Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
After problems with over heating intel CPU’s I’m very interested in getting a nice cool 😎 quite literally new arm based Mac mini .
 
Sadly it resulted a lot of promise, but ultimately a lacklustre product. I'm typing from that machine now, and it's fine, but keyboard is ok at best (some people have had nightmares with the butterfly mechanism); the Touch Bar had so much potential, but as someone who touch-types I'd prefer the fn row, its fundamentally never gained the support that would have made it worth the ~£300 extra cost. USB C only doesn't bother me at all, I have a dock and plugging a single cable for my desktop setup works fine, after the extra expense of buying a dock. Sadly "fine" for a £3k+ machine that feels like an experiment doesn't leave the best impression. However, I'm glad I didn't upgrade to some of the more recent intel models, and I'm not sure if I'll remain a MacBook Pro user as more of my work is on distributed systems. I'd like the M1 in a 15/16" chassis though.
 
  • Like
Reactions: saulinpa
Would it make sense for Apple to release a refreshed Intel based Mac mini? Primarily for the colocation folks but also fro those with Intel needs (VMs).

I don't think that they'd ever do it but also could add secure boot and TPM for Windows 11 Bootcamp support.
 
Haha, that's nothing. I was on the "waiting for Skylake" that got well over 1400 pages.
Ha. That thread...wow.. So much speculation. So much disappointment. Over an incredible amount of time. Every intel release painfully analyzed. But with M series we don't ever have to worry about what intel is doing. Apple will release when its ready.
 
Would it make sense for Apple to release a refreshed Intel based Mac mini? Primarily for the colocation folks but also fro those with Intel needs (VMs).

I don't think that they'd ever do it but also could add secure boot and TPM for Windows 11 Bootcamp support.
Nah, if Apple were to keep an Intel model around, I suspect it would just be the same old Intel model. They've done this before. Introduce a new replacement product, but keep the years-old model available but de-emphasized on their website, for the enterprise/corporate/business (and other) customers who are still forced to use the old model for whatever reason.

This actually has significant advantages for some in this context, because there is no change to the hardware, software, or OS. A new Intel model could change all of that, which in many cases would mean they would not be immediately suitable for those customers even if the machines were running Intel.
 
Wonder how much better M2 chip will be than M1. Ive read the M3 chip will be significantly improved over the M2 than comparing the M1 to M2... lets get this event over with already lol. October event stunk

Yeah, those brand new 14" & 16" MacBook Pro laptops with the M1 Pro & M1 Max SoCs inside; what a crappy event...!
 
Wonder how much better M2 chip will be than M1. Ive read the M3 chip will be significantly improved over the M2 than comparing the M1 to M2... lets get this event over with already lol. October event stunk
Not much gonna happen until we get to MX1 UltraMax (read 11) Why even bother 😉
Ah, well in meantime...I'll satisfy with a new Mini with M1Max. Will keep me happy awhile.
Doubt that they will upgrade the versions every year so…🤯

All doesn’t always go better or faster with more power….the quality of thought matter.
 
Last edited:
Would it make sense for Apple to release a refreshed Intel based Mac mini? Primarily for the colocation folks but also fro those with Intel needs (VMs).
I imagine they may be hidden or dropped into the refurb/business store.
I only care about the Mini. I hate laptops
While you may hate laptops, the event contained a decent amount of info on the processor rather that the product. I’d suggest looking at the trends and pointers for a product you may purchase in the future rather than hating on the product that’s released. Like I’m not a phone person, but being informed doesn’t hurt when I change my phone every 5 or so years. Or I don’t want an iMac but I’m still interested as it is a product that informs laptops, desktops and further down the stack.
 
Wish I had known about it before buying mine.

I specifically went with Intel over a cheaper and more powerful Beelink model specifically due to my belief that the Intel would have more reliable parts.

Will either be going with a fanless Mini PC or use this as an excuse to finally switch to Mac.
I use the NUC for our security system and for legacy scanning software. My daily driver is a mac mini. The NUC has a super loud fan when I process scanned files for OCR or export to PDF. Mac mini? I’ve never heard the fan. I do like the NUC as you can upgrade all the parts. The mini, nope.
 
  • Love
Reactions: Cape Dave
The high-end Mac mini may be rebranded as “Mac Studio” according to a new rumor. This would make sense as they could shrink down the current mini design for M2, M3, M4 (so it’s the size of the raspberry pi) but then offer a larger, unconstrained Mac for those that don’t care about size and want more power instead. Then they’d sell the Mac Pro for those that want the absolute best performance.

Mac mini - M1, M2, M3
Mac studio - M1 Max, M2 Max, M3 Max
Mac Pro - M1 Ultra, M2 Ultra, M3 ultra

(For simplicity I’m only showing the top-tier chip)

 
  • Like
Reactions: Cape Dave
The high-end Mac mini may be rebranded as “Mac Studio” according to a new rumor.
I like the sound of this. Give us 4 full fat TB4 ports so eGPU/PCIe box can still be used for expandability (except obviously GPUs or anything that use old kext). A mini tower with 1 or 2 slots would be mighty fine but I don't think we're there quite yet.
 
The high-end Mac mini may be rebranded as “Mac Studio” according to a new rumor. This would make sense as they could shrink down the current mini design for M2, M3, M4 (so it’s the size of the raspberry pi) but then offer a larger, unconstrained Mac for those that don’t care about size and want more power instead. Then they’d sell the Mac Pro for those that want the absolute best performance.

Mac mini - M1, M2, M3
Mac studio - M1 Max, M2 Max, M3 Max
Mac Pro - M1 Ultra, M2 Ultra, M3 ultra

(For simplicity I’m only showing the top-tier chip)


Huh, first I heard of "Mac Studio" was this thread, where the OP is acting as if they have an inside track on info for this new product...

Naturally I dismissed it as malarkey, but now I see there is an actual rumor published by 9to5 Mac...

Interesting, especially when tied to the Apple Studio Display rumor; Mac Studio, Apple Studio Display...

Maybe Phil Collins will show up at the event singing Sussudio...?!? ;^p
 
  • Like
Reactions: Jorbanead
I like the sound of this. Give us 4 full fat TB4 ports so eGPU/PCIe box can still be used for expandability (except obviously GPUs or anything that use old kext). A mini tower with 1 or 2 slots would be mighty fine but I don't think we're there quite yet.
I’m not sold on the name, but yep it sounds promising. Its nice to see them consider a middle tier desktop that isn’t an AIO. I’d like to see how they’ll address RAM as unified memory is not going to work all the way up the stack. We might start getting hints soon.

I can’t see the 2x max processor appearing here, but there was a rumour of a higher core max. I found that a strange idea as typically the cores are due to faults/binning but the lithography would need to be different. Although maybe a desktop class of chip is inbound, so maybe we’ll see a new letter.

Now the interesting bit will be is if the Mac Studio is what we’ve been calling the Mac mini pro, in which case we may only have a few days to wait. Unfortunately I’m not sure I’m going to be able to order straight away now so I suspect I’ll be receiving it around WWDC at this rate 🤨. Then again when ww3 seems likely, maybe I’ll just suck up the debt for a few months
 
Last edited:
I hope this Studio Mac kills off the iMac. How I despise that machine.
Wait why? You don’t have to buy an iMac if you don’t like it…
I can’t see the 2x max processor appearing here, but there was a rumour of a higher core max.
If they’re designing this as a more Pro-focused Mac as it seems, a 1X and 2X Max chip config seems highly possible.
 
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.