I will a first time mac buyer here in a month and was wondering what should I expect a mini not to do (or do not as well) that an imac or macbook would do. The reason I"m going with the mini is that I have a 22" ws samsung monitor that i don't want to get rid of. Will it be strong enough to run vhs-to-dvd software?
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What is a mac mini recommended not to do?
- Thread starter forelsu
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It's basically a tiny bit slower MacBook.
Not reccomended for graphic intensive gaming on high settings.
Not reccomended for graphic intensive gaming on high settings.
Besides the obvious...
Vs. an iMac... run video games that are dependent on off-loading functions to the video card. Run multiple simultaneous displays (i.e. internal + one external). Run 64-bit versions of Windows or 64-bit Leopard apps when they arrive.
Vs. a Macbook, the above minus the thing about video games (Mini and Macbook in the same boat).
Vs. an iMac... run video games that are dependent on off-loading functions to the video card. Run multiple simultaneous displays (i.e. internal + one external). Run 64-bit versions of Windows or 64-bit Leopard apps when they arrive.
Vs. a Macbook, the above minus the thing about video games (Mini and Macbook in the same boat).
I disagree. I think it would run Photoshop CS2 fine. I have the edu. model iMac, because I couldnt afford anything else. But anyways I run CS on it all the time. Granted it may be a little slower but thats becuase its running under Rosetta. It almost runs as fast as my friends 2.0 GHz G5 iMac. So it might be a little slowe than you want but nothing to get mad about.
I have run CS3 Beta and it absolutley flies on this thing. Just make sure to have enough RAM.
For what it's worth, CS2 (and, AFAIK CS3) do not make much use of the video card. RAM is an issue (because of Rosetta), and perhaps the CD vs. C2D is a minor issue, but the video card should not have such a substantial impact on how Photoshop runs for the most part. Aperture is a different story.
My mini runs CS2 pretty well, but a lot of games don't run that well on it, and video editing isn't very fast, but still works.
The only thing I have ever had trouble with was pushing the video to an HD projector whilst trying to play(decode) an hr hd divx file through front row. And that was only a handful of files that probably were too heavily encoded. Not one single problem with anything else. I surf the web and play flash video's 9ft wide all the time. I don't know why everyone else is so picky. But this is the fastest computer I have ever owned. I got an eyetv hybrid plugged into it and use it all the time to watch free hd, trouble free. The mini is the best bang for your buck.
The only problem with the Mac Mini IMO is that slow video card. If you're not doing anything real video intensive it should be fine. I think its a good purchasing decision, although you would definitely want to upgrade the RAM and probably the HD, and you may end up in a two year upgrade cycle (i.e. sell the Mini every two years and get the new one) because even if its okay now, in two years it probably would be too slow.