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What's your dream "high end" Mac Mini rumored for 2021?

How many of us M1 MacMini owners are going to cry buckets when the "pro" version comes out. I love mine, but I'd love more ports, and I'm always think you can never have too much RAM :) I guess the M1's design limits RAM, right?
 
Match the specs and connections of the 2018 Mac mini and that'll honestly be a good start. (i.e. more than 16GB of RAM, more than two Thunderbolt and two USB, more than only two external displays supported.) Like, make it enough to finally discontinue the 2018 Mac mini due to there being zero drawbacks other than the loss of Intel-only features that were never moving over to Apple Silicon to begin with.
 
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PeterJP said:
I have a mac mini M1 at the office with 16GB RAM and it's a pretty fast machine! By that definition, that should be enough for you! :)
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My system supports 4x4k, Windows (which I need), and x86 virtual machines. And yeah, 128 GB of RAM too. Raw CPU speed isn't everything. The M1s still have far less GPU capabilities than mid-range discrete GPUs.
 
circatee said:
Not to derail the thread. But, is there really a newer model/version of the Mac Mini being sold this year, 2021?
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We believe Apple will replace the 2018 mini currently sold as the 'high end' with an M1X or M2 model. Personally, I think the $700 tier will stay with the current M1, but an $1100 M1X / 16GB / 512GB / 4xTB/USB4 ports (upgrade options to 32GB / 2TB) would be very nice.

Also since we are all dreaming I want an empty user upgradable M.2 SSD expansion slot and 4+ monitor support, either native or via eGPU.
 
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padams35 said:
We believe Apple will replace the 2018 mini currently sold as the 'high end' with an M1X or M2 model. Personally, I think the $700 tier will stay with the current M1, but an $1100 M1X / 16GB / 512GB / 4xTB/USB4 ports (upgrade options to 32GB / 2TB) would be very nice.

Also since we are all dreaming I want an empty user upgradable M.2 SSD expansion slot and 4+ monitor support, either native or via eGPU.
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Ah. got it. I need to check that 2018 model online. Never really paid any attention to it. Thanks
 
M1X/M2, HDMI 2.1 / 120Hz HDR / Dolby DV / Atmos / eARC / 10Gb Ethernet

Yes, I too would love upgradable Memory, Storage - but those days are long gone. *sigh*

And make it come in Black. None of this grey or pastel colours, dammit!

And who else is disappointed they didn't announce it at WWDC? :(
 
pshufd said:
My system supports 4x4k, Windows (which I need), and x86 virtual machines. And yeah, 128 GB of RAM too. Raw CPU speed isn't everything. The M1s still have far less GPU capabilities than mid-range discrete GPUs.
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Good for you. At least you are clear on what you need. The poster I replied to only said his machine had 128GB RAM and was plenty fast, which wasn't very clear.
 
PeterJP said:
Good for you. At least you are clear on what you need. The poster I replied to only said his machine had 128GB RAM and was plenty fast, which wasn't very clear.
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Systems with a lot of RAM usually have a specific purpose. If you need more performance, you can just replace the motherboard and CPU and get something with more cores or more and faster cores. That's the nice thing about desktops. In my prior job, I worked with systems with over 1 TB of RAM, hundreds of TBs SSD and hundreds of cores. Fast is all relative to the what you're doing.
 
pshufd said:
Systems with a lot of RAM usually have a specific purpose. If you need more performance, you can just replace the motherboard and CPU and get something with more cores or more and faster cores. That's the nice thing about desktops. In my prior job, I worked with systems with over 1 TB of RAM, hundreds of TBs SSD and hundreds of cores. Fast is all relative to the what you're doing.
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I know. I have lots of machines with 64GB that I manage at work. Oh, and we're close to a petabyte of storage, too, but not in SSD. And I know all of this is for a specific purpose. My original remark was hinting at that, actually. I asked the poster of the original comment that his 128GB RAM machine was "plenty fast" for more information, in a sarcastic fashion :) He should have a specific purpose if he owns such a machine, but I didn't get which one. I'm always curious to find out. In the case of where I work, it's video editing for broadcast. What do you do?
 
PeterJP said:
I know. I have lots of machines with 64GB that I manage at work. Oh, and we're close to a petabyte of storage, too, but not in SSD. And I know all of this is for a specific purpose. My original remark was hinting at that, actually. I asked the poster of the original comment that his 128GB RAM machine was "plenty fast" for more information, in a sarcastic fashion :) He should have a specific purpose if he owns such a machine, but I didn't get which one. I'm always curious to find out. In the case of where I work, it's video editing for broadcast. What do you do?
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I'm retired but I use my system mostly for trading. My previous job was working in on prem and cloud datacenters. Our cloud systems were truly massive and we had a ton of them.
 
pshufd said:
I'm retired but I use my system mostly for trading. My previous job was working in on prem and cloud datacenters. Our cloud systems were truly massive and we had a ton of them.
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That's nice! I'm currently building a personal cloud with a spare server, Proxmox and NextCloud. Nothing close to what you did, of course! But I'm fed up with things like OneDrive not working on external drives, etc. Having my own setup at home, reachable via DDNS, will allow me to do lots without depending on fickle suppliers.

Anyway, back to the topic. I'd really like to have a 32GB machine with 16+ cores for future proofing. I want to use it 6+ years. Lots of ports, too. USB-C/Thunderbolt to a screen, but plenty of USB to connect my audio interface and synth and all the other music goodies I will end up buying some day anyway. If not, a good desktop 7-port USB hub is only €40. But it'd be nice to spare some cables and boxes. Oh, and 10GbE, but that's a given. GPU isn't so important.
 
PeterJP said:
That's nice! I'm currently building a personal cloud with a spare server, Proxmox and NextCloud. Nothing close to what you did, of course! But I'm fed up with things like OneDrive not working on external drives, etc. Having my own setup at home, reachable via DDNS, will allow me to do lots without depending on fickle suppliers.

Anyway, back to the topic. I'd really like to have a 32GB machine with 16+ cores for future proofing. I want to use it 6+ years. Lots of ports, too. USB-C/Thunderbolt to a screen, but plenty of USB to connect my audio interface and synth and all the other music goodies I will end up buying some day anyway. If not, a good desktop 7-port USB hub is only €40. But it'd be nice to spare some cables and boxes. Oh, and 10GbE, but that's a given. GPU isn't so important.
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I suspect that 16 core systems will be expensive with Apple, even with Apple Silicon. I was shopping for 12 or 16 core AMD Ryzen 5900X and 5950X systems but they're sold by scalpers today at ridiculous prices and you don't really know what you're getting. I'm hoping that supply catches up some day. On the Intel side, it looks like they are working out the problems with 10 nm and maybe we'll get some 10 or 12 core chips next year. I've heard that 7 nm isn't going that well so it might be some time before Intel ships 16-core CPUs in the consumer space.

AMD is generally going with higher core counts as they get on smaller processes. There are rumors that they will have a 128 Core EPYC chip for Zen 4. Not many consumers need that but it's nice to know that they're pushing the envelope as it makes it easier for lowly consumers to get more cores at the same price points each generation.

I have a cloud database instance at Oracle that I can use as long as I want. I don't recall what my storage quota is but it's nice to have space to play around with. Of course there is no expectation of privacy. Lots of free cloud storage but you don't know how reliable free stuff is.
 
Does anyone think they'll release another Intel machine or is that unlikely now? Alot of things I use are not compatible with M1 which means I am limited to older machines.
 
pshufd said:
I suspect that 16 core systems will be expensive with Apple, even with Apple Silicon. I was shopping for 12 or 16 core AMD Ryzen 5900X and 5950X systems but they're sold by scalpers today at ridiculous prices and you don't really know what you're getting.
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I was just thinking 16 based on some rumours. Others say 10 core (8 + 2 low power), which would also be nice.

marklcfc said:
Does anyone think they'll release another Intel machine or is that unlikely now? Alot of things I use are not compatible with M1 which means I am limited to older machines.
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Not for the mini. Mac pro, probably yes.
 
PeterJP said:
I was just thinking 16 based on some rumours. Others say 10 core (8 + 2 low power), which would also be nice.

Not for the mini. Mac pro, probably yes.
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A 10 core Apple Silicon would be comparable to a 16 core Intel or AMD CPU. The M1X will automatically be a very high-end chip and it's pretty hard to get those chips in AMD and you'd have to go Xeon for Intel. Anything above that and Apple makes Intel and AMD look weak.

There's already been a new Xeon 11th gen chip leaked in a filing for the Mac Pro. I would like them to go 11th Gen in the iMac 27 if it's going to be a while before they replace that. The thing is that Apple really isn't under a lot of competitive pressure because of the chip shortages and Intel's process problems. It's a sad state of affairs for consumers though. Similar if you want to buy a house or a car.
 
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