New Mac Mini: A Tour In Pictures

Giles Turnbull ()

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OK. So what have we got here?

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This is my favorite image, I think. On the Mac mini product pages, Apple is making a big deal of how the mini “fits with what you’ve already got”, and here’s why. For a box this size, there’s an impressive array of connectivity options.

The biggest surprise isn’t HDMI, but the SD card slot. But on second thoughts, it’s now in the iMac and the MacBook Pro line; it makes sense for it to appear here. The Mac mini is a low-cost option, though, and I rather expected that an SD slot would be one of the things sacrificed to keep costs low.

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Here’s what you see underneath. It screams consumer product, doesn’t it? The two little dimples are an instruction book in themselves: twist me, it says. Twist me to open me.

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And once twisted open, here’s what you see inside. It reminds me of the old G4 iMac, which had the curved circuit board designed to fit inside its unique hemisphere container.

DON'T MISS

On the right there you can see the RAM card, ready to be easily replaced. It looks like there’s only the one DIMM slot though, so you’ll have to replace one card with one other. UPDATE: No, there are two DIMM slots; thanks to Cult commenters for correcting me on this.

Interestingly, the new mini comes with an HDMI-to-DVI adapter, so you can continue to use your DVI monitor if you’re upgrading from an older mini.

Even more impressive: the power brick is gone. The power management is built-in. You just get a single, slip power lead with no brick.

The processor inside is still the aging Core 2 Duo. Before you get all enraged about this, remember the argument about use of the same chip in the recent MacBook Pro 13”: from Apple’s point of view, the chip’s age doesn’t matter, it’s what it’s capable of that counts. Apple will say that the Core 2 Duo is good enough to make this machine work well, and cheap enough to keep the costs down. Which is part of the point of the Mac mini, right?

22 comments »

About the author

gilest

Giles Turnbull is a freelance writer in England. He writes for the Press Association and The Morning News. He has a website you can ignore and a Twitter account you needn't follow.

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Posted in Hardware, News |

  • Chumphreys

    I have a early 2010 Mac Mini, I really like this refresh but it’s not enough for me to replace my Mini with this one

  • http://www.davidmckeitch.com Peacehey

    Its no slouch of a mac these days.

    Oh and there are two dim slots, looks like it loads ontop of each other like a laptop does :)

    http://www.apple.com/macmini/specs.html

  • David

    It has 2 DMM slots.. this and the 320M chip, its a powerful little machine.

  • stefan

    Love the design but still want more…

  • Uncle Peter

    So for £200 more I could buy a Macbook? The new mini looks nice, but meh; I’d spend just a little more hard-earned and get a Macbook

  • http://gilest.org Giles Turnbull

    Peacehey & David: you’re right, thanks for spotting that. My bad. Two DIMM slots is much better news. :)

  • arya

    looking at the top side, looks like it’s inspired by iphone app icons :D

  • Johnny Rocket

    Size matters…which is why it would have been nice to include measurements or at least a familiar object (like a quarter) as a frame of reference.

    And the third image– the one with the black circle in the while rectangle– looks a great deal like a desktop coffee mug warmer. Is this another, unmentioned feature? ,-)

  • JC Pancake

    No. Not a coffee mug warmer. It’s a griddle for pancakes.

  • Elliot

    Sorry, it might be small and better-equipped than before but it is just too expensive for what you get. Assuming you already have a keyboard and mouse (which would cost you an additional $100 otherwise) you really NEED 4Gb RAM to run Snow Leopard well. Then there’s another $30 for a DVI or VGA adapter.

    You’re looking at $800 (plus tax) minimum to get a monitorless, keyboardless, mouseless box. Too high.

    I’d rather get something used from powermax or craigslist, or a refurbed macbook straight from apple.

  • mabcan

    There’s no way for me to accept this kind of price raise : SD card slot is not new thing, they are just making up for lost time. Graphic memory is still shared with RAM, no Blue Ray… At this price, it can’t be serious to buy that!
    Other than that, I really like the new Mac Mini.
    But I am not buying a marketing concept : I just want a real computer instead.

  • Darcy McGee

    The Mac Mini’s never been a the best bang for your buck performance wise. It’s quite a unique machine, and of all the small footprint machines seems to be the one with the longest life. Dell’s Studio Hybrid shares the same market space and is roughly similar in pricing etc.

    No one’s buying this thing for value. They’re buying it because they want the small form factor.

  • Darcy McGee

    SD card slot on the back? Dumb.

  • pappi81

    The new form factor makes this equal to a time capsule. Although the new mini seems to be a bit rounder at the corners.

  • Pascal

    ” The power management is built-in”? Isn’t that why the Time Capsules all die after a while? Overheating? I don’t get this obsession to have the power supply crammed in the unit. Seems to me that the savings in heat more than justify having an additional external PS. Maybe it’s just me…

  • Jeremy

    Actually, at the time of their release, the $500 Mac mini with 9400m and dual monitor support was the best value in computing.

    Now, not so much. If I was on a budget, I would buy they new white MacBook

  • Peter Story

    @Elliot
    “you really NEED 4Gb RAM to run Snow Leopard well”

    Sorry, but I really disagree with you.
    I run Snow Leopard daily without problem on my MacBook with 2gigs of RAM (video editing, programming, web browsing, etc).

    I’ve also booted Snow Leopard with as little as 128MB of RAM, though the performance wasn’t much to brag about :)

  • Fen Tiger

    £649 vs £509 I wish I hadn’t waited. Nice looking tho’

  • Nick

    too pricey considering you STILL get a measly 5400 rpm drive, wake up Apple…

  • Alexis

    hey…NO ONE gives you a 7200 rpm drive standard…they cost more and therefore are upgrade items…if you don’t want the drive included…remove it when you get it…then put what you want in it…and sell what you take out…enough said

  • http://www.paythegame.net Somian

    Nice machine but the price is ridiculous. You could get a really powerful PC with an i7, a good video card and 4 GB RAM for that.

    The Mac mini should be $399 or $499 but this is way too much.
    I mean, even a MacBook isn’t that more expensive but has a built-in screen, a battery etc.

  • John

    Same pain as before, I really want one, the silent running is really sweet, but the price is eye watering for the performance level you get. And you still have to buy the KB, mouse and screen if you aren’t using it to replace a PC
    Here in NZ they are asking $NZ1000 for the 8GB RAM upgrade!!!!