CS5 Performance on Mac Mini

[superlatic]

I am looking to replace my iMac 7.1 (C2E 2.8ghz, 4GB RAM, 750GB HDD) in the near future. At the moment, I intend on replacing it with the Mac Mini Snow Leopard Server edition, and a decent firewire 800 external drive to store my media files on.

It will act as my main computer, and I will also be streaming SD content over a wireless N network to one of the new Apple TV's downstairs.

Although I don't anticipate much difference in speed, I recently bought a new 22 inch viewsonic monitor and I find this a hell of alot easier to work with than the glossy screen on my iMac.

I will be doing some photoshop work (I use Creative Suite 5 Design Standard, which consists of Photoshop, inDesign and Illustrator). If anyone has any experience or knowledge of how CS5 would perform on this machine it would be much appreciated.

 

[pintsizemacman]

i got a mac mini with 2 GB of ram and it gets the job done all the time. not with adobe or anything though

 

[Ygn]

I use CS5 on my late 2009 mini and it runs perfectly, even if I have photoshop, fireworks and dreamweaver open.

 

[superlatic]

Thanks

It wont be used for any kind of intensive 3D gaming (maybe Football Manager 2011, which is more CPU/Ram intensive than graphics), mainly just music, movies (most of which are encoded in standard definition), photos, and CS5 design standard.

Specs wise an iMac would have been perfect but the glossy screen is a nono. As long as it doesnt chug or isn't unbearably slow, I would be more than happy with it.

 

[WardC]

I run Photoshop CS3 on my 2009 Mac Mini 2.26GHz with 2GB of RAM and it runs great, boots in about 3 seconds flat. But I wouldn't try running CS5 at all on this machine.

 

[FourCandles]

I have a late 2009 Mini 2.53GHz/4GB running CS5 Design Premium with no problems at all. Also running Lightroom 3 with a 30,000 image library and happily hopping back and forth to Photoshop with some big TIFF scans. I am using FW800 external drives for media and one for a PS scratch disk.

 

[WardC]

I don't see the big improvement of CS4 and CS5 over CS3, they really haven't updated that much on any of the apps, especially Photoshop, it's basically the same exact app.

 

[scottsjack]

I don't see the big improvement of CS4 and CS5 over CS3, they really haven't updated that much on any of the apps, especially Photoshop, it's basically the same exact app.

CS5 is a worthy replacement for CS4. There are some CS5 features that could be important but the biggest improvement is in Camera Raw. The the Canon raw files that I work with the CS4 CR can't come close to CS5 for the quality of the conversions.

Also PS CS5, but not Bridge CS5, is 64-bit so you have a little more power to work with. My late 2009 2.66GHz mini handled CS5 well enough to be enjoyable to use.

 

[dolphin842]

Specs wise an iMac would have been perfect but the glossy screen is a nono. As long as it doesnt chug or isn't unbearably slow, I would be more than happy with it.

You're not the only one; I swapped an i5 27" iMac for a Mini because I couldn't see anything with the glossy screen. Currently using an IPS-based Ultrasharp u2211h... much lower resolution, but also much happier .

CPU-wise, you're probably looking at a slight performance decrease, moving down from the Core 2 Extreme. I don't know enough about how well/poorly CS5 uses the GPU to say what the difference will be there, if any (the 320m should be more powerful than the ATI 2600, and is OpenCL compatible as well). Just make sure you have enough RAM, and it should work fine.

 

[superlatic]

You're not the only one; I swapped an i5 27" iMac for a Mini because I couldn't see anything with the glossy screen. Currently using an IPS-based Ultrasharp u2211h... much lower resolution, but also much happier .

CPU-wise, you're probably looking at a slight performance decrease, moving down from the Core 2 Extreme. I don't know enough about how well/poorly CS5 uses the GPU to say what the difference will be there, if any (the 320m should be more powerful than the ATI 2600, and is OpenCL compatible as well). Just make sure you have enough RAM, and it should work fine.

Pretty much what I was expecting to be honest. After playing with a 2.66ghz 2010 mini it was most definitely more nippy than my current iMac.

Its only CS5 Design Standard (Photoshop, inDesign and Illustrator), for which I think the Mac Pro would be a complete overkill.

Another thing I will be using it for is as a media server, and it will be pretty much always switched on. Plan to connect an external FW800 to store my movies/music, and stream to one of the new Apple TVs.

An idle Mini, even with an external FW800 HDD plugged in, will use alot less power than an idle Mac Pro