It least we know it will probably drop sometime after the 13" rMBP is refreshed...
As long as it has Skylake and at least an Iris 550, I'm happy
Or a nice little Nvidia 980m.
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
The new Mac mini is almost certainly coming
- Thread starter GabrieleR
- Start date
-
- Tags
- mac mini new mac mini
- Sort by reaction score
Or a nice little Nvidia 980m.
I believe the 2009 came with a NVIDIA 9400M, the 2010 model had a NVIDIA 320M, and the 2011 had the AMD 6330m.
The 9400m and the 320m where both integrated into the chipset and shared the system RAM as VRAM.
Thanks for the correction. I wonder why Apple chooses to no longer implement this set up. I mean besides saving some money.
The iGPU of the newer Intel chips are faster than the older integrated units so nVidia stopped offering them.
Intel has the significant advantage of being able to integrate their integrated graphics right into the same chip as their CPU, so it's a bit hard to compete with them on this front...
I guess thats too bad for those looking to game on their mac minis. But who knows, maybe we may see intel bring iGPUs up to par with some dGPUs in the far future.
All is not lost on DGPU if Apple brings TB3/USB Type C which would allow an external GPU for those that want to invest in that hardware.
Well, the whole point of an "integrated" GPU is to minimize cost.
By sharing the main memory, being integrated onto the motherboard, and (more recently) integrated right into the CPU chip, you minimize hardware costs (and to a certain extent, can reduce power consumption as well). These tradeoffs mean that integrated GPUs will never be able to compete on equal terms with discrete GPUs. (And this includes Nvidia and AMD integrated graphics.)With an entire discrete graphics card, you'll normally have dedicated RAM for the GPU, and the ability to provide separate cooling (allowing you to push up power consumption); these items allow for significantly increased processing power.
That doesn't mean you can't run games on an integrated GPU.
I've got the 2010 Mini (with the Nvidia 320m integrated GPU), and can play games like Civ 5, The Talos Principle, and XCOM without too much trouble. And the newer Intel Iris GPUs are probably able to handle even fairly up-to-date FPS games, at least at lower settings...
For an extra $1000, probably!
But at this point, I'd be overjoyed if they released a Mini with an R9 M370X.
Are you a Mac gamer as well?
Last edited:
Not likely because of this...
The new iGPUs from Intel are pretty close to last years low-end mobile GPUs and even touching some mid-range ones. They are thoroughly impressive and hopefully Apple sees fit to put one of the better ones into a mini. But there is an alternative thanks to this...
I see a lot of this happening in the PC world. There are even cheap sub $100 adapters that allows you to connect a discrete GPU to a mini PCI-e connector and TB3/USB3.1 are more than fast enough for the likes of a GTX 750 ti. A nice matching enclosure like the OWC miniStack was and you could have a decent external dGPU option.
Although I would love to see a new mini with dgpu, I don't really expect it to happen. I would be a Mac gamer if Apple made a good gaming option. A maxed out riMac 27 is the best for that currently, but with some regret I'm instead using a gaming pc with dual Nvidia 770's. I may upgrade those cards soon, without having to buy a whole new computer and display. I would buy a beastly mini immediately if one was offered.
Apple does make a small beastly computer, but it's round and expensive.
The Mac Pro is beastly for many things, that is true. But for gaming it loses to the top iMac. Now if they would make it available with game-oriented graphics cards, it would be tempting. But I think Apple's new gaming machine is the Apple TV.
It least we know it will probably drop sometime after the 13" rMBP is refreshed...
As long as it has Skylake and at least an Iris 550, I'm happy
I agree that would be nice except for the feature mapping for the Skylake mobile CPU/GPU pairings. Right now it seems like the Iris 550 is never paired with a Quad Core CPU. In fact, I only see HD 530 GPUs teamed up with QC CPUs at this time.
This could be a concern for those of us who desire more processing power.
Like DesertSurfer said, "I would buy a beastly mini immediately if one was offered."
Last edited:
I agree that would be nice except for the feature mapping for the Skylake mobile CPU/GPU pairings. Right now it seems like the Iris 550 is never paired with a Quad Core CPU. In fact, I only see HD 530 GPUs teamed up with QC CPUs at this time.
This could be a concern for those of us who desire more processing power.
It's really curios that their is not a pairing of Iris Pro 550 with a Skylake quad core that would replace the Broadwell CPU used in the new 21" 4K iMac. I would suppose maybe Intel will add more variations to the roadmap or maybe wait until Kaby Lake.
I wonder who'll win... GPU junkies or CPU junkies?I agree that would be nice except for the feature mapping for the Skylake mobile CPU/GPU pairings. Right now it seems like the Iris 550 is never paired with a Quad Core CPU. In fact, I only see HD 530 GPUs teamed up with QC CPUs at this time.
This could be a concern for those of us who desire more processing power.
Like DesertSurfer said, "I would buy a beastly mini immediately if one was offered."
According the the technical specs, the new Iris Pro 580 is a beast! The old 6200 was already nipping at the heels of a GTX 750, and that only had 48EUs, compared to the 72EUs of the Skylake Iris Pro! The Skylake one could probably beat a GTX 750 by quite a bit.
Not in boot camp with crossfire thoughThe Mac Pro is beastly for many things, that is true. But for gaming it loses to the top iMac. Now if they would make it available with game-oriented graphics cards, it would be tempting. But I think Apple's new gaming machine is the Apple TV.
Apple's Tim Cook declares the end of the PC
Apple lets you hook a keyboard to iPad Pro, so no more Mac minis?