it right next to the TV, look at it and listen to it. You might at that point understand why some of us see the Mini as a great little machine at a reasonable price. If you don't, well then you got yourself a powerful desktop at the same price as a Mini and you should be happy knowing that you got more for your money.
Click to expand...

My 3.2GHz Quad core is in my living room, sitting right next to my HDTV. It drives my HDTV a second monitor on my desk.

So no I don't understand. I chose quiet components, so I don't hear my PC even thought it is right next to my TV. I also added a Blu Ray Drive so it works as my Blu Ray player as well.

I don't get the obsession with small when it creates a limited, un-expandable, underpowered and expensive computer.
 
whatever said:
That's an odd statement considering that you're posting it on a rumor forum that discusses Apple products.

Blu Ray is dead. The way of the future is to make HD content available via streaming and download. The average user could care less about the quality of Blu Ray (just like the average user did not care about the superior quality of the compact disc over MP3).

As bandwidth increases the higher quality will be made available.
Click to expand...

Perhaps I could have worded it better. 'Apple have made me lose interest in buying their products until they start supporting blu ray'. Make more sense? I seriously just can't justify spending any large ammount of money on a machine that supports DVD only. It's antiquated and silly. So much for Steve Jobs supporting products in their 'springs'.

As for your claim that blu ray is dead, I know what you're trying to get at, but you're not really seeing the reality of the situation here. Film enthusiasts want quality. I don't know where you get your statistics to say that the average consumer is happy with downloadable HD content. Home theatre enthusiasts want nothing but blu ray. This is so for various reasons. iTunes for example supplies sub standard quality films, often for a larger price than blu ray. It is actually ridiculous. No special features, pathetic quality on a decent TV, and what's worse, very little support for sub titles and foreign languages. I see iTunes movies as elitist and a kick in the teeth for people with hearing impairment or from a language background other than english.

In an ideal world you would be right. I really don't like physical mediums either. But we arn't quite there yet and won't be for a long time. The day iTunes start offering films with foreign language options, 1080p quality and special features, is the day that I will agree with you and say that the blu ray is dead. Until then, it is the ONLY medium that film enthusiasts and people with any taste for quality will opt for.
 
whatever said:
That's an odd statement considering that you're posting it on a rumor forum that discusses Apple products.

Blu Ray is dead. The way of the future is to make HD content available via streaming and download. The average user could care less about the quality of Blu Ray (just like the average user did not care about the superior quality of the compact disc over MP3).

As bandwidth increases the higher quality will be made available.
Click to expand...

Blu Ray is dead?! I could hop in the car and drive to Best Buy or Wal-Mart and buy a Blu Ray movie and be back home before the equivalent HD movie finishes downloading. And that's for legitimately sourced materials... if downloading by torrents, it could take days. Not to mention no extras, no subtitles, no language tracks.

I really enjoy watching 1080p Blu-Rays on my projection screen. It sure doesn't seem dead to me.
 
whatever said:
Blu Ray is dead. The way of the future is to make HD content available via streaming and download.
Click to expand...

Okay, so what am I supposed to do in between Blu Ray being dead and "the future," where I can instantly suck down 4-8GB of full-quality HD video of any movie I care to watch? Blu-Ray isn't dead, it's just getting warmed up.

I realize that Steve thinks anything worth watching is on iTunes or YouTube, but at some point reality steps in--and by "reality," I don't mean "BitTorrent streams of ripped Blu-Ray discs".

Peace
Ty
 
Looks great but...

  • as desktop machine the price/performance is not even close to being competitive with an iMac or even the MacBook. Size doesn't really compensate this.
  • as HTPC I doubt that anyone serious with HT will invest in something without BD. For HD streaming, the rumored iOS based version of AppleTV might make a better choice. (time will tell...)
  • as Home or Small-business Server it seems to offer an acceptable price/performance. Only thing missing is eSata or USB3 to add more (fast) storage.
Somehow its not really clear what Apple has in mind with this upgrade.

Its almost like the high price of the entry level Mini is deliberately set high to bring people closer to the tipping point of buying an iMac (as desktop) or Mini Server (as HTPC). I've actually waited for the Mac Mini upgrade to finally replace an older Windows desktop. But with this price-tag I have to rethink if its really worth it...
 
There are a number of great improvements, but the processor is still an Intel Core 2 Duo. And that for a lot of money;

US $699 (from)
Germany € 809
Spain € 779
UK £ 649
Rest of Europe € 779

Too much if you ask me!
 
Will somebody please e-mail Steve to ask what the hell was he thinking by raising the prices so much?:eek:
 
whatever said:
Blu Ray is dead. The way of the future is to make HD content available via streaming and download.
Click to expand...

Okay, Blu-Ray is dead. What am I supposed to do between now and "the future," where I can instantly suck down 4-8GB of full-quality HD video of any movie I care to watch?

I realize that Steve thinks anything worth watching is on iTunes or YouTube, but at some point reality steps in--and by "reality," I don't mean "BitTorrent streams of ripped Blu-Ray discs".

Peace
Ty
 
whatever said:
That's an odd statement considering that you're posting it on a rumor forum that discusses Apple products.

Blu Ray is dead. The way of the future is to make HD content available via streaming and download. The average user could care less about the quality of Blu Ray (just like the average user did not care about the superior quality of the compact disc over MP3).

As bandwidth increases the higher quality will be made available.
Click to expand...
I'll stick with the library. Unless you're willing to pay for my additional bandwidth.
 
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