Next-gen Mac mini 'photo' surfaces A fuzzy photo of a purported new Mac mini appeared in a MacRumors forum post, and the resulting rumor instantly made the rounds of the MacRumors news page, Ars Technica, AppleInsider, Cnet, Gizmodo, 123Macmini, SlashGear, VentureBeat, and Electronista For all we know, Al Jazeera's tech desk is about to post it any moment now …
Meh... non news item...
feeding frenzy? While I picked up an original back when 499 clams got me one I for one have moved on to a MBP, so I guess the original intent worked, got me using along with windows, then found myself using it more than windows, the found I only turned my windows box on to play games.. then found I didn't like my windows pc anymore :-) same old story really... since I only turned on windows to play games, I got a dedicated games console so no more windows headaches or time wasted maintaining windows and keeping it malware and virus free so I could just play a game...
I wonder if I can find my original old-school web camera from creative labs.. I bet it can make a super fuzzy photo I can Photoshop up in no time. I think I'll make a mid-size tower! now that will start a feeding frenzy compared to a product that served its purpose when it was released but in todays market does not have the same bang for buck.
another mb of cache or so and I'd consider replacing my 10 year old poor old modified G4 Cube running 10.5 server........
Although I'm still waiting to see Vista or Win7 run AT ALL on a 450mhz cpu.
From recent reports its supposedly a fake with the USB ports not lining up *shrugs* Remove a few USB add another gigabit ethernet and tv tuner and I'd be a happy camper.
(typed on a very VERY over powered Linux box because I refuse to pay the current apple tax on mac pros)
Actually it is hard. Well, it is with an auto focus camera phone in low light - which is what this looks like. Low light = wide aperture = little depth of field, hence if the auto focus focuses on the table the object on it is likely to be out of focus.
/camera bag
Apart from that, this 'new' mini looks really unlikely. Why 5 USB ports?
I'm with you on the display connectors - why bother with two? (unless you want to offer people as many monitor options as possible, but that isn't terribly Jobsian, is it?)
But sounding "fishy" because of having 2GB RAM and a SATA optical drive?!
2GB became the base amount of RAM in the MacBook range when the White got updated, so why shouldn't we expect the next mini to have 2GB?
As for SATA... well, thay can't stick with IDE forever can they? And again, the notebooks are all SATA now.
Seems feasable to me (although I'd expect to be seeing black plastic, not white).
There's a recession therefore companies don't release products is a load of rubbish. Chances are Mini sales have been declining due to its age and need for a refresh. People seem to have no problem buying iPhones, iPods and MacBooks!! Are they going to leave the Mini as it is until 2010 / 2011? I think not.
2gig sounds reasonable. RAM costs peanuts and it is 2009.
The display ports sound genuine to me. A lot of people use the Mini as a media device, which is something Apple might not have expected at the start. Serving them with the extra port seems like a good idea to me.
There's probably more money to be saved these days in deleting the IDE support from the mobo than there is in buying in PATA rather than SATA optical drives in bulk from OEMs. Also I suspect that the SATA ones will continue to fall in price as world + dog heads that way while the PATAs increase as they become more scarce.
Not to mention that in a box the size of a mac mini, where every cubic centimetre counts, the space saving and ease of assembly of SATA cabling has got to be a tempting factor....
I reckon this one's got legs.
The incremental cost of including both display connectors is sqrt(fuck all) and is something the mac mini badly needs. With slow graphics, an inaccessible RAM slot (with expensive upgrade options) and a complete lack of multimonitor it's an embarassment.
If it's a con, it's got a genuine level of believability in it. Any replacement now is certainly likely to have SATA and 5 USB ports is possible (although if they control the motherboard I'd have thought 6 would be more likely). DDR3 SODIMM (it'll still be a laptop chipset..) is possibly an unusual but future proof option at this stage - could probably get more DDR2 for less..
I might actually buy one if it turns out to be real and Apple don't screw everyone on price.
The thing that makes this look fishy to me is the FW800 port. It's on its side compared to all the other FW800 ports I've seen. It also looks like a PCB mounted port, but the side that mounts to the PCB is on the left in the photo (NB the gap between the port & case on the top, right and bottom in the pic). Ok, it could be on some kind of riser, but that seems unlikely....
I've got one of the current 1.83GHz Mac Minis at work for use and it's a nice enough piece of kit (more so because I didn't buy it :-) ) and I've been considering one for home use as a relatively low-powered web/mail/print server. I've been holding off deliberately to see what the next revision will look like.
For me, something like Firewire would be a bonus but probably of little use (no Firewire devices, no plans to buy any) and funky display ports don't bother me all that much either. 2Gb of RAM would be good, and I'd like to see the optical drive removed - I guess a lot of people have USB CD/DVD drives kicking around and I've not been a fan of slot-loading drives since the drive on my old iBook decided it was going to try and eat DVDs. Make it expandable to 4Gb too (2x2Gb SODIMMs - job's a good'un)
In fact, thinking about it, lose Firewire and add a couple of extra USB ports - also, make it possible to get the lid off without having to resort to putty knives and screwdrivers.
Bring it on - if the price and spec are right, I'm in.
My Mac mini has 2GB of RAM, a dual core 2GHz CPU, Firewire400, DVI video output.
So this isn't much of a jump, if they were to update perhaps these would be the features...
*Allow more than 2GB or RAM
*Firewire800 or external Sata
*Larger HDD option
The Mac mini is cheap, that's why people buy it, Apple no doubt want to keep it that way, so if the optical drive works out cheaper as sata they would so do it!
Five USB ports? Apple have traditionally only included 3 USB ports on the back of the computer. OK, so they include 2 on the keyboard (Apple count this as 5 ports, cleverly omitting the point that you lose one by plugging the keyboard into the back of the Mac).
Looking at their site, they have done the same on their new generation iMacs (the display port ones) so why on earth would they include an extra two ports on their bottom of the range machine?
to screw the opposition big time, kick em when there down and do it hard! with a big kick ass product at a cut down price, especially now as parts prices are plummeting. (dont forget MS is the competition! so do it big before W7 up that market share!)
Customers are looking at value for money, the only products that will sell are the kick ass new products!
Why have a sata and an ata chip makes sense to use just one and sata uses less board space and solder! so sata superdrive is a reasonable step.. but no esata? if the cheap chip supports only 2 devices then maybe not and why not push fw800?
5 usb's suggests they have gone for a cheaper keyboard!
SATA superdrive makes sense now they are using them in the laptops, extra Mini DVI also, seeing as mini display port won't play nice with a lot of existing monitors/tv's yet they wouldn't want to exclude their own monitors from sales. 2GB Ram is believable, 5 USB ports looks plain wrong though, smoking gun in this photoshop.
It's probably another rumour "leaked" from Apple to try and get the faniboy's juices bubbling.
It is the only way they can get sane people interested in their form over function boxes. Let's not forget that this is the same company that thought releasing a "smart phone" without rudimentary features like copy and paste.
Cynicism is rife in this review by Rik Myslewski but given that the leaked image is in fact the same as the newly released Mac Mini, announced this week, Rik has ended up with egg on his face for his purported denial of legitimacy for the said leaked image. It's a novel idea to believe that someone might actually be telling the truth about a new Apple product. :D
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