2012 2.5Ghz Mac Mini or 2014 2.6Ghz Mac mini?

[Kaikidan]

I want to buy a mac mini, i have the option between a used late 2012 2.5Ghz, 4GB, 500Gb HDD, and a new late 2014 2.6Ghz, 8gb, 1Tb HDD.

By the price of the 2014 in it raw specs i can buy the 2012 one and buy 4 or 8+GB of ram and a external SSD to run the system on.

Would it be worth purchasing the old one if it is working with no hardware problens? will it be slower than the 2014 model? i saw a lot about the 4 core models on the internet, but how it would compare (CPU wise), as booth are 2 core models?

Thanks in advance!

 

[chrfr]

I want to buy a mac mini, i have the option between a used late 2012 2.5Ghz, 4GB, 500Gb HDD, and a new late 2014 2.6Ghz, 8gb, 1Tb HDD.

By the price of the 2014 in it raw specs i can buy the 2012 one and buy 4 or 8+GB of ram and a external SSD to run the system on.

Would it be worth purchasing the old one if it is working with no hardware problens? will it be slower than the 2014 model? i saw a lot about the 4 core models on the internet, but how it would compare (CPU wise), as booth are 2 core models?

Thanks in advance!

The 2014 will be faster. The graphics are quite a bit faster, and it also has Thunderbolt 2 if you need it. You can open up the 2014 and replace the HD with an internal SSD if you're inclined to do that.

 

[tibas92013]

Nothing like the Apple Internal SSD, so, it appears that the "Bottleneck" in both MM's is the Internal HDD. My Refurbished MM(Late 2014) 2.8GHz, 8GB Ram, 256SSD "screams" in great performance.

 

[Boyd01]

I like the 2012 2.5ghz mini, and recently gave mine to my daughter's family after upgrading to 16gb and moving the system to a USB3 external SSD. Feels like a very responsive little machine. I also have a base model 1.4ghz? 2014 mini for an iTunes server. Works well for that, but feels very sluggish for other things. The base 2012 model definitely feels faster.

However I am sure the 2014 2.6 ghz model will be faster than the 2012 2.5 and it has a faster internal bus if you install a SSD. Other advantages are the two thunderbolt 2 ports and much faster 802.11ac wifi (if you have a compatible router). But the big downside is the non-upgradeable RAM so if you plan to keep this machine awhile you'll probably want to get 16gb and that will be very expensive.

 

[Kaikidan]

I like the 2012 2.5ghz mini, and recently gave mine to my daughter's family after upgrading to 16gb and moving the system to a USB3 external SSD. Feels like a very responsive little machine. I also have a base model 1.4ghz? 2014 mini for an iTunes server. Works well for that, but feels very sluggish for other things. The base 2012 model definitely feels faster.

However I am sure the 2014 2.6 ghz model will be faster than the 2012 2.5 and it has a faster internal bus if you install a SSD. Other advantages are the two thunderbolt 2 ports and much faster 802.11ac wifi (if you have a compatible router). But the big downside is the non-upgradeable RAM so if you plan to keep this machine awhile you'll probably want to get 16gb and that will be very expensive.

In my case, the price of the 2.5ghz is the same as the 1.4ghz, they cost 2/3 of the price of the base config 2014 2.6Ghz, those 1/3 of diference i can use to buy more ram and a external usb 3.0 SSD and still have money left. Are the 2.5 noticeably slower than the 2.6ghz one? i saw some benchmarks and it seens like its more towards the 1.4 than the 2.6 in performance, that's the only thing that is bugging me, as i worry that i can regret it in future, but to upgrade the 2014 model will be way past my budget and there is no option for 16gb of ram here i will be stuck with 8gb.
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The 2014 will be faster. The graphics are quite a bit faster, and it also has Thunderbolt 2 if you need it. You can open up the 2014 and replace the HD with an internal SSD if you're inclined to do that.

Actually i dont need the thunderbolt 2, as i don't even have anything that uses this conection, and the displays that use it are extremelly overpriced here, so i think i will don't miss that functionality.

 

[Boyd01]

Are the 2.5 noticeably slower than the 2.6ghz one?

A little confused by your post, sorry. I have owned both a 2012 2.5ghz and 2014 1.4ghz. The 2012 is noticeably faster IMO. There are long delays (like as much as 15 seconds) waiting for system preferences to open on the 2014 1.4ghz for example. This never happened on my 2012 2.5ghz

Like I said before, I've never used a 2014 2.6ghz but it should be faster than the 2012 2.5ghz. I don't think it will be "oh wow!" faster though.

 

[AdeMorgan]

Performance is improved by increase in memory, more processor cores, internal bus speeds and obviously SSDs have no mechanical moving parts so are way faster and that applies to all things computer ...

So if you get offered a 2011/2012 mini with i7 quad the only worry you have is the graphics/thunderbolt and USB2 but if like me your ex-IT professional, dabble technically, program occasionally, do 3D sketch work and want a bloody good iTunes AV media server then bite their hands off as both the upgrades memory and disks will have given mine another 5 years of life. Having spent all my working life with Microsoft OS and servers I want a machine I can tinker with and upgrade myself ... so please grab the concept Apple before I go and update my mini with a PC because I can currently only buy a PC display through Apple.

Irony is seeing the iPOD Hifi (2009ish) re-incarnated as a mac pro with siri ...

 

[bigfatipod]

Performance is improved by increase in memory, more processor cores, internal bus speeds and obviously SSDs have no mechanical moving parts so are way faster and that applies to all things computer ...

So if you get offered a 2011/2012 mini with i7 quad the only worry you have is the graphics/thunderbolt and USB2 but if like me your ex-IT professional, dabble technically, program occasionally, do 3D sketch work and want a bloody good iTunes AV media server then bite their hands off as both the upgrades memory and disks will have given mine another 5 years of life. Having spent all my working life with Microsoft OS and servers I want a machine I can tinker with and upgrade myself ... so please grab the concept Apple before I go and update my mini with a PC because I can currently only buy a PC display through Apple.

Irony is seeing the iPOD Hifi (2009ish) re-incarnated as a mac pro with siri ...

I think all 2012 models have usb 3.0 rather than 2.0

 

[sublunar]

I'd say that it's well worth waiting for the end of October in case a 2018 Mini shows up if your budget allows for the mid SKU 2014 brand new. How much you'd get out of the presumed quad core would depend on what you intend to use the Mini for. You don't mention what monitor you intend to use and the resolution you want to use it at either which would also be a factor.
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I think all 2012 models have usb 3.0 rather than 2.0

The 2011 has USB2 but it was easy to add USB3 because of the Thunderbolt port. The 2012 and 2014 both have USB3 as standard, the 2014 has Thunderbolt 2. You could expect the 2018 Mini to have Thunderbolt 3 in the USB-C format which would be useful for very modern monitors and hubs.

 

[ivnj]

2011 is dead as of december 04 2017. No mojave support so 2011 is a papper weight now.

 

[BigRed1]

Don’t be afraid to swap out the internal hdd for a ssd. Wasn’t nearly as painful as it was on my 2009 mini. If you’re in the us you can get a 240gb ssd from micro center for $40 right now and move the internal to a cheap external enclosure. I bought a 2012 2.5 a few months back for about $250. My 2012 i7 MacBook Pro runs circles around it (quad i7 will do that), but the 2.5 is doing just fine for me so far.