Official "I Ordered an Intel Mac Mini" Thread...

[generik]

From the many reviews I read on Amazon it seems like Civ IV is really a step backwards from Civ III. Oh, and the crashes, which the many patches failed to fix... definitely a downer.

I'm not too excited about it even though I'm quite a big Civ fan too.

 

[MacSA]

I know of this self-restraint. I've been staring at the unopened box for four hours. I'm considering waiting and returning it for one of the ones they'll get in with more RAM (coming "sooner or later" according to them...).

Huh? So someone at the Apple store told you there would be other configurations of the Mini coming out?

 

[xterm]

Im back home from uni, ran xbench and uploaded the benchmark stats, this thing absolutely destroys the G4 Mac Mini, even in OpenGL!

http://db.xbench.com/merge.xhtml?doc1=158732&doc2=146457

If you use digg.com, digg this story please http://digg.com/apple/Mac_Mini_Core_Duo_1.66Ghz_Benchmarks._OpenGL_over_2x_Faster_than_G4

 

[MacSA]

Im back home from uni, ran xbench and uploaded the benchmark stats, this thing absolutely destroys the G4 Mac Mini, even in OpenGL!

http://db.xbench.com/merge.xhtml?doc1=158732&doc2=146457

Good stuff......... although i'm sure someone will find something to complain about

How much lower would you expect the Core Solo results to be?

 

[phampton81]

Im back home from uni, ran xbench and uploaded the benchmark stats, this thing absolutely destroys the G4 Mac Mini, even in OpenGL!

http://db.xbench.com/merge.xhtml?doc1=158732&doc2=146457

Hmm, I bet this thing wouldn't be quite that bad at gaming afterall. I'm not saying you should consider this one for your primary gaming, but I think this test shows it can hold it's own, especially against the ATI 9200, the 64mb vs. 32mb video may have a bit to do with this.

 

[generik]

My guess is that the Duo has enough spare juice left over to do some video rendering of its own?

 

[bigandy]

Being pretty sure that an Intel Mac mini was coming, I had planned to order one today. However, due to the integrated graphics, and high price, I'm not ordering one. Drop the price $50-$100 on both models, and put in a dedicated GPU, and I'll buy one.

"drop the price $50-$100" - so they lose a big chunk of their profit (due to the vastly increased cost of the Core chips compared to the G4's)

"put in a dedicated GPU" - so the rest of the profit goes.

so, apple potentially losing money on each mini would be ok then?

i bet they disagree.

 

[generik]

"drop the price $50-$100" - so they lose a big chunk of their profit (due to the vastly increased cost of the Core chips compared to the G4's)

"put in a dedicated GPU" - so the rest of the profit goes.

so, apple potentially losing money on each mini would be ok then?

i bet they disagree.

Maybe they should learn to sell OSX to themselves at OEM prices then

 

[cube]

Wow, the graphics results are pretty impressive. It consistently performs at or above the level of the iMacG5, but what's up with its Hardware OpenGL score?

The Intel graphics don't have hardware T&L so this is done in software.

 

[TBi]

According to this the intel mac mini is faster than a 20" core duo iMac. Something must be wrong...

 

[munkees]

According to this the intel mac mini is faster than a 20" core duo iMac. Something must be wrong...

You cannot trust xBench, it does not give true resaults

 

[liketom]

GUTTED - was going to be 8th march when i get it but now

 

[coot]

Mine is due for shipment today ( coming to Beverely, E. Yorks ), for delivery by the 9th.
Not sure where they are being shipped from though.....

Almost quicker to head off to Meadowhall to see if they have any...

Pete.

 

[liketom]

Mine is due for shipment today ( coming to Beverely, E. Yorks ), for delivery by the 9th.
Not sure where they are being shipped from though.....

Almost quicker to head off to Meadowhall to see if they have any...

Pete.

mines on the slow boat from china should have gone to medowhall

 

[coot]

mines on the slow boat from china should have gone to medowhall

If mine hasnt been sent out by end of play today I'll have a trip out tomorrow and try and get one - downside is I was at Trafford apple centre last weekend, should have delayed that for a couple of days

Cheers,

Pete.

 

[coot]

Yay!

Shipped, TNT International, will wait until I can track it to see where it gets to.... dont think I'll be having any big screen goodness this weekend though

 

[Spanky Deluxe]

I don't quite see why people are so surprised that the Core Duo mini can play 1080p smoothly, I explained several times on here why it was perfectly capable of doing so!! Its exactly as I said, Core Solo underpowered for 1080p, Core Duo perfectly capable of smooth 1080p!
The integrated graphics doesn't have any impact on the performance of 1080p decoding since most graphics cards don't support hardware accelerated HD decoding anyway right now. As long as the graphics card supports basic 2D acceleration HD is completely possible on a decent CPU. As this shows!!

On a side now, mine got shipped today!! Although its saying "We estimate that it will be delivered to your shipping address on or before 14.03.2006.".

I hope that's not true!! It can't possibly take 12 days to get here from the factory!!

The insides of the mini look beautiful though. I don't think it'll be *that* much harder to upgrade the RAM. The hard bit I always thought was getting the case off without damaging it. Anything after that's fine. I'm guessing the CPU's soldered on, does anyone know for sure yet though?

 

[Daedalus]

Where can I buy this putty knive thing that I have been reading about?

Do I need a special Apple Certified(tm) putty knive to service my Mini?

Generic pizza cutter wheel, straight from your kitchen! The ones with a wheel attached to a handle...

Most already have a beveled edge, and being round lets you rock it back and forth in the seam to pop all the catches.

Works even better than the putty knife (at least the putty knives I tried) and you might already have one!

 

[bevo]

i have found that the apple expected delivery date is just an guesstimation.

Both times I have ordered from apple.com I've had my delivery come before they're expected date.

When I ordered the mini, they said 3/08. Once I got a track number from fedex, fedex said it would get here on 3/05


My shuffle shipment came 2 days ahead of schedule, but it had to come from Ca.

 

[xterm]

CINEBENCH 9.5
****************************************************

Tester : xterm

Processor : 1.66GHz Core Duo Mac Mini
MHz : 1666
Number of CPUs : 2
Operating System : Mac Os 10.4.5

Graphics Card : Intel GMA950
Resolution : 1600x1200
Color Depth : Millions
****************************************************

Rendering (Single CPU): 255 CB-CPU
Rendering (Multiple CPU): 473 CB-CPU

Multiprocessor Speedup: 1.85

Shading (CINEMA 4D) : 300 CB-GFX
Shading (OpenGL Software Lighting) : 1075 CB-GFX
Shading (OpenGL Hardware Lighting) : 545 CB-GFX

OpenGL Speedup: 3.58

****************************************************

How does it compare?

 

[jsw]

I don't quite see why people are so surprised that the Core Duo mini can play 1080p smoothly, I explained several times on here why it was perfectly capable of doing so!!

It was just nice seeing confirmation - the theory was sound, but the reality is better.

 

[iHeartTheApple]

Im back home from uni, ran xbench and uploaded the benchmark stats, this thing absolutely destroys the G4 Mac Mini, even in OpenGL!

http://db.xbench.com/merge.xhtml?doc1=158732&doc2=146457

If you use digg.com, digg this story please http://digg.com/apple/Mac_Mini_Core_Duo_1.66Ghz_Benchmarks._OpenGL_over_2x_Faster_than_G4

Xterm, did you disable the beam sync like others were suggesting when you ran Xbench on your intel mini? Just wondering because I posted an Xbench score of ~49 (without disabling beam sync) on a stock Duo that I was playing with in my local Apple Store last night. If you did, that would definitely mean that the "beam sync on" scores are a load of garbage! Here's to hoping...'cause the benchmark you just posted was impressive!

 

[srobert]

This thread is very encouraging. I'm glad to hear about 1080i/p running fine.

I'd like to hear from people who have this setup:

Dual core Mini (1GB to 2GB RAM) --> DVI to HDMI Cable --> 16:9 HDTV (i)

Question 1: How does 1080i/p behave? When displaying the desktop, does it all fit on the TV?

I ask because I tried hooking a dual core iMac to my HDTV and I was missing a few rows of pixels at the top and bottom. iMac can't output to 16:9 out of the box, only 16:10. The top menu was completely outside the viewing area. SwitchResX couldn't fix this since it's having trouble with my intel core and TV.

Question 2: Using Front Row, has anybody tried streaming 1080p video hosted on another computer? Did it work fine? Through Airport or cables?

I ask because if this works fine, I might not upgrade the Mini's Hard Drive, having a few terabytes spread around the house's Macs and external Hard Drives.

Question 3: Is it worth the trouble getting the maxed RAM from crucial instead of Apple? How much could I save?

Thanks guys

 

[Spanky Deluxe]

Question 3: Is it worth the trouble getting the maxed RAM from crucial instead of Apple? How much could I save?

If you're going of 1GB total then you won't save much in getting the RAM from Crucial and its not worth the savings imo. If you're going for the 2GB then its most definately worth going for the Crucial option. I can't say how much exactly you'd save but for me over here in the UK getting Apple to install the RAM and using my educational discount it only cost like £10-£15 more, which isn't worth the hassle of opening the mini up. If it were a PowerMac I would probably have installed the extra memory myself but these Minis are tough little cookies that are pretty tricky to get into.

 

[tjwett]

...
Question 3: Is it worth the trouble getting the maxed RAM from crucial instead of Apple? How much could I save?

from what i've found the third party stuff is as or more expensive than Apple's price, depending on the config. Apple's 1GB kit is actually nicely priced. but you can save a few bucks on the 2GB kit from RamJet for example. not a huge savings though, about $20. keep in mind that installing RAM on the Intel mini is not quite as easy as in the G4. the RAM is no longer exposed and you have to remove the drive cage to get to it. not sure i feel like dealing with that. i putty knife'd open a few G4s and while nothing ever went wrong it still wasn't a pleasant experience. crunch.