There's some rumblings the Mac Mini is gone now from the 10/27 line up. The Mini concept as we know it may be no more but there might be something else.
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The new Mac mini is almost certainly coming
- Thread starter GabrieleR
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Very mysterious. Care to elaborate?
Just posting what I heard from a mate. When events are planned (e.g. 10/27) then there's a lot of information pollution occurs to cause thorough confusion as to what is real and what's not. It ramps up as the event approaches.
Thanks for the info and the insight into the disinformation machine. The new mac mini is almost certainly coming, but there is that 'almost.'
I was fully expecting this. Mini's have always used laptop processors (currently U series) for low power/heat. However most products in the Mini SFF category have moved to T series processors for the low price / low power usage / nearly full desktop speed combination. If Apple moves to the T series, that's significantly more performance for customers while giving Apple $100+ more profit for each unit sold because of the lower chip cost. Apple would be insane not to do that.
Unfortunately, Kaby Lake T series processors are not expected to come out until January
Still seems odd that there have been so many leaks about new MBA's, MBP's, iMacs, etc, but nothing about a new "something else". One might expect that to be a big story….
Here's some tortured lo
One possible "something else" might be a successor to the Thunderbolt monitor, which has been rumored. If so, it would make sense also to update the mini and pro to go with it (in my world if not Apple's).
One possible "something else" might be a successor to the Thunderbolt monitor, which has been rumored. If so, it would make sense also to update the mini and pro to go with it (in my world if not Apple's).
Nah, the whole point of this new monitor (with the built-in GPU) is to provide souped-up graphics to the Mac laptops. In this way, they can lock consumers into their brand of monitor, and avoid the frightening danger of competition.
The Pro doesn't need a monitor that comes with its own eGPU. (Which is one reason why the Pro costs so much, I guess; because Apple knows it isn't going to be able to sell a monitor along with each unit, and therefore is demanding greater markup.) The Mini does need one, but only because Apple has worked hard to avoid placing any useful GPUs into them; and the way things are going, Apple will avoid the dire situation of people purchasing non-Apple monitors for their Minis by simply not producing any more Minis.
(Yeah, I guess I'm somewhat bitter here. Sorry about that.)
Quite an old observation, but on the 2013 Mac Pro it appears that one of the GPUs is used for display driving, with the other one used for GPU compute. There isn't a lower level version of AMD Crossfire or Nvidia SLI for the Mac which would use both GPUs - it's there if you boot into Windows I guess.
The Mac Pro uses Intel Xeon CPUs that have 40 PCIe lanes, with 32 of them used up by the 2 GPUs - bit galling when one of them just drives a display and the other is revved up only for compatible applications. The remaining few PCIe lanes are in effect blocked out by the Thunderbolt ports, ethernet, and USB3, creating potential bottlenecks.
In effect, what I would say is that despite Apple's best efforts over the last 3 years to get people writing apps that would fully utilise the narrow use case that the Mac Pro serves (it's undoubtedly a Final Cut Pro X box) there hasn't been the progress that Apple might have expected. It doesn't help when you kill off Aperture for the photography users.
In this event, I don't think it would be a waste if Apple were to launch a 5k monitor with built in GPU although it'll quickly become galling if it's still on sale after 5 years at the launch price while Dell are selling broadly similar units for a third of the price.
A 4k or 5k cinema display with built in GPU and using USB-C ports (capable of sending 100w power) could clearly connect and power every Mac laptop on sale. It could even potentially power a Mac Mini IF Apple redesigned the Mac Mini to use a 15w Kaby Lake CPU, go all SSD, removing the built-in PSU and reintroducing an external power brick.
On the other hand, you can make a cheaper Mac Pro if you go with one powerful GPU rather than two where the OS doesn't use both properly in Crossfire/SLI.
Even if you stick with the Xeons for the extra PCIe lanes you could get fewer bottlenecks or, optionally, create a much cheaper entry level model using i7 CPU with Iris Pro graphics or Xeon E3v5 Skylake. Throw in 2 USB-C ports on that, a stack of USB3, couple of ethernet, and let people mount a couple of hard drives where the GPUs were and there could be another potential customer for the Cinema 5k display using a GPU.
Evidently Apple will release a new version of FCP X at the event. Perhaps they will show it off with a new monitor and new computer? https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/fcpx-update-today.2007940/
May be too little too late for Apple. Without a decent roadmap of where the software and hardware is going you'll find people migrating away to the likes of Premiere Pro or AVID. Why spend £3k on base model machine to run a £199 piece of software which hasn't been updated in months and is falling behind all the time? Both the hardware and software appear to be left to rot for months or years at a time.
£3k buys an awful lot of PC and years of subscription to Adobe's Premiere Pro for which there IS a roadmap.
If Apple's strategy with software was to price it cheaply and look for volume sales then why are they not even meeting pro users half way with the Mac Pro?
Use the Mac Pro case, add i7 CPU with Iris Pro 580 - or a Skylake E3 Xeon, keep the SSD, drop both GPUs and allow hard drives to be user mounted instead. See how many people take you up on that if you can price it at a fraction of the cost of a Mac Pro with GPUs. Call it a 'Mac' if you have to.
If Apple then offer a GPU enabled 4k or 5k monitor they might even gain a few extra sales there too.
Again, I've gotta say it: if Apple is going to introduce a monitor that includes the powerful GPU that is missing from the Mac Mini (and the laptops), they really ought to add all the other things missing from the Mini: a powerful CPU, upgradeable RAM, and better storage options.
In short, just make it an iMac.
There are a bunch of rumors about ARM Minis, AppleTV sized Minis, etc. I think maybe there's a little truth in them all insofar as they all contribute to the final product. I'm expecting a renamed Mini product running an ARM processor with only a USB-C external port, that can connect and use a GPU based thunderbolt LCD display. Maybe the Mac Nano?
Talk about pushing even more people away. A move like that would leave only money foolish diehards for Apple. Pros have left. cost conscious(knowing Macs cost a bit less over time to maintain) folks have greatly slowed down their purchases with all the glued in crap. And I can not longer, in good faith, recommend Macs to my extended family, so there are several purchases gone as well.
Way over priced laptops, to be paired with exceptionally overpriced monitors? It's like the cube, all over again.
Only this would give meaning to the "hello again!" slogan I think. However it is more probable that they will introduce a new idevice. Maybe a siri based smart home computer. I hope they don't waste the historically meaningful slogan.
I'm really looking forward to the event on the 27th. Will we see the Apple Corporation surprise us with a fresh, new, amazing set of beautiful designs, sowing among the mini afficianados optimism and joy like Johnny Appleseed? Or will they create a towering inferno of rage among "The new mac mini is almost certainly coming" community, like Crabby Appleton - Rotten to the Core? (If you get these references, you are probably older than dirt.) Either way, we will live in interesting computer times next week.
An interesting possibility for powering the Mini. If they do it in a way that locks it into the new Apple display (i.e. you can only run a Mini from the Apple display), that would solve the 'problem' Apple have of the Mini competing with the iMacs.
But, dang it, what would be the point? If you use the Mini without the eGPU display, you've got a severely underperforming SFF box. If you use the Mini with the eGPU display, you've got something like an iMac, only more expensive and less convenient.
The whole idea of a display with an eGPU is to solve a problem that Apple has created for itself: Apple just can't be bothered to provide their machines with decent GPUs, so they're trying to install that missing piece into the display. It would be far easier and less expensive to simply put the dang GPU inside the Mac to begin with (or at least provide an expansion slot for people who wish to do so on their own).
I hope not. Intel would be much better. How many apps would be rewritten to work on ARM as well? I suspect at least some of the ones I need would not. Also would the ARM CPU come anywhere close to the performance of an Intel CPU?
That would be my preferred solution too. When you start talking about Razer Core or other eGPU solutions and consider the price, it's just easier to have the thing inside. Similarly, if you want loads of storage wouldn't it have been easier to include drive bays rather than ask users to buy expensive multi-bay Thunderbolt/NAS drives?
Mind you, Apple expect their average user to not bother about future expansion. Leave the 'pro' users to buy 'pro' external solutions.
If Apple expect the 4k/5k 24"/27" Cinema display (with GPU) to become a popular docking solution for people with laptops and perhaps even the Mac Mini then they'd better price it competitively and perhaps design in a slot to place a miniaturised Mac Mini so it's completely out of the way.
Having a new Mini come with 2 to 4 USB-C/Thunderbolt 3 ports wouldn't lock you into an Apple display. You'd just buy a USB-C to HDMI/Displayport/Mini-Displayport dongle and carry on (yes, more expense). The more worrying thing for me would be a unit so small that Apple then starts to limit total number of ports - hopefully not to the point where the satirists are joking about 1 USB-C/Thunderbolt 3 port and everything else wireless! For something that's not much bigger than an AppleTV 4 - for example - we could have just 2 USB-C expecting one to be either used up by a power adaptor or a docking cable for the external monitor/dock. It's then a question of how many USB you add on - perhaps as few as 2 - and then you have maybe an Ethernet. And that's it.
Desktop computers are dead unless you are building gaming computers.
Apple shoots for the mass market now and only cares about those products.
Laptops, iPads and iPhones are what sells. There may not be any more Pro machines unless it takes the form of a Pro iMac.
There will be some form of a home hub which the Mini may turn into but it will probably cease to exist in it's present form.
Just my opinion based on what Apple has turned into.
Apple shoots for the mass market now and only cares about those products.
Laptops, iPads and iPhones are what sells. There may not be any more Pro machines unless it takes the form of a Pro iMac.
There will be some form of a home hub which the Mini may turn into but it will probably cease to exist in it's present form.
Just my opinion based on what Apple has turned into.
That's not true... if you are a professional in any field you require a desktop computer.
True pretty much for consumers. Businesses will make a desktop last for many years.
Apples desktop is an iMac...Apples flagship AOI desktop.
Apple only cares about high volume mobile devices they can sell their services on.
Apple has become a service driven company.