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HDD and monitor advice for 2009 Mac Mini

B

belltree

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Feb 17, 2008
395
60
Tokyo, Japan
I have just ordered a new Mac Mini and it should arrive in a few days. My 4GB Crucial kit has arrived and I am left with deciding what HDD and Monitor to go with.

For the HDD, I would like to go with a 7,200rpm 500GB drive but as Seagate is the only one out there at the moment I will hold off (not a Seagate fan).

My current candidates for the upgrade HDD are:
  • image-3160356-10521304
    WD3200BJKT (this drive includes a free-fall sensor which is still beneficial for a desktop...you never know ;). But no reviews for this that I can find. I assume it is essentially the same as the BEKT).
  • image-3160356-10521304
    WD3200BEKT (lots of good reviews for this one).
On the monitor side, I am left wondering if it would be best to get a 1080 LCD TV or just settle for a 21-24" monitor. Any opinions or suggestions on models? Thanks folks.
 
As for a monitor, it depends where you're planning to place it. If you'll place it to desk go for 20"-24" monitor. If you'll place it to its own "TV desk" and you need/want a TV for watching TV too buy a 1080p TV.

If you decide to go for monitor, go for 20"-24" monitor. Samsung offers some great 24" monitors for 200$

If you decide to go for TV go for 32"-42". Smaller than 32" can't take full advantage of full HD
 
bigbird said:
This one's pretty much been beaten to death already. If you did a search you might have started here:
https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/667111/

Then when you're done with the HD, do your own search on the monitor. That's also been beaten to death.
Click to expand...

Thank you for your reply but I don't see any mention in that thread about WD3200BEKT and WD3200BJKT and if there any issues with the free-fall sensor conflicting with the Mac Mini. So I believe there is some validity to this thread.

Thanks all for the feedback, much appreciated.
 
belltree said:
Thank you for your reply but I don't see any mention in that thread about WD3200BEKT and WD3200BJKT and if there any issues with the free-fall sensor conflicting with the Mac Mini. So I believe there is some validity to this thread.
Click to expand...

In your original post you stated that you had two candidates for HD's. Did you ask for only opinions of those two HD's? Did you ask for opinions of other HD's? I have to answer "no" to both those questions. That's why I steered you towards another thread with some other options. Silly me for wasting your time doing that.
 
One thing, if you decide to go with the 1080p, is make sure you the TV you get has an option on it to turn off overscan, or has no overscan. I got a Panasonic 42" and it doesn't have this option to turn off and I didn't realize that it had a 2.5% overscan so that my desktop gets cut off on the top and sides by that amount. The solution was just to turn overscan on the mini off so that now there is an inch of black around the whole picture but oh well. Just in case you were wondering.

Also if you are getting a smaller one I would recomend getting 24" atleast so that you can have 1920x1200 res, which i have yet to find on anything under 24".

Cheers!
 
Hellhammer said:
As for a monitor, it depends where you're planning to place it. If you'll place it to desk go for 20"-24" monitor. If you'll place it to its own "TV desk" and you need/want a TV for watching TV too buy a 1080p TV.

If you decide to go for monitor, go for 20"-24" monitor. Samsung offers some great 24" monitors for 200$

If you decide to go for TV go for 32"-42". Smaller than 32" can't take full advantage of full HD
Click to expand...

I've found a Hans-G for £79.90 which is about $100.
 
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