The 2009 (Penryn) Mac Mini: Everything We Know

[Tallest Skil]

lol it would be nice but I wouldn't count on it. I have a feeling they would put Firewire 3200 or something on before eSATA.

And correct me if I'm wrong but the Mac Pro doesn't have eSATA ports, am I right? I know it has some SATA ports, but they are NOT (supposed to be) compatible with eSATA...

The Mac Pro has six SATA ports on the logic board. Four of them are used for the HDDs and the other two are hidden behind the main fan assembly. People have routed SATA cables up to the ODD bays (for Blu-ray drives) or out to the PCIe slots to plug into PCIe eSATA cards.

The Mac Pro does not have dedicated eSATA ports, you are correct.

 

[Sky Blue]

Wonder if this thread will still be relevant in December

 

[illegallydead]

IMO i dont feel that the minis will have 2 display ports. simply because if you really wanted/needed 2 displays you would most likely be a professional and would buy the Mac Pro. Light/Beginners buy the mini as it is cheap machine and good for light use eg. Safari, Mail, iLife, iWork

That is the whole argument for the xMac. Because people don't want to go either Mini (underpowered) or Mac Pro (pretty overkill for most). But, seeing as xMac ramblings are strictly forbidden , I will stop there.

And +1 Tallest, if they were to actually give the Mini that option (maybe a BTO option or something?) it would certainly shut some of those folks up...

 

[illegallydead]

The Mac Pro has six SATA ports on the logic board. Four of them are used for the HDDs and the other two are hidden behind the main fan assembly. People have routed SATA cables up to the ODD bays (for Blu-ray drives) or out to the PCIe slots to plug into PCIe eSATA cards.

The Mac Pro does not have dedicated eSATA ports, you are correct.

cool thats what I thought. It is something you can do with other cards, etc., but not built in...

 

[Hellhammer]

As the main post says, no talking about xMac here. Let's keep it on mini

 

[plumbingandtech]

lol it would be nice but I wouldn't count on it. I have a feeling they would put Firewire 3200 or something on before eSATA.

And correct me if I'm wrong but the Mac Pro doesn't have eSATA ports, am I right? I know it has some SATA ports, but they are NOT (supposed to be) compatible with eSATA...

True/ Not sure if they are TRUE eSata ports. but they work like ones.

Here's what I used:

http://www.newertech.com/products/esata_cable.php

 

[illegallydead]

True/ Not sure if they are TRUE eSata ports. but they work like ones.

Here's what I used:

http://www.newertech.com/products/esata_cable.php

oh thats pretty cool. very good idea!

 

[Tallest Skil]

As the main post says, no talking about xMac here. Let's keep it on mini

I actually contemplated making an xMac thread that follows the same format as these, but then I realized that I don't really care about it enough to keep it "updated"*.

I made this one as a courtesy to the other market segment that has to wait inexcusable amounts of time between updates, and because the other thread has proven to be a popular resource of information for people waiting for the product therein. There SHOULD be just ONE place that people go to get the prerelease information they want, hence threads for the Mac Pro and Mac Mini.

*An xMac thread in this vein would have to catalog the three major types of xMac, and I don't really want to keep up with people on that.

The small, "plausible" xMac.
The truly tower-shaped, mid-range, one HDD bay, one PCIe slot xMac.
The über-xMac that uses Core i7 Quad processors and is basically a cheaper Mac Pro that can use a bunch of GPUs (you see the problem here? what's the point without games in OS X?)

But as I have said in two threads now, I would love to see someone else–someone passionate about the xMac–make their own thread about it.

One condition... call it "The 20?? xMac: Everything We Want".

 

[Hellhammer]

I actually contemplated making an xMac thread that follows the same format as these, but then I realized that I don't really care about it enough to keep it "updated"*.

I made this one as a courtesy to the other market segment that has to wait inexcusable amounts of time between updates, and because the other thread has proven to be a popular resource of information for people waiting for the product therein. There SHOULD be just ONE place that people go to get the prerelease information they want, hence threads for the Mac Pro and Mac Mini.

*An xMac thread in this vein would have to catalog the three major types of xMac, and I don't really want to keep up with people on that.

The small, "plausible" xMac.
The truly tower-shaped, mid-range, one HDD bay, one PCIe slot xMac.
The über-xMac that uses Core i7 Quad processors and is basically a cheaper Mac Pro that can use a bunch of GPUs (you see the problem here? what's the point without games in OS X?)

But as I have said in two threads now, I would love to see someone else–someone passionate about the xMac–make their own thread about it.

One condition... call it "The 20?? xMac: Everything We Want".

Yea, I remember that talk we had in other thread. That time you called it "The 20??? xMac: Why it won't happen". No proofs about xMac, so it's just wondering and hoping.

 

[CharlesX]

What the... we don't know anything about a new Mini.

It's a fact, though, that they should have updated it twice by now and even that would have been stretching the schedule.

Desktops are dying. Apple doesn't care about them anymore, so there'll be suckage.

 

[Tallest Skil]

What the... we don't know anything about a new Mini.

We know that it will use the nVidia 9400M.

 

[iMacmatician]

Hardware Specifications:
2.0 and 2.4GHz Penryn (Montevina-clock on nVidia board) processors with a 1066MHz FSB

There are 2.0/2.2 GHz 35 W 800 MHz FSB CPUs that have just been released (and are OEM). Is there a chance that we might see those CPUs in the Mac mini?

There's also a 2.27 GHz 1067 MHz FSB CPU too.

160GB HDD in the 2.0, 250GB in the 2.4, 128GB SSD option for both models

I'm not sure about the SSD, is that something that Apple may keep to notebooks (and high-end desktops)?

The chipset, nVidia's ________ (what's it called?):

MCP79 (I know, I couldn't remember it at first either).

Redesign Talk:

There's a lot of this going around. Here's where the MacBook relation becomes important. The MacBook logic board will fit inside a Time Capsule case unmodified. How does a Time Capsule-sized/shaped Mac Mini sound?

Sounds fair, although I would imagine such a Mac mini would be shorter than the current one. I would also think that the Mac mini would have the black highlights etc. of recent Mac redesigns.

There may also be a possibility that (like the MacBook redesign) the current $599 Mac mini may be price dropped to $499 and updated with NVIDIA chipset etc. and kept in the lineup alongside 1 or 2 more expensive ($699?) Mac minis.

Speaking of pricing, anyone care to speculate? My opinion is that we may not see price drops (besides from the above possibility).

 

[illegallydead]

Speaking of pricing, anyone care to speculate? My opinion is that we may not see price drops (besides from the above possibility).

I think that sounds about right. Right in line with what they did with the MB's, and certainly could make sense here. Especially since they must be making a HUGE profit currently, using such dated hardware and all, I see no reason why they would drop the price at all...

 

[iMacmatician]

Also:

• Fifth USB port?
• Black plastic and aluminum redesign with Time Capsule-like "lip" (or not)?
• Optical drive swap-out for 2nd HD?

These are pre-MWSF rumors and missed the release date, but that doesn't necessarily mean the other info in the rumors are false.

 

[Undo Redo]

Speaking of pricing, anyone care to speculate? My opinion is that we may not see price drops (besides from the above possibility).

If a new mini has identical specs to the low-end aluminum MacBook, I'd expect the price to be at least $699. Apple could retain the older model and sell it for $499 but it's doubtful. More likely, they'll blow out the leftovers for $499/599 and be done with the old model.

Knowing Apple's history with the mini, I expect the new model to have the specs of the low-end white MacBook at best. In which case, it might sell for $599. Apple just doesn't seem to want the mini to compete with anything else, so they cripple it in some way. Even so, white-MacBook-specs would be an adequate upgrade and I might buy one.

Nice thread, by the way. All we need now is a release date so I can stop wondering.

 

[iParis]

Well I wouldn't be surprised if they offered two models with the spec you stated for the current price.
AND if they kept the current low end model but lowered the price $100 and gave it a superdrive.

Also, 2 hard drive bays would be one of the best things in the world!
Hell, it would still be cool if Apple just put in two bays but only one hard drive, I'd love to have the other one open to put in my own.

 

[ideonode]

I ask because I want to know whether or not it is viable to say "MagSafe adapter for power, to connect easily to the 24" LED Cinema Display" under the I/O section.

Not so sure about MagSafe on a desktop. The idea of an easily-removable power source on a device that has no internal battery worries me. It works like a dream on my MB and MBA, since an accidental detachment of the cable won't be the end of the world, but on my mini....

 

[Tallest Skil]

Not so sure about MagSafe on a desktop. The idea of an easily-removable power source on a device that has no internal battery worries me. It works like a dream on my MB and MBA, since an accidental detachment of the cable won't be the end of the world, but on my mini....

Well, yes, so it wouldn't be a MagSafe, but if the power draw is low enough, what's the problem with still using a plug that takes the MagSafe cable?

Just make it snugger. Hey, that's a word. Make it snugger or have the magnet be obscenely powerful so that it can't come out accidentally.

 

[Tara Davis]

A machine with neither eSATA nor Firewire would be dead to me. I'd just limp along with the old Mini for as long as I could keep it working.

As for arguing that FW was not removed from a laptop because there was "plenty of room" on the side... That's silly. A firewire controller is bigger than just a magical hole on the side of the laptop. It's an entire separate breadboard of circuits which you need to hide somewhere in the machine and connect to the MB (unless they could talk Intel into integrating it on a motherboard for them, which I doubt since Intel owns USB and would like to see it used more.)

Apple packs their laptops REALLY tight, and in this case they decided that FW was not worth the space it required on a mobile device. That doesn't automatically mean this will be the choice they make for the Mini

 

[iMacmatician]

Knowing Apple's history with the mini, I expect the new model to have the specs of the low-end white MacBook at best. In which case, it might sell for $599.

Agreed, especially with the original Intel Mac mini which had an OEM-only 1.5 GHz Core Solo (only single-core Intel Mac). There was a pretty big CPU gap between the Mac mini and the MacBooks then (1.5 solo / 1.67 dual vs 1.83/2.0 dual), and I wonder if something like that would happen this time around too.

That could mean that the Mac mini will use the 2.0/2.2 GHz (800 MHz FSB) CPUs with 667/800 MHz RAM, and leave the upcoming (aluminum) MacBook refresh to have 2.27/2.4 GHz (or similar) CPUs with 1067 MHz RAM etc.

Nice thread, by the way. All we need now is a release date so I can stop wondering.

The Mac mini was updated on the last week of February in 2006—maybe that's a possible update date this year?

 

[m1stake]

It's hard to get excited about one of the most gimped computers in existence, update or not.

It doesn't make sense to buy what is essentially a MacBook that's not portable. All of those drawbacks and none of the advantages.

 

[Undo Redo]

It doesn't make sense to buy what is essentially a MacBook that's not portable. All of those drawbacks and none of the advantages.

The way I see it, it's the cheapest Mac, period. If you have a nice display on your desk (or a TV) and need a computer to go with it, what do you want to do, buy a MacBook or Mac Pro for more money or get a mini?

Fact is, Apple sells nothing but notebook style computers, including the iMac, if you don't count the excessively priced Pro.

 

[robotartfashion]

It's hard to get excited about one of the most gimped computers in existence, update or not.

It doesn't make sense to buy what is essentially a MacBook that's not portable. All of those drawbacks and none of the advantages.

well, it depends on what you want one for

all of my macs fill a role

what's missing is a solid HTPC that's small and readily capable of handling 1080p without hickups

that's what I've been waiting for

My MacPro would be pretty ridiculous in my living room

 

[Tallest Skil]

...if you don't count the excessively priced Pro.

*Me proving you wrong using several different explanations and in multiple ways, some of which you hadn't even thought of*

To save me the trouble of actually doing that, can we just agree that you don't know why the Mac Pro exists?

 

[Undo Redo]

...can we just agree that you don't know why the Mac Pro exists?

Oh, I know why it exists and I own one, but I got the single quad core model because the eight core was overkill.

Can we agree that for the average computer using joe, the Mac Pro isn't even on the radar?