Is it worth it?

[RolandH]

Hy everybody! First of all i am a proud owner of my very first Mac A 2015 Early 13" MacBook Pro which i bought in 2015! It served me great for the past 9 years but recently i noticed that the fans are turns on more frequently than before, and it is very laggy! If i am tying to play some 4K videos recorded with my iPhone, the fans are spinning insanely and sounds like a jet engine and of course it can not play it whitout serious lags! So i think this is the time to upgrade! I have a quite good offer from my cellular provider! I can buy a new M2 Mac Mini for just 200K HUF which is 560USD! The official apple store price starts at 300K HUF or 841USD in Hungary! The entry model M1 MBA starts at 370K HUF or 1041US so i think this Mac Mini is a good deal! Is it good to everyday tasks and document editing? And i would like to make beginner homemade movies with my kids! Can i manage it on the base model M2?

Thank You! 😀

 

[Ben J.]

I've used intel minis and Mx minis the last few years, and no question that M2 mini will handle general use and basic video editing without breaking a sweat. Even the M1 mini would do that. I had a base M2 mini for a year, and it was so good that I upgraded to the M2 Pro with more cores and ram to last me for some years. But the base 8GB M2 is very powerful indeed, and that price is great. Just take into account that you'll need to spend some money on screen/mouse/keyboard etc. Also limited number of ports, so you might need a dock.

It's also completely silent, which is simply lovely. Never gets hot.

You are of course aware that the apple silicon design with 'system on chip' and 'unified memory' means that neither ssd or memory can be upgraded later?

 

[RolandH]

I've used intel minis and Mx minis the last few years, and no question that M2 mini will handle general use and basic video editing without breaking a sweat. Even the M1 mini would do that. I had a base M2 mini for a year, and it was so good that I upgraded to the M2 Pro with more cores and ram to last me for some years. But the base 8GB M2 is very powerful indeed, and that price is great. Just take into account that you'll need to spend some money on screen/mouse/keyboard etc. Also limited number of ports, so you might need a dock.

It's also completely silent, which is simply lovely. Never gets hot.

You are of course aware that the apple silicon design with 'system on chip' and 'unified memory' means that neither ssd or memory can be upgraded later?

Hi Ben! Thank you for your time to answer my questions! Fortunately I have a Magic Keyboard 2nd gen and the 1st gen Magic mouse, and a display too because in the past 3 years the MacBook was used as a desktop computer! So if i am buying this mac i just have to buy a better display, because i just have a 1080p display! I am thinking about a 4k display but i have read about some scaling issues, if you are not using the native resolution of display! I have read that the 4k displays are almost useless in their native resolution because of the size of the UI! So i am thinking about to buy jus a 2K display which i can use at i'ts native resolution! In some tests they said that due to the scaling issue the mac uses significantly more ram and cpu than it should be! But i think this would not be a huge problem in everyday use! And sure i know that SoC can not be upgraded later! But i think the 8 gigs of ram is jut enough for everyday use! My macbook has 8 gigs of ram and 256SSD too and i haven't seen any problem with it in everyday use, until i have started to film in 4K with my phone! But i hope is upgrading from this old MacBook to an M2 desktop computer will be a huge leap for me! 😀

 

[MacFoxG4]

I used to own an M2 Mini and the Wi-Fi would be rather unreliable. I had to position the mini a certain way (vertical with the bottom facing towards the left) to get a consistent signal and even then I would still have problems occasionally, so if you primarily use Wi-Fi to get online, I wouldn't recommend the M2 Mini.

 

[HobeSoundDarryl]

...or get one of those dock holders so that OP too can get the bottom to face the direction of the router... or do as I did with a Studio and mount it to a wall, bottom out.

And then there's that other option to just ethernet wire it, which is also what I did (wall mount, bottom out for bluetooth signals).

OP: Base M will do fine against your stated goals. If anything, I would save up the extra and get the additional RAM. You can't add it later. When 8GB is overloaded, it will use SWAP on the SSD. Fans will deny it of course, but I suspect heavy SWAP will wear out the SSD faster than historical norms and video will tax RAM (4K video even more so). So I'd pay the hefty premium to up the RAM if the goal is another 9 years. If you want to replace it sooner than that, you can take the gamble on SWAP wear and be ready to buy another sooner than 9 years.

Unlike your MB, when either RAM or SSD conks in Silicon Macs, you have to replace the entire thing: no hardware repair potential at all. So if you are buying for almost another (entire) decade, you need to be buying NOT for 2024 but maybe for 2030-2034.

You sound like an Apple enthusiast but the other option would be to consider a PC... where tremendous competition on manufacturers and parts like RAM & SSD can get you a pretty robust Mac mini-like PC for value pricing. iPhones work great with PC too. I reluctantly added a little PC when I went Silicon (as I had to have full Windows compatibility too) and have since come to really appreciate concepts like "power" vs. PPW and flexibility to upgrade RAM and SSD whenever I want... and at MUCH BETTER prices thanks to robust competition.

One more option: crack that MB open and clean it out. Fans might be caked up with dust. Open it up, blast it with some canned air, etc and you might be able to squeeze another year or two out of it for no new costs.

 

[RolandH]

I used to own an M2 Mini and the Wi-Fi would be rather unreliable. I had to position the mini a certain way (vertical with the bottom facing towards the left) to get a consistent signal and even then I would still have problems occasionally, so if you primarily use Wi-Fi to get online, I wouldn't recommend the M2 Mini.

I think i will use the eternet port primarily, but the wifi will be used for AirPlay speakers! The speakers will be next to the Mac! Anyway thank you for your time to answer my questions and share your experiences! 😊

 

[RolandH]

...or get one of those dock holders so that OP too can get the bottom to face the direction of the router... or do as I did with a Studio and mount it to a wall, bottom out.

And then there's that other option to just ethernet wire it, which is also what I did (wall mount, bottom out for bluetooth signals).

OP: Base M will do fine against your stated goals. If anything, I would save up the extra and get the additional RAM. You can't add it later. When 8GB is overloaded, it will use SWAP on the SSD. Fans will deny it of course, but I suspect heavy SWAP will wear out the SSD faster than historical norms and video will tax RAM (4K video even more so). So I'd pay the hefty premium to up the RAM if the goal is another 9 years. If you want to replace it sooner than that, you can take the gamble on SWAP wear and be ready to buy another sooner than 9 years.

Unlike your MB, when either RAM or SSD conks in Silicon Macs, you have to replace the entire thing: no hardware repair potential at all. So if you are buying for almost another (entire) decade, you need to be buying NOT for 2024 but maybe for 2030-2034.

You sound like an Apple enthusiast but the other option would be to consider a PC... where tremendous competition on manufacturers and parts like RAM & SSD can get you a pretty robust Mac mini-like PC for value pricing. iPhones work great with PC too. I reluctantly added a little PC when I went Silicon (as I had to have full Windows compatibility too) and have since come to really appreciate concepts like "power" vs. PPW and flexibility to upgrade RAM and SSD whenever I want... and at MUCH BETTER prices thanks to robust competition.

One more option: crack that MB open and clean it out. Fans might be caked up with dust. Open it up, blast it with some canned air, etc and you might be able to squeeze another year or two out of it for no new costs.

Unfortunately there is no option to the larger ram version MacMini in this store, but this low price deal is just available there! I think that the 8 gigs of RAM will be enough for me! I am not a hardcore video editor! 😀 It will be just for fun with my kids, so render times and etc.. doesn't really matter this time! I'm indded an Apple fan so the PC thing is absolutely out of question for me! I know that there are lots of things to pc which are cheaper options, but the stability of Mac-s and the whole ecosystem is the reason why i have choosen Mac many years ago! One thing that i don't know: can i see the SSD health in Silicon Mac-s? I mean that you mentioned, if the mac goes out of RAM it will use the SSD SWAP so it will be worn out faster than it should be! But i think it will not last for another 9 years, because i am planning to get a MBA 13" to a portable computer next year! So i will use te Mac Mini mainly maybe for a year, and then it will be just a secondary computer! Anyway, thank you for your time too, to answer my questions! 😀

 

[meson]

The base model mini will serve you well, and it sounds like you can get it at a really good local price. I say go for it. It will serve you well.

Don’t fuss over the SSD health. For your use, you’ll never stress it to the point that it’s worth losing sleep over. You are at a far greater risk of a random failure than wearing out that SSD.

For a monitor, your 1080p monitor will work the same as it always has. As far as 4k and scaled resolutions is concerned, you will be blown away compared to what you are currently using.

Personally, I really like my 32” 4k monitor. I can read the UI elements just fine at full res. I do bump up font sizes or scaling in text-heavy apps to make things easier on my eyes when sitting back in my desk chair. The screen real estate is amazing.

For you, a 27” 4k monitor would be a major step up and look way better at scaled to look like 1440p than using a 1440p monitor.