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The new Mac mini is almost certainly coming

EugW

EugW

macrumors Pentium
Jun 18, 2017
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CWallace said:
With every month, I more firmly believe it is the replacement for the iMac 5K (doubly so when paired with the Apple Studio Display).

The base Studio will probably be where I end up (hopefully paired with a 27" Pro Display XDR) when it comes time to replace my 2020 iMac 5K in a few years.
Click to expand...
I just picked up a 3840x2560 (3:2) Huawei MateView 28.2", and I'm pleasantly surprised. It's sleek and behaves well over USB-C with the M1 Mac mini. At 164 ppi, its text is actually very decent. IMO, from a price perspective, this is a better mate to the Mac mini than the Apple Studio Display, even if the Huawei Mateview doesn't have perfect 2X scaling. The ASD just costs too much for the Mac mini's price tier IMO. The ASD seems better matched to the Mac Studio, price-wise. It's interesting that you can run a Pro Display XDR off the Mac mini though.

67935_7e37a60d-70d.jpg


I'm running the MateView at a scaled 2304x1536, which gives me font sizes similar to the 30" Apple Cinema Display I was using before, but at the higher 164 ppi pixel density, which is supposedly "Retina" at about 21" viewing distance. The 30" ACD is 101 ppi, and 2304x1536 on a 28.2" screen would correspond to 98 ppi.

For some strange reason, my 5K iMac doesn't offer me a scaled resolution of 2304x1296. It jumps from 2560x1440 (native) to 2048x1152 with nothing in-between.

EugW said:
M1 Mac mini is a disaster for monitor support, but a lot of you knew that already. For text quality:

30" 2560x1600 at 2560x1600 - 101 ppi is OK. Not great but acceptable text.
32" 2560x1440 at 2560x1440 - 92 ppi text is blurry and pixelated.
32" 3480x2160 at 2560x1440 - 138 ppi is decent, but text looks a bit soft.
32" 3480x2160 at 2560x1440 - 138 ppi with font smoothing off looks crisper, but some fonts are too thin looking.
32" 3480x2160 at 3008x1692 - 138 ppi is OK but Windows VPN text quality is noticeably worse.
27" 5120x2880 at 2560x1440 - 218 ppi looks great, but the default font sizes are smaller than my preference.

I'd like to see a 5K 30" at 5120x2880 - 196 ppi, or 6K 32" at 6016x2880 - 202 ppi. Text would be excellent.
120 Hz at that high a resolution would probably take an M3 or M4, but 120 Hz isn't mission critical.
Click to expand...
 
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F

Freida

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Oct 22, 2010
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I think if Apple releases this 27" Display XDR version and at the same time reduce the price of the current ASD then they might have more customers overall.
The ASD is just way too expensive for what it offers (especially if you get the stand) so reducing the price would make more sense overall.
Have 3 displays: lite, prosumers and pro
27 ASD
27 ASD XDR version
32 PRO XDR (7-8k resolution)

Pricing maybe:
1) $1399 (+$200 for stand)
2) $2699 (stand included)
3) $4999 (stand included)

As for Mini, I feel if they can price the M2 Pro well it will be a big hit. Standard M2 is not good enough for a lot of people but Studio is overkill so there is clearly a gap inbetween.
 
Boil

Boil

macrumors 68040
Oct 23, 2018
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Stargate Command
Freida said:
I think if Apple releases this 27" Display XDR version and at the same time reduce the price of the current ASD then they might have more customers overall.
The ASD is just way too expensive for what it offers (especially if you get the stand) so reducing the price would make more sense overall.
Have 3 displays: lite, prosumers and pro
27 ASD
27 ASD XDR version
32 PRO XDR (7-8k resolution)

Pricing maybe:
1) $1399 (+$200 for stand)
2) $2699 (stand included)
3) $4999 (stand included)

As for Mini, I feel if they can price the M2 Pro well it will be a big hit. Standard M2 is not good enough for a lot of people but Studio is overkill so there is clearly a gap inbetween.
Click to expand...

The Apple Studio Display includes a stand, no extra charge...

Now, the height-adjustable stand, that is the one that adds to the cost of the ASD...

For the cost, Apple should have made a variant of the Pro Display XDR stand for the ASD as standard, thereby giving tilt / height / rotation abilities to the ASD...
 
opeter

opeter

macrumors 68030
Aug 5, 2007
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Here, where I live, the stores, that sell Apple producst, don't have the Mac mini with Intel CPU in their sales programme. You cannot order/buy these anymore. Only the standard M1 Mac mini. And BTO options. But for the later, the waiting can be more months. Not to speak of prices.
 
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jtdx99

jtdx99

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Aug 28, 2021
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So do we think the March event will update the base Mac mini or just the higher end mini? I'm looking to get one just with upgraded RAM to 16GB, not urgent but I can wait a few months.
 
EugW

EugW

macrumors Pentium
Jun 18, 2017
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jtdx99 said:
So do we think the March event will update the base Mac mini or just the higher end mini? I'm looking to get one just with upgraded RAM to 16GB, not urgent but I can wait a few months.
Click to expand...
I think they will update the base mini with M2 plus a 24 GB option, but not the higher end mini. That "higher end" Intel mini will likely be discontinued sometime in 2023, and it will get replaced by nothing. So, by late 2023 I see the product mix to be M2 Mac mini and M2 Max/Ultra Mac Studio.
 
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sublunar

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Jun 23, 2007
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EugW said:
I think they will update the base mini with M2 plus a 24 GB option, but not the higher end mini. That "higher end" Intel mini will likely be discontinued sometime in 2023, and it will get replaced by nothing. So, by late 2023 I see the product mix to be M2 Mac mini and M2 Max/Ultra Mac Studio.
Click to expand...
Just to update/reiterate my own theory on this, I think the upper SKU Mac mini (retailing for $1099, higher than the $699 and $899 price points on the current M1 mini) may well get discontinued or allowed to limp on while stocks last as long as Apple think there's a good reason to keep it going despite potentially having to keep macOS supported for it while it's an active product.

Apple could at any point raise prices around the world for the Mac mini M1 with no plans to replace it due to foreign exchange rates and inflationary pressures. If they do so, it could have the effect of raising the price of Apple's cheapest Mac.

But now we have couple of examples of Apple addressing the issue:

Firstly, their cheapest iPads. They still sell the 9th generation iPad after releasing the 10th generation at a higher price (but with extra features like bigger screen, USB-C, moved the FaceTime camera, and added the smart connector), and the 9th gen continues (I believe at the old price).

A second example is the M2 MacBook Air which has bigger better screen, better webcam, but is priced higher while the M1 MacBook Air continues at the old price point.

The counter example is the M2 MacBook Pro which has had nothing improved on it except for the SoC but in the US has retained the same price.

So with all this in mind what could Apple do with an M2 mini to make it fit a $1099 SKU (for American users as well as European)?

They can't exactly give it a bigger screen or a better webcam. The chipset offers the potential to choose between 8 and 10 GPU cores but Apple chose not to increase the price on the M2 MacBook Pro which has the 10 core GPU whereas they added £100 to the price in the UK (maybe 100 Euros in the rest of Europe?).

Looks an awful lot like the logical choice is to replace M1 with M2 with no further changes but we all know this probably triggers an FX related price uplift.

The only way out of this in my opinion would be to release a 10 GPU core Mini as the upper SKU replacement for $1099 and it would start with 16Gb RAM and 512Gb SSD.

The M1 models would remain at their old prices with 8/256 and 8/512 SKUs.
 
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EugW

EugW

macrumors Pentium
Jun 18, 2017
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12,968
sublunar said:
So with all this in mind what could Apple do with an M2 mini to make it fit a $1099 SKU (for American users as well as European)?

They can't exactly give it a bigger screen or a better webcam. The chipset offers the potential to choose between 8 and 10 GPU cores but Apple chose not to increase the price on the M2 MacBook Pro which has the 10 core GPU whereas they added £100 to the price in the UK (maybe 100 Euros in the rest of Europe?).
Click to expand...
One thing I've been thinking about is that compared to the US, there is a small compression of the price range here in Canada.

US pricing

$699 - M1 Mac mini 8/256
$899 - M1 Mac mini 16/256
$899 - M1 Mac mini 8/512
$1099 - M1 Mac mini 16/512

$1099 - Core i5 Mac mini 8/512
$1299 - Core i5 Mac mini 16/512
$1299 - Core i7 Mac mini 8/512
$1499 - Core i7 Mac mini 16/512

$1999 - M1 Max Mac Studio 32/512

Canadian pricing

$899 (US$655) - M1 Mac mini 8/256
$1149 (US$837) - M1 Mac mini 16/256
$1149 (US$837) - M1 Mac mini 8/512
$1399 (US$1019) - M1 Mac mini 16/512

$1399 (US$1019) - Core i5 Mac mini 8/512
$1649 (US$1201) - Core i5 Mac mini 16/512
$1659 (US$1209) - Core i7 Mac mini 8/512
$1909 (US$1391) - Core i7 Mac mini 16/512

$2499 (US$1821) - M1 Max Mac Studio 32/512

So at the low end of the spectrum, the M1 Mac mini 8/256 is 6% cheaper in Canada than in the US.
However, at the high end of the spectrum, the M1 Max Mac Studio is 9% cheaper in Canada than in the US.

I'm not sure why they priced it this way, but I've noticed this in the past with other products too. At the low end you pay the same or more in Canada, but at the high end it's sometimes cheaper in Canada, or else there's less of a price premium in Canada vs. the low end. Not sure but maybe it's because the average income per capita in Canada is lower than in the US.

I'll admit that the difference between 6% and 9% isn't huge, but once you start including a 24 GB option for the M2 Mac mini, there is much less room to manoeuvre below the price of the Mac Studio, so from a marketing point of view, it makes sense to just delete the "high end" tier of the Mac mini altogether and replace it with nothing (as others have suggested in the past in this thread). Basically, that "high end" gets replaced with the 24 GB option. Or, as you suggest, they could have 8 GPU core vs. 10 GPU core models, but somehow I don't think they're going to that.

BTW, with these cheaper prices in Canada, I could see them raising prices of course, but I still think they still may maintain that small price range compression vs. the US pricing.

Anyhow, I'm happy I paid CA$1099 for that used M1 Mac mini 16/1TB I'm typing on right now. That's just a shade over US$800. :) 16 GB appears to be sufficient for my needs for now, so unless something surprising comes with the M2 Mac mini, I'm staying put with the M1 for the foreseeable future.
 
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