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Apple's Mac Mini Is Now Three Years Old, No Refresh Date in Sight

dingo_bat 9y ago
Aren't there hundreds of small form factor PCs available now? Just get them. It's a commodity market. Apple is unwilling/incapable of competing on such low margin boxes.
firemancoder 9y ago
I think the article covers it pretty well, I don't have much hope for a refresh, and I didn't buy the last one. Still using a 2012 MM that runs superb. Was waiting for an upgrade, then saw the processor and passed on it. I would love to see a new MM with a real CPU in it, and the two drive option. Will likely never happen, but at least Intel is getting into the smaller form factor market with the NUC.
- jagger27 9y ago
  If you really like macOS, the Hackintosh route is keeping quite stable these days. The NUCs have such generic hardware that there is practically no .kext fiddling and with the Clover bootloader any adjustments that need to happen are a breeze. Up until recently graphics issues with my Radeon cards kept me from using macOS full-time on my rig, needing major backflips to get acceleration and full resolution support working reliably. Now it's just a zero-config .kext drop in, whereas the common suggestion was just to get an Nvidia GPU or live with the on-board graphics. Even better is the recent work to support AMD CPUs. Dev interest in getting them supported fell off quite a bit since the Leopard and Snow Leopard days but it's seeing a strong resurgence now. Just to put things in a more perspective, though I have a few years of effort put into understanding what goes into Hackintoshing my latest effort in getting High Sierra working on an APFS drive took less than an hour overall. Whereas before, it was a weekend job. Better still, if you're in the market to buy new, the common build guides are bullet-proof. Basically anything from Intel (like Ethernet controllers) works without any issues and has for some time. Most hardware that looks something like an iMac or Mac Pro will be reliable and trouble-free, especially if you hang back a dot release or two.
walterbell 9y ago
Apple should create a “Mac Mini Retro”, an update of the 2012 Mac Mini.
- convolvatron 9y ago
  the 2008 minis would still be perfectly useful machines if they still got browser upgrades, or better yet OS upgrades
  - SyneRyder 9y ago
    They'll probably run Windows 10. I've got a couple of 2006/2007 MacBooks that I ended up installing Windows 10 on, since Apple long ago stopped making OS updates for them. (One was stuck on Snow Leopard, but still runs Win 10 fairly well, especially any Win32 apps.)
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
pippy 9y ago
The lack of effort on the Mini line demonstrates Apples focus on profit over its customers. Boosting desktop market share, gaining new customers, while still operating a profit are all worthwhile focusing on. Given they're all long term goals, it's well worth while investing in. I'm disheartened with what Apple did with the Mini line up. I love the form factor.
joshmn 9y ago
Hackintosh Minis have never been more popular. For those who are weary: I've made my Hackintosh Pro a daily-driver for the last 3 years without issue. i7/4770k/32GB/Gigabyte mobo/1070/1TB SSD. Even seamlessly upgraded from 10.9 to 10.10 to 10.11 just like you would any other Mac. Happy to answer any questions.
- ac29 9y ago
  It's not too hard to pirate Windows either. That doesn't make it a viable option for individuals, or, especially, businesses who don't want to engage in copyright infringement. If you make your living even in part by using a Hackintosh, that is, at best, hypocritical.
  - joshmn 9y ago
    I have a trashcan pro that sits and collects dust (I paid more than $3k for it). Then I needed to upgrade the video card and was left SOL. My Hackintosh Pro is simply my "backup". I don't feel the need to further justify my decision, but I've supported Apple for a very long time. I'm simply one of the many buyers who they've seem to leave behind.
    - Recurecur 9y ago
      "I'm simply one of the many buyers who they've seem to leave behind." Exactly. It's fairly mindboggling that a company with Apple's resources isn't doing a better job at producing a sufficient lineup of machines. Minis with CPUs up to quad core i7s would be great. Apple also ought to introduce a mini-tower with (gasp) upgradable components. That is in fact the "greenest" type of computer, as it won't be recycled for much longer. Apple could then, once again, legitimately claim to offer some of the most powerful consumer systems - something it's a long way from at the moment. Finally, Apple should offer a true "pro" laptop with a Xeon processor, lots of ECC RAM, and a choice of "pro" graphics chips. HP, Dell, and Lenovo all do. Apple is the last company left with a viable commercial Unix. It needs to offer powerful machines!
- jmnicolas 9y ago
newscracker 9y ago
Apple has really dropped the ball on the Mac mini (and also the Mac Pro, though that got some attention in some official interviews). It's a shame that the company, even with so much money, is unable to segregate work among different teams and get things done. Since a Mac is a required machine for iOS/tvOS/watchOS development, pushing out new MacBook after MacBook and pushing out new iMacs once in a while just isn't enough. The Mac mini is a really great machine by itself, and the older models that were also easily upgradeable on RAM and secondary storage were fantastic (the Intel CPU based models can still run Linux if they do not have official support for the latest or recent versions OS X or macOS).

Aren't there hundreds of small form factor PCs available now? Just get them. It's a commodity market. Apple is unwilling/incapable of competing on such low margin boxes.

firemancoder 9y ago

I think the article covers it pretty well, I don't have much hope for a refresh, and I didn't buy the last one. Still using a 2012 MM that runs superb. Was waiting for an upgrade, then saw the processor and passed on it. I would love to see a new MM with a real CPU in it, and the two drive option. Will likely never happen, but at least Intel is getting into the smaller form factor market with the NUC.

jagger27 9y ago
If you really like macOS, the Hackintosh route is keeping quite stable these days. The NUCs have such generic hardware that there is practically no .kext fiddling and with the Clover bootloader any adjustments that need to happen are a breeze. Up until recently graphics issues with my Radeon cards kept me from using macOS full-time on my rig, needing major backflips to get acceleration and full resolution support working reliably. Now it's just a zero-config .kext drop in, whereas the common suggestion was just to get an Nvidia GPU or live with the on-board graphics. Even better is the recent work to support AMD CPUs. Dev interest in getting them supported fell off quite a bit since the Leopard and Snow Leopard days but it's seeing a strong resurgence now. Just to put things in a more perspective, though I have a few years of effort put into understanding what goes into Hackintoshing my latest effort in getting High Sierra working on an APFS drive took less than an hour overall. Whereas before, it was a weekend job. Better still, if you're in the market to buy new, the common build guides are bullet-proof. Basically anything from Intel (like Ethernet controllers) works without any issues and has for some time. Most hardware that looks something like an iMac or Mac Pro will be reliable and trouble-free, especially if you hang back a dot release or two.

walterbell 9y ago

Apple should create a “Mac Mini Retro”, an update of the 2012 Mac Mini.

convolvatron 9y ago
the 2008 minis would still be perfectly useful machines if they still got browser upgrades, or better yet OS upgrades
- SyneRyder 9y ago
  They'll probably run Windows 10. I've got a couple of 2006/2007 MacBooks that I ended up installing Windows 10 on, since Apple long ago stopped making OS updates for them. (One was stuck on Snow Leopard, but still runs Win 10 fairly well, especially any Win32 apps.)

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

pippy 9y ago

The lack of effort on the Mini line demonstrates Apples focus on profit over its customers. Boosting desktop market share, gaining new customers, while still operating a profit are all worthwhile focusing on. Given they're all long term goals, it's well worth while investing in. I'm disheartened with what Apple did with the Mini line up. I love the form factor.

joshmn 9y ago

Hackintosh Minis have never been more popular. For those who are weary: I've made my Hackintosh Pro a daily-driver for the last 3 years without issue. i7/4770k/32GB/Gigabyte mobo/1070/1TB SSD. Even seamlessly upgraded from 10.9 to 10.10 to 10.11 just like you would any other Mac. Happy to answer any questions.

ac29 9y ago
It's not too hard to pirate Windows either. That doesn't make it a viable option for individuals, or, especially, businesses who don't want to engage in copyright infringement. If you make your living even in part by using a Hackintosh, that is, at best, hypocritical.
- joshmn 9y ago
  I have a trashcan pro that sits and collects dust (I paid more than $3k for it). Then I needed to upgrade the video card and was left SOL. My Hackintosh Pro is simply my "backup". I don't feel the need to further justify my decision, but I've supported Apple for a very long time. I'm simply one of the many buyers who they've seem to leave behind.
  - Recurecur 9y ago
    "I'm simply one of the many buyers who they've seem to leave behind." Exactly. It's fairly mindboggling that a company with Apple's resources isn't doing a better job at producing a sufficient lineup of machines. Minis with CPUs up to quad core i7s would be great. Apple also ought to introduce a mini-tower with (gasp) upgradable components. That is in fact the "greenest" type of computer, as it won't be recycled for much longer. Apple could then, once again, legitimately claim to offer some of the most powerful consumer systems - something it's a long way from at the moment. Finally, Apple should offer a true "pro" laptop with a Xeon processor, lots of ECC RAM, and a choice of "pro" graphics chips. HP, Dell, and Lenovo all do. Apple is the last company left with a viable commercial Unix. It needs to offer powerful machines!
jmnicolas 9y ago

newscracker 9y ago

Apple has really dropped the ball on the Mac mini (and also the Mac Pro, though that got some attention in some official interviews). It's a shame that the company, even with so much money, is unable to segregate work among different teams and get things done. Since a Mac is a required machine for iOS/tvOS/watchOS development, pushing out new MacBook after MacBook and pushing out new iMacs once in a while just isn't enough. The Mac mini is a really great machine by itself, and the older models that were also easily upgradeable on RAM and secondary storage were fantastic (the Intel CPU based models can still run Linux if they do not have official support for the latest or recent versions OS X or macOS).