Initial impressions - Mac Mini base model?

[penguy]

I'm really looking for your impressions, but I'll start it off with my own. Having used a G4 mini since '05 with Tiger and 1gb plus a FW 250gb external...I have something to base my comparison on.

Not having the same operating system may make my points moot, but here goes. I find that my G4 mini (w/ 4200 rpm 80gb drive) tends to have fewer beach balls where the computer, or at least the app goes unresponsive. Now, maybe the new mini is doing something for spotlight or something else I'm not aware of, but I've been less impressed than I expected to be.

Other areas are MUCH better, playing an HD trailer at a full 24 fps with no processor stress for example. Loading PSE 6, and others are much better. Either way, I've ordered the 4 gb ram, so I expect things to improve in ways the older mini could not.

I also have a question about right clicks. I use a Logitech MX revolution which had right click options like a PC, but for some reason under Leopard, I cannot enable them. What am I missing?

 

[tobyg]

Your 1GB Mac Mini effectively has 896MB of RAM available to Leopard as it's taking 128MB for video ram. That's enough to run Leopard, but not do much else. Especially if you start doing any sort of multitasking. Get it up to 4 and let us know if your impressions change. I put 4 in mine and it's night and day compared to the 1GB.

As far as right clicks go, any standard 2 button mouse should default to having left as primary and right as secondary. You can install Logitech's software, but it shouldn't be necessary to just get the standard primary/secondary clicks going on a 2 button mouse. I don't know what you're doing wrong, but anytime I plug a standard 2 button mouse into a Mac, both buttons are enabled for primary/secondary actions by default.

 

[penguy]

Your 1GB Mac Mini effectively has 896MB of RAM available to Leopard as it's taking 128MB for video ram. That's enough to run Leopard, but not do much else. Especially if you start doing any sort of multitasking. Get it up to 4 and let us know if your impressions change. I put 4 in mine and it's night and day compared to the 1GB.

As far as right clicks go, any standard 2 button mouse should default to having left as primary and right as secondary. You can install Logitech's software, but it shouldn't be necessary to just get the standard primary/secondary clicks going on a 2 button mouse. I don't know what you're doing wrong, but anytime I plug a standard 2 button mouse into a Mac, both buttons are enabled for primary/secondary actions by default.

Thanks. I was really looking for confirmation that Leopard does need more memory than Tiger did to run decently. For a first gen mini with the 1.42 to run more smoothly than a C2D is a little surprising...and as I mentioned, it's not for everything, mainly seems to be when switching programs.

As for the mouse, I don't think I've 'done anything wrong'. I've installed the software from Logitech and yet it still won't give me the secondary action. Can't explain it.

 

[fhall1]

I also have a question about right clicks. I use a Logitech MX revolution which had right click options like a PC, but for some reason under Leopard, I cannot enable them. What am I missing?

It should work....I assume you've set it all up in the Logitech Control Panel in system prefs? IS the Apple Mouse pref "stealing" the setup? Were you running Steermouse or USB overdrive before? If so, you need to TOTALLY uninstall them as their remnants (in my case at least) prevented LCC from recognizing the mouse.

 

[penguy]

It should work....I assume you've set it all up in the Logitech Control Panel in system prefs? IS the Apple Mouse pref "stealing" the setup? Were you running Steermouse or USB overdrive before? If so, you need to TOTALLY uninstall them as their remnants (in my case at least) prevented LCC from recognizing the mouse.

Thanks. I finally got it to work. It was a case of slow mind at work here. Fir some reason both buttons were set to 'click' and there was an option to make it 'right click'. I must have stared at it 5 times and missed it. Maybe 1:30 AM is a bad time to setup a computer.

So that works. Still having troubles with mail. It will not work and I tried removing the plist and backup and restarting, but no joy there.

 

[DannySmurf]

Thanks. I was really looking for confirmation that Leopard does need more memory than Tiger did to run decently. For a first gen mini with the 1.42 to run more smoothly than a C2D is a little surprising...and as I mentioned, it's not for everything, mainly seems to be when switching programs.

If you've only got the stock 1GB in the C2D model, that is most definitely your issue. With only 896 available, that will absolutely kill Leopard. Especially if you attempt to run any Rosetta applications.