Mini 1.25Ghz Processor upgrade?

[captain kaos]

Im sure this has been covered somewhere, but its hard to find in the forums!

Can you upgrade the 1.25Ghz processor in an early mac mini? (original specs are 512mb RAM, 40gig 4200rpm hard-drive).

I can see you can upgrade the RAM and HD, and some minis (mainly the 1.6ghz) has been covered on other threads/forums pages as possible to upgrade to a 2.1ghz.

If so is it A) Worth it (if it can only be upgraded to say 1.8ghz? B) any heat/power consumption issues? (Im also going to be upgrading the HD to a 7,200rpm, the RAM to 2Gb and if needed an airport extreme card)

If anyone has done this any info would be helpful (even better would be details of the new processor fitted!)

cheers

 

[iphong]

Yes, if you have extreme soldering skill. You have can have someone with that skill to do it for you, and yes, he would charge you fortune and in that case it's not worth it. Other solution is to order a new logic board from Apple or some other vendors. I think the whole would cost as much as the new mini so I don't think it's worth it either. You will better off buying a new mini.

 

[noodle654]

You cannot swap the processors because it is soldered to the logic board. The Core Solo Mini however, thats a different story.

 

[4JNA]

resistors on, resistors off.

you can't, as the other said 'upgrade' the cpu, but it is very possible to overclock the 1.25 to 1.42 with no cooling/heat issues. the addition of the faster hard drive, and maxing the ram to 1gb (only 1 slot, can't go to 2gb) and you would have a very usable system.

i've done this to several g4 minis without any problem. used a 1.42 overclocked to 1.5 for more than a year as a 24/7 always on workstation. really neat little computers! best of luck.

 

[captain kaos]

you can't, as the other said 'upgrade' the cpu, but it is very possible to overclock the 1.25 to 1.42 with no cooling/heat issues. the addition of the faster hard drive, and maxing the ram to 1gb (only 1 slot, can't go to 2gb) and you would have a very usable system.

i've done this to several g4 minis without any problem. used a 1.42 overclocked to 1.5 for more than a year as a 24/7 always on workstation. really neat little computers! best of luck.

Great news!

Im looking to have this as my home server and to stream my itunes library so it will be pretty much "always on". Is over clocking a difficult thing to do (bearing in mind im happy with taking the mini apart for the HD/RAM upgrade!)...and will it really cause no extra problems re: over heating?

UPDATE< i've just seen the OC info, and im not sure its worth the hassle!!!

Thanks again for the info.

 

[300D]

Its not really worth the hassle. If the machine is running well, the risk of fubar'ing it isn't worth a 10% boost in performance.

 

[nick9191]

TBH, your Mini is worth about $300. If you spend $200 on RAM, hard drive and an Airport card, thats $500.

You can pick up a brand new Mini for $599, which would offer tremendous speed gains. Literally at least 5 fold speed gains in CPU and graphics intensive areas. Plus of course you get Leopard (and Snow Leopard for a $10 upgrade fee).

I've played the upgrade game before, it's just not worth it on such an old machine.