Would a base 2012 Mini even be be noticeably faster then base 2011?

[dvdchance]

I'm not too impressed with this update.

I saw in the Mac Mini Vault review that the base 2012 got a Geekbench of 7433 vs 6583 with the 2011. But that was 4gb RAM vs 2gb in the 2011. If you evened out the memory, or say put in 8gb in both like I have in my 2011, I'm wondering just how big a difference it would be?

As someone who uses my Mini basically as a general purpose PC and also as a Plex server, I'm not seeing anything that really would make me want to pull the trigger on an update.

Am I missing something tangible here or is my thinking correct?

 

[Kryptik.Kode]

I'm not too impressed with this update.

I saw in the Mac Mini Vault review that the base 2012 got a Geekbench of 7433 vs 6583 with the 2011. But that was 4gb RAM vs 2gb in the 2011. If you evened out the memory, or say put in 8gb in both like I have in my 2011, I'm wondering just how big a difference it would be?

As someone who uses my Mini basically as a general purpose PC and also as a Plex server, I'm not seeing anything that really would make me want to pull the trigger on an update.

Am I missing something tangible here or is my thinking correct?

For a general purpose computer / Plex server, you won't notice much difference. The biggest difference would be if you store your media on USB3 external drives. The transfer speed would be significant. Everything else is marginal.

 

[fa8362]

I'm not too impressed with this update.

I saw in the Mac Mini Vault review that the base 2012 got a Geekbench of 7433 vs 6583 with the 2011. But that was 4gb RAM vs 2gb in the 2011. If you evened out the memory, or say put in 8gb in both like I have in my 2011, I'm wondering just how big a difference it would be?

As someone who uses my Mini basically as a general purpose PC and also as a Plex server, I'm not seeing anything that really would make me want to pull the trigger on an update.

Am I missing something tangible here or is my thinking correct?

The base 2011 didn't score a 6583. You're looking at the mid-level 2011 results.

 

[philipma1957]

the mid level 2012 quad for 799 is good.

other then that the other 2012 minis are nothing special.

when the midlevel goes to other stores buying it for 725 to 750 will be doable.

it is a powerful machine for cpu work.

my biggest disappointment was not the lack of a discrete gpu. the lack of a second t-bolt port was disappointing .

 

[santos79]

I was considering buying one until I saw that they crippled the base version with an old-fashion HDD. Had they offered a 128GB as an alternative it would have been a great deal. But they obviously want you to buy the more expensive one.

 

[Omnius]

I was considering buying one until I saw that they crippled the base version with an old-fashion HDD. Had they offered a 128GB as an alternative it would have been a great deal. But they obviously want you to buy the more expensive one.

doesn't take more than a few minutes to do it yourself...

 

[dvdchance]

The base 2011 didn't score a 6583. You're looking at the mid-level 2011 results.

I'm not doubting you, but thats the numbers given in the Mac Mini Vault review.

http://www.macminivault.com/2012mini/

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the mid level 2012 quad for 799 is good.

other then that the other 2012 minis are nothing special.

when the midlevel goes to other stores buying it for 725 to 750 will be doable.

it is a powerful machine for cpu work.

my biggest disappointment was not the lack of a discrete gpu. the lack of a second t-bolt port was disappointing .

I totally agree. I was hoping to have a second t-bolt port, then get one of the portable Seagate adapters and a nice SSD. I have the one port used with the Seagate desk adapter then my monitor ends the chain.

 

[fa8362]

I'm not doubting you, but thats the numbers given in the Mac Mini Vault review.

http://www.macminivault.com/2012mini/

Okay, I take it back. I was looking at the default 32 bit page on primate labs site. 64 bit score for the base 2011 was 6428.

So, a 16% improvement. As you stated, not worth upgrading for. I doubt Haswell will be worth upgrading for you either because that's only expected to be 20-25% improvement. You're probably looking at 2015 for a significant change.

 

[dvdchance]

Okay, I take it back. I was looking at the default 32 bit page on primate labs site. 64 bit score for the base 2011 was 6428.

So, a 16% improvement. As you stated, not worth upgrading for. I doubt Haswell will be worth upgrading for you either because that's only expected to be 20-25% improvement. You're probably looking at 2015 for a significant change.

I'm not that knowledgable about the geekbench criteria, but would the 2011 score be higher still with an equal amount of RAM?

 

[santos79]

doesn't take more than a few minutes to do it yourself...

I'll wait for the ifixit teardown before I believe that. They might have changed something compared with the 2011 version. Also - won't ripping out the HDD void the warranty?

 

[fa8362]

I'm not that knowledgable about the geekbench criteria, but would the 2011 score be higher still with an equal amount of RAM?

If it ran out of RAM and had to use the hard drive as a substitute during any part of the test, yes. Otherwise, not.

 

[Omnius]

I'll wait for the ifixit teardown before I believe that. They might have changed something compared with the 2011 version. Also - won't ripping out the HDD void the warranty?

There are already teardowns online. The internals are extremely similar to the 2011 internals. The primary difference is the location of the antennas.

 

[fig]

I'll wait for the ifixit teardown before I believe that. They might have changed something compared with the 2011 version. Also - won't ripping out the HDD void the warranty?

I've heard conflicting things on the warranty, curious myself. A poster in another thread has stated that it does not but haven't confirmed it.

 

[rshock]

Looking at the user posted Geekbench scores, that 6583 appears to be for a 2011 Mac Mini with more than 2Gb of RAM. The 2011 2.3Hz Mini posted scores with 8Gb RAM are all around 6600. The 2011 2.3Ghz Mini posted scores with 2Gb RAM are all closer to 6000.
(http://browser.primatelabs.com/geekbench2/search?utf8=✓&q=2011+mac+mini)

If the 7400 score is accurate for a 2012 2.5Ghz Mini with 4Gb, that's a pretty good bump, even over the 8Gb configuration (at least 12%). Plus, I believe Geekbench focuses on CPU and Memory performance. So this doesn't reflect the 70% increase in GPU performance of going from a HD3000 to HD4000.

Would I sell my 2011 Mac Mini with 8Gb to upgrade to the 2012? Maybe not. But I'm awful glad I waited a couple weeks and got the upgraded CPU and GPU for the same price I would have last month.