[HN Gopher] New Mac Mini with M4
___________________________________________________________________
New Mac Mini with M4
Author : victorbjorklund
Score : 403 points
Date : 2024-10-29 15:00 UTC (8 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.apple.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.apple.com)
| alberth wrote:
| Does anyone know how many P vs E cores? 10 core =
| 4 P and 6 E 12 core = 8 P and 4 E <-- 2.0x P core over
| base 14 core = 10 P and 4 E <-- 2.5x P core over base
|
| EDIT:
|
| Updated with known P and E amounts.
|
| Thanks HN for posting below.
|
| https://www.apple.com/mac-mini/specs/
|
| https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2024/10/apples-new-mac-mini-i...
| WesleyLivesay wrote:
| Spec page: https://www.apple.com/mac-mini/specs/
| alberth wrote:
| No M4 on the spec sheet.
|
| Maybe Apples CDN cache is stale but I only see M2 specs on
| that page.
| r2_pilot wrote:
| Force refresh on your end as I see the M4 specs.
| wongarsu wrote:
| definitely a stale cache somewhere, shows M4 specs for me
| too
| wongarsu wrote:
| So 4P+6E for the M4, and 8P+4E for the M4 Pro
| scrlk wrote:
| M4 10-core = 4P, 6E
|
| M4 Pro 12-core = 8P, 4E
|
| M4 Pro 14-core = 10P, 4E
| alberth wrote:
| Where do you see the 14-core version detailed on the spec
| sheet?
|
| I don't see it stated with the specific P vs E cores are for
| the 14-core version on:
|
| https://www.apple.com/mac-mini/specs/
| scrlk wrote:
| From the press release:
| https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2024/10/apples-new-mac-
| mini-i...
|
| > With up to 14 cores, including 10 performance cores and
| four efficiency cores
|
| They've backtracked from the M3 Pro P:E ratio downgrade,
| which is a welcome surprise.
| korhojoa wrote:
| 10 = 4P 6E 12 = 8P 4E 14 doesn't seem to be listed at the
| moment
| kissiel wrote:
| M4 pro comes with Thunderbolt 5, which means one cable to run 2x
| 2160p120. And in case of macbooks equipped with TB5, one cable to
| do 2x high res, high refresh displays + power + plenty of
| bandwdith for data accessories. Omnomnom.
| chaostheory wrote:
| Are they shrinking minis for future versions of Apple Vision or
| would an iPhone be enough?
| sureIy wrote:
| I'm seeing 3200 points for iPhone 16 Pro single core and 3800
| for an M4 Mac. That's only about a 18% difference. I don't
| think a cabled desktop computer is the right choice for this
| endeavor anyway.
| jsheard wrote:
| 16GB base RAM across the board, following the iMac. AI is
| certainly good for pushing up the baseline RAM that manufacturers
| can get away with shipping if nothing else.
| mentos wrote:
| No mention of the SSD size that was the reason I returned my
| Mac mini 256Gb last year was just a pain juggling files
| nordsieck wrote:
| > No mention of the SSD size
|
| The base model is 256 gb. You can see it here:
|
| https://www.apple.com/shop/buy-mac/mac-mini
| wongarsu wrote:
| Base model is 256GB configurable up to 2TB, all others start
| at 512GB, the M4 Pro model can go up to 8TB
| rtkwe wrote:
| It's $800 to go up to 2TB from the 256GB model which is
| just criminally over priced. I can get double that for half
| the price with a Gen 4 NVMe drive. Weirdly the 8TB drive on
| the Pro is at least in line with the top of the line 8TB
| NVMe SSDs you can buy though there are cheaper options at
| about $600 vs the $1200 Apple is charging.
| wongarsu wrote:
| That's regular Apple pricing for you. Great deals on the
| baseline models, but insane margins on the upgrades that
| make them usable. And of course the ability to upgrade
| the devices yourself has been phased out in the name of
| performance and power efficiency
| Y_Y wrote:
| in the name of [share price] performance and [market]
| power efficiency
| pantulis wrote:
| Edit: sorry, answered to the wrong post.
| wtallis wrote:
| I just checked some Dell prices: $730 to upgrade an XPS
| desktop from 512GB to 4TB (Apple charges $1200), or $508
| to upgrade an Optiplex tower from 256GB to 2TB QLC, or
| $654 to upgrade it from 256GB to 2TB TLC (Apple charges
| $800). Scalping on upgrade pricing is something _all_ the
| PC OEMs do.
| jsheard wrote:
| Yeah, but the 5 minute job of installing a cheap retail
| SSD in that Dell machine yourself is still an option
| which Apple has removed from all but the Mac Pro, which
| offsets any SSD savings by being $3000 more expensive
| than an equivalently specced Mac Studio.
| wtallis wrote:
| Right. The repairability argument is the reasonable
| discussion to have. The silly pricing games are more of a
| red herring.
| rtkwe wrote:
| I think it's more relevant with Apple because they've
| removed all the competition for basically all upgrades to
| their devices by either soldering things to the board or
| bundling them into their SOC. When there's no alternative
| their prices become the only option.
| jsheard wrote:
| The Mac Studio technically still has socketed SSDs, which
| presumably cuts costs by not having to manage a separate
| motherboard SKU for every SSD capacity, but they went out
| of their way to design a proprietary SSD module format
| rather than just using the standard...
| rtkwe wrote:
| Kind of, they were socketed NAND cards and the controller
| lived on the mainboard, so as far as getting out of the
| problem of Apple entirely setting the prices for
| everything it's not relevant. As far as I'm finding no
| one managed to find a way to create a compatible card to
| create an avenue for DIY upgrades. I've found a few
| upgrades but they consist of buying an entire second Mac
| Studio to harvest the drive from.
| throwaway48476 wrote:
| Giles from Polysoft is manufacturing 3rd party mac studio
| nand cards. There is still a problem sourcing nand
| because apple doesn't let the owm sell to anyone but
| them.
| rtkwe wrote:
| I thought I had seen something about that but couldn't
| find the actual boards mentioned for sale. Sounds even
| worse though because it should be possible but Apple
| being Apple has ensured there's no source for Giles or
| other companies to perform repairs.
| throwaway48476 wrote:
| There's an industry in China for desoldering and reusing
| apple bands. Unfortunately getting new oem nands is going
| to take legislation.
| rtkwe wrote:
| Yes, though that relies on the product being fairly
| popular and for the chip to be stable for a while for it
| to be a useful source. Mac Studio NAND chips aren't going
| to be readily available from them unless they happen to
| be a shared part from a more popular device.
| throwaway48476 wrote:
| All macs use the same compatible nand chips.
| wtallis wrote:
| Is there any compatibility between generations, eg.
| harvesting NAND from a M1 generation machine to upgrade a
| M3 (or now M4) generation machine?
| wtallis wrote:
| I think repairable or not, the pricing to upgrade to the
| max config just isn't something a price-sensitive
| consumer should take seriously. Beyond one or two
| upgrades, you might as well pretend it says "call for
| quote" and just not consider 4+ TB as a realistic option
| to get from the OEM, because those prices are _trying_ to
| cause sticker shock. And that goes for any PC OEM--the
| price-gouged upgrades are so far beyond reasonable that
| it really doesn 't matter whose prices are the most silly
| or by exactly how many hundreds of dollars. What does
| matter is whether aftermarket upgrades and repairs are
| possible.
| rtkwe wrote:
| It matters that there are no after market options for
| Apple because it means the inflated OEM upgrade price is
| the ONLY price available for every given upgrade. It
| matters less with Dell/Asus/Lenovo etc. because that's
| not the only price available.
|
| The top of the line is also not where Apple is gouging
| the worst. It's in the middle tiers that are actually
| relevant to many more people. Most don't have a need for
| 4+ TB main drives but 1-2 TB is a size that's pretty easy
| to justify for a lot of people and Apple's price is the
| only option for them and they're absolutely lining their
| pockets with cash at the expense of anyone not going for
| the bargain bin basic tier that can't hold 2 modern
| games.
| wtallis wrote:
| By all means, complain about the cost to get a 1TB
| config, and put _that_ price in proper context. But it
| still doesn 't make much sense to focus on the $1200
| upgrades, or any of the other upgrades whose price rounds
| up to "lol, no".
| rtkwe wrote:
| The gouging is bad at all levels as well as the design
| effects on repairability and the issues with
| obsolescence. If you'll look way back though I
| acknowledged the $1200 is at least vaguely in line with
| the top of the line Sabrent 8tb NVMe of the same size.
| sangnoir wrote:
| "Repairability" is a red-herring when the discussion is
| about user-upgrades and the ability to purchase
| components from 3rd-party suppliers (who compete against
| each other and the OEM)
| dvfjsdhgfv wrote:
| Apple is getting at throwing this red herring.
| angoragoats wrote:
| At least on the storage side, Apple's parts are neither
| more performant nor all that much more power-efficient
| than a standard, replaceable SSD.
| matheusmoreira wrote:
| Apple's silicon is good but I don't see what's so special
| about all the other stuff. Looks like they just solder
| components to the motherboard instead of using industry
| standard interfaces.
| throwaway48476 wrote:
| *industry standard physical interfaces. The electrical
| interace is bog standard.
| throwaway48476 wrote:
| Phased out in the name of profit efficiency. Despite what
| marketing will tell you the SSD is industry standard NVMe
| and the RAM is standard LPDDR5.
| angoragoats wrote:
| > I can get double that for half the price with a Gen 4
| NVMe drive
|
| It's worse than that -- 4TB gen 4 drives can be had for
| well under $300, sometimes $225-250, and that's for
| buying a drive outright, not "trading up" from a 256GB
| device. I think it'd be more accurate to say that you can
| get double the capacity for a _quarter_ of the price.
| rtkwe wrote:
| I was ballparking it based on my recent buy of a Samsung
| 990 Pro 4TB and inflated the price a little in my head to
| closer to $400 than the $330 it actually was.
|
| I also, as a side note, try to give the loosest most
| favorable (to my opposite) comparison because when I err
| on my side it becomes a "well actually" debate a lot of
| the time about how it's "not quite X times as many it's
| more like X-1 (so I'm not even going to touch that X-1 is
| still quite bad)" that is really tedious and annoying
| especially when the favorable version of the comparison
| is still quite bad for their point/side.
| FireBeyond wrote:
| Very much so. When I bought my "cheesegrater" Mac Pro, I
| wanted 8TB of SSD.
|
| Except Apple wanted $3,000 for _7TB_ of SSD (considering
| the sticker price came with a baseline of 1TB).
|
| I bought a 4xM.2 card and 4x2TB Samsung Pro SSDs, cost me
| $1,300, I got to keep the 1TB "system" SSD, and was
| faster, at 6.8GBps versus the system drive at 5.5.
|
| Similar with memory. OWC literally sells the same memory
| as Apple (same manufacturer, same specifications. Apple
| also wanted $3,000 for 160GB of memory (going from 32 to
| 192). I paid $1,000.
| sib wrote:
| It's USD2,400 to upgrade the M4 Pro model from 512GB to
| 8TB, which feels a bit steep, but it's an option.
|
| Alternatively, you can get one of these[1] external Other
| World Computing NVME SSDs for USD1,190 right now. And then
| you can easily move all your files from your laptop to your
| desktop when you get home.
|
| [1] https://eshop.macsales.com/item/OWC/US4EXP1MT08/ (15%
| off list price as of writing)
| jillesvangurp wrote:
| You can get some decent size external usb SSDs. I have the
| Samsung T5 2TB. I think they have larger models now. Works
| pretty well. And with USB-C speeds are very usable. You can
| probably get faster/bigger stuff via thunderbolt.
|
| I'm considering getting one and a nice big monitor or TV.
| It needs to run x-plane 12 at decent speeds and maybe
| support a bit of light gaming. My macbook M1 pro is
| actually pretty decent for this but the screen is too small
| for me to easily read the instruments. I expect this will
| do better even in the base setup.
|
| Otherwise my needs are pretty modest. I'd love to see steam
| add some emulation support for these things as I have some
| older games that I enjoy playing. I currently play those on
| a crappy old intel laptop running linux. I've also been
| eyeing a new AMD mini PC with the latest amd stuff
| (Beelink's SER9).
|
| Seems pretty nice as well and seems like it is more
| performance for the money. Apple is doing its usual thing
| of charging you hundreds of euros for 50 euro upgrades. Get
| the base mac studio instead. It probably makes more sense
| if you are going down that path.
| msh wrote:
| The big problem is that there are lots of stuff that
| macOS won't let you move to a external drive, like iCloud
| Drive.
| selimnairb wrote:
| It's a desktop. Use an external disk. Much cheaper.
| jsheard wrote:
| It kind of undermines the sleek form factor if you need to
| have a clunky NVMe enclosure dangling off the back though.
| Even with this tiny new design I bet they could fit a hatch
| on the bottom with space for a 2230 M.2 drive, but they
| don't want to because that would let you upgrade to 2TB of
| fast internal storage for $200 instead of $800.
| nordsieck wrote:
| There are a number of companies that specialize in making
| hubs/NVMe enclosures that match the aesthetics of the Mac
| Mini and sit directly underneath it.
|
| For example: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08S47KBMC/
| awiesenhofer wrote:
| > clunky NVMe enclosure
|
| We really are living in the future if people are using
| these words in combination.
|
| Though compared to this new mini a lot will feel clunky.
| Any HDD enclosure is certainly larger.
| burnerthrow008 wrote:
| It's not the size of the NVMe enclosure that makes it
| clunky. It's that you now have an extra dongle hanging
| off the back of your Mac and cluttering up the desk.
|
| There is a reason for the popularity of those
| enclosure/hub combos that have the same footprint and
| color as the Mini.
| crest wrote:
| Until someone brings out little two or four drive NVMe
| enclosures that fits exactly under the Mac Mini with a
| Thunderbolt bridge/plug that doesn't snag cables, because
| we all know Apple can't resist gauging buyers by refusing
| to include two easy to access M.2 bays on the underside.
|
| I can't imagine anyone but Apple shareholders drooling at
| the taught of overpriced soldered memory would prefer a
| smaller Mac Mini case if ~0.5" more height would get you
| M.2 bays for storage.
| 93po wrote:
| these exist on amazon
| selimnairb wrote:
| You mean like this [1]? I would shocked if OWC didn't
| have a version of this for the new mini form factor in
| the works.
|
| [1] https://eshop.macsales.com/shop/external-drives/owc-
| ministac...
| kridsdale3 wrote:
| It even looks like the standard iconography for
| "Database"!
| walterbell wrote:
| With heat now venting downward, that would work better
| above the new Mac Mini.
| syndicatedjelly wrote:
| You might be interested in this then -
| https://satechi.net/collections/ssd-enclosures
|
| Upgrade your memory and connect it externally over USB-C. It
| works brilliantly
| mitjam wrote:
| Yes I have a Samsung T7 works like a charm.
| magnio wrote:
| Couldn't we just add extra drives into the extra internal SSD
| slots? Or does Mac Mini not have those?
| jsheard wrote:
| There are no slots, it's all soldered directly to the
| motherboard. Even in the Mac Studio, which does use modular
| SSDs, they're proprietary modules rather than anything you
| can easily swap out yourself.
| mathnmusic wrote:
| AFAIK, Apple took away those slots when Mac minis
| transitioned to Apple silicon. Attempts to replace SSD with
| re-soldering have not been successful.
| baq wrote:
| So not even milling off the ssd works now?
|
| Fortunately I don't really see the point of using a mac
| mini, so this doesn't bother me too much, but... it's
| poor taste. _You 're holding it wrong_ was not cool the
| first time.
| dagmx wrote:
| You can mill them off and replace them with supported
| nands. People have videos on YouTube but it's not very
| accessible to do.
|
| The issue is that Apple moved the storage controllers
| into their SOC. So they use raw nand chips, and you need
| to use ones that the SOC supports.
| GeekyBear wrote:
| You do have the option of a 10 gigabit Ethernet port, so you
| can build out a linux box for local shared storage with
| components as cheap as you're willing to trust.
| mmaunder wrote:
| That's useful. The TB3 external 10 gig interfaces I've been
| using for my Mac get crazy hot.
| kridsdale3 wrote:
| As someone who just made a 16tb SSD array over
| Thunderbolt 3 (Best I could find) at 40gbps and the
| interface is still the bottleneck (disks are fast now!),
| 10gbps is going to feel really really slow vs the
| internal stuff.
| TacticalCoder wrote:
| > ... 10gbps is going to feel really really slow vs the
| internal stuff
|
| How do you love your internet speed compared to the
| internal stuff?
| GeekyBear wrote:
| It's possible to build a faster non-shared array if you
| aren't price sensitive (Thunderbolt 5 is 80 gigabits a
| secind), but someone with multiple computers and devices
| gets much better bang for the buck from shared local
| network storage.
|
| As a bonus, you can back up your computers and iDevices
| to the shared local storage instead of paying for
| (probably much slower to access) cloud storage.
| lawlessone wrote:
| Unified memory too. It's your GPU and your ram.
| wing-_-nuts wrote:
| This is huge for AI / ML at least for inference. Apple chips
| are among the most efficient out there for that sort of
| thing, the only downside is the lack of cuda
| talldayo wrote:
| > Apple chips are among the most efficient out there for
| that sort of thing
|
| Not really? Apple is efficient because they ship moderately
| large GPUs manufactured on TSMC hardware. Their NPU
| hardware is more or less entirely ignored and their GPUs
| are using the same shader-based compute that Intel and AMD
| rely on. It's not efficient because Apple does anything
| different with their hardware like Nvidia does, it's
| efficient because they're simply using denser silicon than
| most opponents.
|
| Apple _does_ make efficient chips, but AI is so much of an
| afterthought that I wouldn 't consider them any more
| efficient than Intel or AMD.
| nextos wrote:
| For inference, Apple chips are great due to a high memory
| bandwidth. Mac Studio is a popular choice in the local
| Llama community for this particular reason. It's a cost
| effective option if you need a lot of memory plus a high
| bandwidth. The downside is poor training performance and
| Metal being a less polished software stack compared to
| CUDA.
|
| I wonder if a little cluster of Mac Minis is a good
| option for running concurrent LLM agents, or a single Mac
| Studio is still preferable?
| angoragoats wrote:
| The memory bandwidth on Apple silicon is only sometimes
| comparable to, and in many cases worse than, that of a
| GPU. For example, an nVidia RTX 4060 Ti 16GB GPU (not a
| high-end card by any means) has memory bandwidth of
| 288GiB/sec, which is more than double that of the M4 CPU.
|
| On the higher end, building a machine with 6 to 8 24GB
| GPUs such as RTX 3090s would be comparable in cost (as
| well as available memory) to a high-end Mac Studio, and
| would be at least an order of magnitude faster at
| inference. Yes, it's going to use an order of magnitude
| more power as well, but what you probably should care
| about here is W/token which is in the same ballpark.
|
| Apple silicon is a reasonable solution for inference only
| if you need the most amount of memory possible, you don't
| care about absolute performance, and you're unwilling to
| deal with a multi-GPU setup.
| Y-bar wrote:
| Note that they said the _Mac Studio_ which in the M2
| model has between 400GB/s and 800GB/s memory bandwidth.
|
| https://www.apple.com/mac-studio/specs/
|
| Edit: since my reply you have edited your comment to
| mention the Studio, but the fact remains that the M2 Max
| has at least ~40% greater bandwidth than the number you
| quoted as an example.
| angoragoats wrote:
| Yeah, sorry, I realized that as well so I edited my post
| to add a higher end example with multiple 3090s or
| similar cards. A single 3090 has just under 1TiB/sec of
| memory bandwidth.
|
| One more edit: I'd also like to point out that memory
| bandwidth is important, but not sufficient for fast
| inference. My entire point here is that Apple silicon
| does have high memory bandwidth for sure, but for
| inference it's very much held back by the relative
| slowness of the GPU compared with dedicated nVidia/AMD
| cards.
| int_19h wrote:
| It's still "fast enough" for even 120b models in
| practice, and you don't need to muck around with building
| a multi-GPU rig (and figuring out how to e.g. cool it
| properly).
|
| It's definitely not what you'd want for your data center,
| but for home tinkering it has a very clear niche.
| angoragoats wrote:
| > It's still "fast enough" for even 120b models in
| practice
|
| Is it? This is very subjective. The Mac Studio would not
| be "fast enough" for me on even a 70b model, not
| necessarily because its output is slow, but because the
| prompt evaluation speed is quite bad. See [0] for example
| numbers; on Llama 3 70B at Q4_K_M quantization, it takes
| an M2 Ultra with 192GB about 8.5 seconds just to evaluate
| a 1024-token prompt. A machine with 6 3090s (which would
| likely come in cheaper than the Mac Studio) is over 6
| times faster at prompt parsing.
|
| A 120b model is likely going to be something like 1.5-2x
| slower at prompt evaluation, rendering it pretty much
| unusable (again, for me).
|
| [0] https://github.com/XiongjieDai/GPU-Benchmarks-on-LLM-
| Inferen...
| nextos wrote:
| Exactly, the M2 Ultra is competitive for local inference
| use cases given the 800 GB/s bandwith and a relatively
| low cost and energy efficiency.
|
| The M4 Pro in the Mini has a bandwidth of 273 GB/s, which
| is probably less appealing. But I wonder how it'd compare
| cost-wise and performance-wise, with several Minis in a
| little cluster, each running a small LLM and exchanging
| messages. This could be interesting for a local agent
| architecture.
| angoragoats wrote:
| See my sibling reply below, but I disagree with your main
| point here. M2 Ultra is only competitive for very
| specific use cases, it does not really cost less than a
| much higher-performing setup, and if what you care about
| is true efficiency (meaning, W/token, or how much energy
| does the computer use to produce a given response), a
| multi-GPU setup and Mac Studios are on about equal
| footing.
| reissbaker wrote:
| For reference comparing to what the big companies use, an
| H100 has over 3TB/s bandwidth. A nice home lab might be
| built around 4090s -- two years old at this point --
| which have about 1TB/s.
|
| Apple's chips have the advantage of being able to be
| specced out with tons of RAM, but performance isn't going
| to be in the same ballpark of even fairly old Nvidia
| chips.
| cpuguy83 wrote:
| And yet the GPU costs about as much as the whole Mac Mini
| and wouldn't even come close to fitting inside one.
| angoragoats wrote:
| You're mostly correct, though a 4060Ti 16GB is 20-30%
| cheaper than the cheapest Mac Mini. More importantly
| though, "fits inside a Mac Mini" is not a criterion I'm
| using to evaluate whether a particular solution is
| suitable for LLM inference. If it is for you, that's
| fine, but we have vastly different priorities.
| alwayslikethis wrote:
| Does it use the GPU? I was under the impression that it
| uses the CPU. It's only faster because of the massive
| memory bandwidth compared to DDR4/5
| astrange wrote:
| The AI features use all three of NPU ("ANE"), GPU, CPU,
| mostly depending on model size.
|
| https://machinelearning.apple.com/research/neural-engine-
| tra...
| DrBenCarson wrote:
| Frankly you're very wrong. NPUs and GPUs aside, 16gb of
| GPU memory is very rare in consumer hardware
| astrange wrote:
| You can't use all 16GB because it's unified, so it's
| shared with the system, SSD controller etc. You can use
| something like 12-14GB though.
| DrBenCarson wrote:
| Sure, still incredibly rare in a $600 device
| angoragoats wrote:
| I'm not sure what you mean. RTX 4060 Ti/4070 Ti
| Super/3090/4090 cards can be easily purchased at any
| major electronics store in person or online and have 16GB
| or 24GB depending on model. Once you get up to 32GB, your
| point would stand, but 16-24GB GPUs are common.
| burnerthrow008 wrote:
| Lack of Cuda is not a problem if for most ML frameworks.
| For example, in PyTorch you just tell it to use the "mps"
| (metal performance shaders) device instead of the "cuda"
| device.
| xattt wrote:
| Cuda Apple license it from nVidia?
| rob74 wrote:
| Cude, er, cute, but... no.
| ojhughes wrote:
| I tried training some models using tensorflow-metal a
| year ago and I was quite disappointed. Using a relu
| activation function led to very poor accuracy [0] and
| training time was an order of magnitude slower than just
| using the free tier of Google Colab
|
| [0] https://github.com/keras-team/tf-keras/issues/140
| throwaway314155 wrote:
| That simply isn't true in practice. Maybe for inference,
| but even then you're running up against common CUDA
| kernels such as FlashAttention which will be far from
| plug and play with PyTorch.
| rowanG077 wrote:
| I consider that a plus. Maybe the AI community wil start to
| wake up and realize that going all in on cuda is
| ridiculously stupid.
| kridsdale3 wrote:
| Not if you're an NVDA shareholder!
| wing-_-nuts wrote:
| To be totally honest, there's enough money in the ML / AI
| / LLM space now that I fully expect some companies to put
| forward alternative cards specifically for that purpose.
| Why google does not sell their TPU to consumer and
| datacenter instead of just letting you rent is beyond me.
| whartung wrote:
| So, do you think that when the Mac Studio gets upgraded, it
| will also come with less max RAM, but be unified?
|
| Is the whole "unified" RAM a reason that the iMac and Mini
| are capped at 32G?
| transitorykris wrote:
| The Mac Studio has always had unified memory
| kridsdale3 wrote:
| All "Apple Silicon" products, going back to the first
| one, which was the iPhone 4.
| angoragoats wrote:
| Fun fact: any PC with integrated graphics has also had
| unified memory (yep, including Intel Macs), for at least
| the past decade!
| TiredOfLife wrote:
| Yeah the same tech pcs were using for 14+ years
|
| https://x.com/LinaAsahi/status/1820947147312820497
| acchow wrote:
| > I know ancient iGPUs had that thing for setting the GPU
| memory size in the BIOS, but that's aaaaaancient and
| completely obsolete. If you still have that, just set it to
| the minimum value. The rest of memory will be unified.
|
| I hadn't used a PC in so long, I still thought that bios
| setting decided the division. TIL.
|
| Lucky we have Asahi Lina to clarify the details.
| abhinavk wrote:
| It shows up as "Shared GPU memory" in Task Manager. What
| BIOS sets is the Dedicated i.e. reserved video memory in
| RAM.
|
| e.g. My Ryzen iGPU reserves 2GB/32GB for itself (which
| Windows can't see) via BIOS and use 9 more as shared
| "unified" memory.
| bitwize wrote:
| The on-chip RAM means that you can run models on the CPU that
| would require the GPU on a peecee.
| angoragoats wrote:
| The RAM is not on the chip. I need to get a tee shirt and a
| bumper sticker that says this.
| fulafel wrote:
| The reality distortion field is not dead, rebranding the iGPU
| like this even convincing the technical crowd has been a
| great marketing win for Apple.
| o_m wrote:
| Also the base ram for the pro chip is 24gb. I hope it will be
| the same for the MacBook Pro.
| jeffbee wrote:
| I have a feeling this could simply be an outcome of samsung not
| offering anything smaller.
| jsheard wrote:
| The M4 iPad Pro still starts at 8GB though, so Samsung is
| supplying them with lower capacity modules.
| alberth wrote:
| It's not just RAM.
|
| It's _Unified_ RAM. So that memory is also used for the GPU &
| Neural Cores (which is for Apple Intelligence).
|
| This is actually why companies moved away from the unified
| memory arch decades ago.
|
| It'll be interesting to see as AI continues to advance, if
| Apple is forced to depart from their unified memory
| architecture due to growing GPU memory needs.
| JKCalhoun wrote:
| At this point it feels like (correct me if I'm am wrong) that
| Apple's AI is often performed "in the cloud". I suspect
| though that if Apple moves increasingly to on-device AI (as I
| suspect they will -- if not for bandwidth and backend
| resource reasons then for privacy ones) Apple's Silicon will
| have adopted more and more specialized AI components --
| perhaps diminishing the need for use of off-board memory.
| Etheryte wrote:
| Last I checked, Apple was pretty much the only major player
| who does everything that they can do on device on device,
| that is their whole ethos behind it, no?
| aldarisbm wrote:
| Yeah they have literature about this, they do as much as
| they can on device
| bee_rider wrote:
| It is possible that they do everything they can on the
| decide, but still have to do lots in the cloud, right?
| For some definition of lots, at least...
| Etheryte wrote:
| I mean, there is no need to speculate about any of this,
| they've put out a number of articles that outline their
| whole approach. I'm not really sure where the ambiguity
| lies?
| throwaway48476 wrote:
| They have a new bug bountry program for their
| confidential compute platform... in the cloud.
| ErneX wrote:
| It's always local 1st and remote for certain things, and I
| think it warns your before going to the cloud IIRC.
| yodon wrote:
| >This is actually why companies moved away from the unified
| memory arch decades ago.
|
| I don't understand - wouldn't the OS be able to do a better
| job of dynamically allocating memory between say GPU and CPU
| in real time based on instantaneous need as opposed to the
| buyer doing it one time while purchasing their machine?
| Apparently not, but I'm not sure what I'm missing.
| burnerthrow008 wrote:
| I disagree that unified memory is a bad thing.
|
| The usual reasoning that people give for it being bad is:
| you share memory bandwidth between CPU and GPU, and many
| things are starved for memory access.
|
| Apple's approach is to stack the memory dies on top of the
| processor dies and connect them with a stupid-wide bus so
| that everything has enough bandwidth.
| runjake wrote:
| If it's the shift I think you're referring to, I find it
| strange that you compare computing decisions from the 50s and
| 60s to today. You're correct, but that was over half a
| century ago. The reasons for those decisions, such as bus
| speeds, high latency, and low bandwidth, no longer apply.
|
| Today, the industry is moving toward unified memory. This
| trend includes not only Apple but also Intel, AMD with their
| APUs, and Qualcomm. Pretty much everyone.
|
| To me, the benefits are clear:
|
| - Reduced copying of large amounts of data between memory
| pools.
|
| - Improved memory usage.
|
| - Generally lower power consumption.
| pohl wrote:
| Depart? They just got there, didn't they? And on purpose.
| There's more memory bandwidth, and also no need to copy from
| main memory to VRAM. Why would they bail on it?
| ErneX wrote:
| I think they moved away because system memory was lagging
| behind in speed to the memory being used on video cards?
|
| And besides, what Apple is doing is placing the RAM really
| close to the SoC, I think they are on the same package even,
| that was not the case on the PC either AFAIK?
| yunohn wrote:
| I learned yesterday that all M-chip Macs with enough RAM are
| getting Apple Intelligence?
|
| This basically proves that Apple shot themselves in the foot
| for AI on mobile by artificially restricting RAM for so long!
| Heck, even the Neural Engine has turned out to be basically
| useless despite all their grandstanding.
|
| So alas, their prior greed has resulted in their most popular
| consumer iDevices being the least AI compatible devices in
| their lineup. They could've leapfrogged every other
| manufacturer with the largest AI compatible device userbase.
| mostlysimilar wrote:
| I think it's great that Apple was able to ship devices that
| millions of people made happy use of without needing to put
| additional hardware resources into them. That's efficiency,
| not greed.
| yunohn wrote:
| I own almost every Apple ecosystem device, but I definitely
| wouldn't call their mobile device RAM capacity as
| sufficient. It physically hurts me when my iPad Pro M2 and
| iPhone 16 Pro Max (earlier 15,14,13,12,11) start to swap
| out live apps - sure some apps retain state, but the
| majority still don't. Even Safari randomly reloads tabs for
| me, while I'm just researching purchases across <10 live
| tabs.
| mostlysimilar wrote:
| That's fair, it sounds like you've got a real problem.
| I'd be surprised of the majority of users experience that
| problem though.
| grahamj wrote:
| > This basically proves that Apple shot themselves in the
| foot for AI on mobile by artificially restricting RAM for so
| long!
|
| What they shot was us. My 14 Pro won't do AI despite having a
| better NPU than an M1, all because Apple chose -
| intentionally - to ship it with too little RAM. They knew AI
| was coming and they did this anyway.
|
| Although having played with it on my MBP it's clear I'm not
| missing much. But still.
| DrBenCarson wrote:
| They knew they were releasing Apple Intelligence before
| ChatGPT went live? lol
| TiredOfLife wrote:
| But now they get to sell new devices to them
| medell wrote:
| This might actually push people to upgrade their hardware.
| And Apple retention rates are high. Apple will be fine.
| captainbland wrote:
| Sounds like they've just done planned obsolescence faster to
| their lower paying customers.
| superjan wrote:
| The RAM is expandable as well... however I am curious how well
| the extra RAM performs. Part of the M-series performance gain
| is from having the RAM dies very close to the processor.
| throwaway48476 wrote:
| It performs the same. You don't get any extra ram channels
| for upgrading the capacity.
| tonyedgecombe wrote:
| This is good news for me because I usually buy the base machine
| and accept its performance as a constraint on what I'm doing.
| I'm not sure it is all about AI though, Apple has been getting
| a lot of criticism for selling machines with just 8GB of RAM.
| nordsieck wrote:
| The new model is looking really good.
|
| * Kept HDMI
|
| * New, much smaller form factor
|
| * Front facing USB-C
|
| * Base model has 16 gb of ram
| melling wrote:
| How much faster is the M4 vs the M2 for Swift development?
|
| I'd probably get 32GB. I started buying 16GB Macs in 2013. The
| extra RAM will keep any Mac useful for a few extra years. In
| fact, my 2013 Intel MB Pro would be still be great if I could
| upgrade the OS
| svantana wrote:
| Geekbench clang benchmark:
|
| M4: 21k lines / (core-second)
| https://browser.geekbench.com/v6/cpu/8495624
|
| M2: 16k lines / (core-second)
| https://browser.geekbench.com/v6/cpu/8546977
| Hamuko wrote:
| I think I'd miss my USB-A ports if I switched my Mac Studio for
| this. Apart from that, it looks pretty good. Not really sure if
| it's worth saving a couple of hundred when you spec it up to
| par with an M4 Max Mac Studio when that comes out though. It's
| the same price as the base M2 Max Mac Studio when you upgrade
| the memory and SoC.
| nordsieck wrote:
| I have lots of USB-A devices, so I get what you're saying.
| But converters are pretty cheap and seem reliable.
|
| And Apple has a long history of making this change ahead of
| the rest of the market. It's been years since they've move to
| all USB-C in their laptops, so IMO, it was only a matter of
| time.
|
| And yeah - upgrades are awful price wise. From what I can
| tell, it's basically only worth it to buy base models unless
| the machine is making you money. Hopefully they upgrade the
| Mac Studio to M4 down the line.
| Hamuko wrote:
| I actually recently discovered that my USB DAC was skipping
| a lot because I had it connected to a hub. Threw it
| directly onto the Mac Studio and now everything's peachy,
| so there are definitely downsides to trying to get a bunch
| of USB-A devices attached to one of these.
| jwells89 wrote:
| Sadly it's been common for USB hubs to be dodgy ever
| since the advent of USB 3. I rarely had trouble out of
| 1.x and 2.x hubs, but 3.x+ hubs are consistently trouble.
| The only ones that haven't been problematic are those
| integrated into Thunderbolt docks, probably because those
| undergo more stringent certifications.
| reaperducer wrote:
| _And Apple has a long history of making this change ahead
| of the rest of the market._
|
| I agree. My wife has a MacBook that is USB-C only, and it
| turns ten years old in a couple of months.
| 2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote:
| No AV1 encode?
| bdcs wrote:
| That is correct[0], as known from the iPad M4 analysis.
|
| I will say SVT-AV1 has had some significant ARM64 performance
| improvements lately (~300% YoY, with bitrate savings at a given
| preset[1][2], so call it a 400% increase), so for many use-
| cases software AV1 encoding (rather than hardware encoding) is
| likely the preferred modality.
|
| The exceptions, IMO, are concurrant gaming with streaming
| (niche on MacOS?) and video server transcoding. However, even
| these exceptions are tenuous: Because Apple Silicon doesn't
| play x86's logical core / boost clock games, and considering
| the huge multi-threaded performance of M4, I think streaming
| with SW encoding of AV1 is quite feasible (for single streams)
| for both streaming and transcoding. x86 needs a dedicated AV1
| encoder more-so due to the single-threaded perf hit from
| running a multi-threaded background workload. And the bit-rate
| efficiency will be much better from SW encoding.
|
| That said, latency will suffer and I would still appreciate a
| HW AV1 encoder.
|
| [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_M4 [1]
| https://www.phoronix.com/news/SVT-AV1-1.8-Released [2]
| https://www.phoronix.com/news/Intel-SVT-AV1-2.0
| Flux159 wrote:
| Time to update all the Mac Mini server racks for the new design
| jelled wrote:
| Specs say it's 2.0 inches tall, going to need a 2U rack
| roopepal wrote:
| I believe the previous design was around for well over a
| decade, so it did have a pretty good run.
| Afforess wrote:
| This seems like the perfect home media transcoding server (Plex,
| Kodi, etc). I am curious if these will ever be able to run Linux.
| vineyardlabs wrote:
| Almost certainly. Asahi linux is getting pretty useable on M1
| and M2. They don't support M3 yet, let alone M4, but support
| will surely come eventually.
| amelius wrote:
| There are no guarantees that it runs correctly, though, as
| it's all based on reverse-engineering work that includes a
| lot of guesswork.
| amelius wrote:
| And this also has implications for security.
| prewett wrote:
| I would be shocked if they weren't using a test suite,
| especially given all the platforms and devices Linux
| supports. POSIX has a test suite, and there are several
| Linux test suites [1], [2]. Although, I would think that an
| architecture port is fairly straightforward. It's reverse-
| engineering and writing all the device drivers, but devices
| generally have a well-known interface (and, therefore,
| presumably tests). The OpenGL drivers are being tested
| against the official OpenGL test suite.
|
| Of course, there _are_ no guarantees that it runs
| correctly. Probably doesn 't, given that even Apple and
| Microsoft's software don't run correctly, either. But
| saying software doesn't run perfectly in all cases is
| almost tautological.
|
| [1] https://github.com/phoronix-test-suite/phoronix-test-
| suite
|
| [2] https://github.com/linux-test-project/ltp
| amelius wrote:
| I don't think this is a viable path as the technology
| gets more alien with every generation.
| pantalaimon wrote:
| > support will surely come eventually
|
| I wouldn't be so sure - if marcan loses interest (already
| looks like it), who is going to keep up with supporting the
| latest Apple chips?
|
| When the M series chips were the hot new thing, there sure
| was developer interest - but now that a new chip is released
| every year, it becomes boring drudgery.
|
| Look at support for T2 Macs - it took a decade to get them
| supported, not because the hardware was so different, but
| mainly because the hardware was 'boring'.
| vineyardlabs wrote:
| Fair enough, I suppose I could be overly optimistic. I just
| figure it's garnered enough interest that even if there's
| turnover in the team somebody will carry the torch.
| Especially since Apple seems to be actively tolerant if not
| even supportive of the project.
| jlokier wrote:
| The other comments talk about Asahi Linux, which doesn't
| support the M3 yet. You can also run Linux in a VM on MacOS,
| and it runs very well.
|
| For some uses you won't get the best performance compared to
| native Linux. But for a Plex/Kodi server a VM should be great.
|
| (On an x86 Apple laptop I found the power consumption better
| with a Linux VM on MacOS than with native Linux, so VMs can be
| quite efficient for some uses. Software builds sometimes run
| much faster in a Linux VM inside MacOS than natively in MacOS.
| On the other hand, I found Qemu inside a Linux VM for Android
| development was extremely slow.)
| jamesy0ung wrote:
| One of the reasons Asahi doesn't support M3, is that Apple
| never released a Mac Mini, so they can't do continuous
| integration. [1] That being said, it seems Apple does re use
| a lot of the parts on the SoC in each generation, so it's not
| too different.
|
| [1]
| https://social.treehouse.systems/@marcan/112277289414246878
| fckgw wrote:
| Having a fully fledged computer this small without an external
| power brick is pretty impressive.
| jsheard wrote:
| Not making it VESA mountable is a missed opportunity, but I
| suppose they want you to buy an iMac instead of doing that.
| fckgw wrote:
| There's currently plenty of 3rd party VESA mounts for Mac
| Mini, I'm sure they'll have some for this new Mac Mini as
| well. They slide down into a "clamp" style bracket. They run
| about $15 on Amazon.
|
| https://www.amazon.com/Sabrent-Mount-Under-Black-BK-
| MABM/dp/...
| aseipp wrote:
| You can get 'sandwich' enclosures that put the mini between
| the monitor arm and the monitor itself, or off to the side.
| That's what I do with an M1 Mac Mini sitting next to me.
| Maybe it's a blessing in disguise since you can get these
| cheaper than what Apple would sell them for :)
| tootie wrote:
| A box that small can be mounted with double-sided tape or
| velcro.
| grahamj wrote:
| No surprise there; even their monitors' VESA mounts are
| optional :D
| nordsieck wrote:
| Honestly, I wish they'd go with an external USB-C power brick.
|
| The only reason they might not is that they want to keep
| everything across the entire line, and the highest end Mac
| Studio probably needs more power than USB can offer.
| andreasley wrote:
| Why would you prefer an external power brick?
|
| The internal power supplies in Mac minis have been extremely
| reliable and the fewer cables the better, in my opinion.
| fckgw wrote:
| Plus you would lose a USB-C port to power
| makeitdouble wrote:
| They can surely add another USB-C port, it would take the
| space of the current power socket so space wise it
| shouldn't be an issue either.
| makeitdouble wrote:
| There can be advantages to an external brick, but I see
| parent's comment mostly centered on having USB-C as input.
|
| That gives a lot more options IMHO on how to handle power
| for this machine, including portability, even if it's
| supposed to be a desktop machine.
|
| I thought the same for the minisforum machines which would
| be competitive to this, they have a 19V input that really
| should be USB-C at this point.
| kytazo wrote:
| USB-PD as of its last revision can deliver up to 240W.
| diffeomorphism wrote:
| Is it? This seems pretty average mini pc size and much larger
| than small ones, e.g.
|
| https://www.notebookcheck.net/fileadmin/_processed_/6/b/csm_...
|
| Also just connecting the mini pc to a monitor with PD and not
| using any extra power brick at all seems like the much more
| relevant comparison.
| wpwpwpw wrote:
| As usual, no upgradability. There's evidence that it's possible
| with SSDs with no loss of performance. Probably the same would
| apply to memory, maybe with replaceable memory chips and a simple
| switch. More future landfill material.
| kissiel wrote:
| On a desktop computer it's not as bothersome to have an NVME
| plugged in to one of the thunderbolt ports.
| Longlius wrote:
| Thunderbolt is significantly slower than gen 4 NVME. In the
| PC world, gen 3 speeds are considered an extreme budget-tier
| option these days.
| PaulRobinson wrote:
| Not everyone needs a Lamborghini just to do their weekly
| grocery shopping.
|
| The vast majority of people who will buy this will be just
| fine with that level of performance for many years to come.
| kissiel wrote:
| Bandwidth vs latency is like a pickup vs lambo I guess.
| And what the tb limits is the bandwidth, if you catch my
| drift (although lambos are awd and poor at drifting). So
| the actual performance that matters (the snappiness) is
| still there.
| kstrauser wrote:
| This is the Mac Mini, their budget desktop. It's not the
| one targeted at people who would consider Thunderbolt a
| limiting factor.
| jsheard wrote:
| The same limitation applies to all of their higher end
| machines though, with the sole exception of the Mac Pro.
| kissiel wrote:
| TB5 is 15GB/s. So gen 5 equivalent. I'm not saying there
| are tb5 enclosures in the wilds, but it's a matter of time.
| Also if you're bottlenecked by buffered, linear reads and
| writes so much that there is a difference between 3GB/s and
| 7GB/s then I envy you. Most of what I choke my desktops and
| servers with is random IO that wouldn't saturate gen2 :)
| massysett wrote:
| For drives at least, the upgrade path is the USB-C port.
| 999900000999 wrote:
| I don't think these even boot once the SSDs die.
|
| Apple knows how to make money, I can buy a quality 4TB Nvme
| for 300$( you can definitely go lower if you want to risk it
| ). The upgrade to 4TB on the M4 Pro Mini is 1200$(it's not
| supported on the base model) , on top of 1400$ for the actual
| computer.
|
| It I had to guess, most of Apple's margin is on users riding
| the pricing ladder up into the stratosphere.
|
| I had an experience a few years ago at an Apple store, where
| this clerk refuse to sell me the cheapest m1 MacBook Air.
| There's probably some direction from up top which is trying
| convince people they need the more expensive Macs.
| kstrauser wrote:
| > I don't think these even boot once the SSDs die.
|
| All Macs that I know of let you configure the boot drive. I
| had an older Mac Mini with a spinning HDD. I added an
| external SSD, set that up as the boot drive, and never
| touched the slow drive again. I'd be extremely surprised if
| you couldn't do the same with this.
| 999900000999 wrote:
| I can't find an official source, but from what I've heard
| the newer Macs need to boot from the internal SSD.
| https://www.reddit.com/r/mac/s/CZOHuFQcy4
| kersplody wrote:
| Correct, the stage 2 bootloader and system firmware must
| be on the SSD. The OS can then boot from an external
| volume.
|
| https://support.apple.com/guide/security/boot-process-
| secac7...
| orangecat wrote:
| M-series Macs require a functioning internal drive in
| order to boot off external storage:
| https://tidbits.com/2021/05/27/an-m1-mac-cant-boot-from-
| an-e...
| kstrauser wrote:
| Well, I guess I'm extremely surprised, then. I don't care
| for that one bit.
| hggigg wrote:
| I doubt the internal SSD is going to die before the power
| supply gets cooked.
|
| If it does, you _can_ get the SSD chips replaced. That is
| well proven now. Granted it needs a specialist with rework
| kit but they are starting to become more common now that it
| 's an issue.
| piva00 wrote:
| > Probably the same would apply to memory, maybe with
| replaceable memory chips
|
| The memory chip is embedded in the SoC, how do you envision a
| way to do replacement of memory chips with this
| design/architecture?
| berbec wrote:
| It is possible but very hard and dangerous. I wouldn't
| recommend it to anyone.
|
| 0: https://www.chongdiantou.com/archives/73084.html
| jsheard wrote:
| As discussed in the iMac thread yesterday, LPCAMM2 makes it
| possible. There are LPCAMM2 modules with the same 7500 MT/s
| spec as the M4s integrated memory, and two of them running in
| parallel would match the M4 Pro.
|
| https://www.anandtech.com/show/21390/micron-ships-
| crucialbra...
|
| Even if Apple wanted to support modular memory, which they
| obviously don't, the ultra-tiny form factor of the new Mini
| would probably still rule it out though. Soldering the memory
| down is still more compact.
| Rohansi wrote:
| No way the new Mini is too small to allow upgradability.
| You can buy a Windows mini PC that is not only smaller than
| the new Mini but also allows upgrading both RAM and SSD.
| And that's without using LPCAMM2 - just normal SO-DIMMs.
| (Example: https://trigkey.com/products/trigkey-
| green-g4-16g-500g-n100)
| wtallis wrote:
| That system you linked to is an extremely poor example.
| It relies on an external power brick, is incredibly
| underpowered, only gives one PCIe lane to the M.2 slot
| limiting it to ~800MB/s according to their specs (meaning
| it's only PCIe gen3), and has only one SODIMM slot
| (meaning it's operating with just a 64-bit memory bus,
| half the bandwidth of mainstream consumer PCs).
|
| It's basically a 12 year old PC shrunk into a tiny box
| and low power budget.
| Rohansi wrote:
| Sure, it's not on the same performance level but this
| isn't the only option. There is a wide range of options
| available in the same form factor. Here's something
| higher end: https://www.bosgamepc.com/products/bosgame-
| mini-pc-p3-amd-ry... Probably still uses an external
| power brick but I imagine that's just to reduce costs.
|
| My point is that this size of device is already available
| with upgradability so the form factor isn't the issue.
| Apple is significantly better at engineering products
| than these random companies and they could surely have
| made this new Mac Mini upgradeable. I do understand why
| they wouldn't want to though!
| wpwpwpw wrote:
| I am not talking about DIMMs. Talking about the chips
| themselves. I am pretty sure they don't make different APUs
| for different memory sizes, it's just a fuse or something
| like that. If CPUs can use sockets, so do memory chips.
| buildbot wrote:
| Nope. Not reliable ones.
|
| The pin density on a bga memory is like, 0.3mm for the type
| typically used by apple. That's 200 0.3mm pins that have to
| line up and work at 4GHz and survive you dropping it 5
| feet.
| infecto wrote:
| Are we going to hear this for every product release ad nauseam
| forever? Not sure about you but at least for myself, I always
| trade-in/recycle my products with Apple which I hope closes the
| loop as close as possible.
| richwater wrote:
| Yes because it's so ridiculous to call it a professional
| machine and not let people put in their own RAM and instead
| charge $200+ for 8GB
| infecto wrote:
| The days where this actually matters is going away. Your
| opinion is but a tiny minority, for the vast majority it
| does not matter. $200-800 for a tool that generates an
| enormous amount of value is incredible, no desire to
| upgrade it myself. I think about how rarely a PC gaming
| computer needs to be upgraded these days, by the time it
| happens its usually a complete overhaul because there is a
| CPU, Mobo upgrade required.
| buildbot wrote:
| It does not apply to memory. It's much harder to maintain
| signal integrity. 200+ 4GHz signals.
| wpwpwpw wrote:
| If a CPU is socket-able, so should memory chips be.
| buildbot wrote:
| It won't ever be able run as fast as a soldered system.
|
| Have you installed a server CPU?
|
| It's really easy to fuckup and lose a few channels of
| memory due to the contact being bad. Right now I've got a
| 3647 Xeon phi cpu that's refusing to train dimm a1 for
| _reasons_
|
| That's not an experience Apple wants any user of their
| products to have.
|
| Here's an example BGA socket:
| https://www.ironwoodelectronics.com/products/bga-sockets/
|
| Not something that's going in a tiny laptop chassis.
| richwater wrote:
| People running a single desktop machine are way better
| served by being able to upgrade RAM modules than worrying
| about single contacts being bad between the RAM stick and
| motherboard.
| buildbot wrote:
| Yes? I wasn't making a claim that it was better to solder
| everything for everyone. I'm saying the overlap between
| most Apple users and those people is low.
| aseipp wrote:
| And many desktops do that today, but like everything it has
| tradeoffs, such as peak bandwidth and power usage. DDR
| sockets inherently make this sacrifice, integrated designs
| will always have wider buses, higher bandwidth, etc. That's
| also why you don't get sockets for your GPU memory, either.
| It's a design tradeoff.
| wpwpwpw wrote:
| -> It won't ever be able run as fast as a soldered system.
|
| Yeah, just take a look at PCIe 5 and it's 512GB/s of
| bandwidth.
|
| -> Have you installed a server CPU?
|
| Yeah, and none of the problems you mentioned.
|
| -> That's not an experience Apple wants any user of their
| products to have.
|
| Yeah, just look at the older macs with upgradable
| components and the easyness you had replacing them... So,
| instead of making it easier, let's just remove it
| altogether.
| aseipp wrote:
| PCIe is a serial interface, not parallel like modern DRAM
| interfaces. They're completely different at a hardware
| level, the electrical design constraints are completely
| different, the latency characteristics are completely
| different. I think you are just throwing words and
| numbers out and don't really know what they mean at all.
| jonas21 wrote:
| Apple puts the memory, CPU, and GPU all on the same chip.
| This generates less waste as you only need a single package
| and socket, and uses less energy during operation.
| wmf wrote:
| LPCAMM2 solves this.
| llm_nerd wrote:
| >More future landfill material.
|
| I wish Apple devices were more upgradable (and cheaper and more
| fixable), but I would speculate that Apple devices are the
| _last_ devices to end up in a landfill (or more aptly,
| recycled). If you outgrow a device there is a very robust
| resale market and that machine will happily fill someone else
| 's needs.
|
| Apple devices seem to stay in use for an eternity.
| spiderfarmer wrote:
| I used to upgrade my Mac mini every time a new one came out.
| The resale value was amazing.
| PaulRobinson wrote:
| Wow, are you still using your original 386DX board, with minor
| upgrades along the way? /s
|
| I actually think Apple's way of managing upgrades isn't as
| harsh as many people think.
|
| The first thing to get to sustainability is to use less. If you
| don't need the hardware to make hardware easily upgradable, you
| simplify the hardware and use less of it. This is one of the
| reasons Apple do it.
|
| Secondly, they're using a lot of recycled material in this
| thing. Their lede line on it is that its carbon neutral. Show
| me another desktop PC like this that can make that claim.
|
| Thirdly, the "half-life" of a Mac is kind of insane. When I was
| buying Thinkpads, Dells, and the like, I'd get 2-3 years down
| the line and I'd "need" to upgrade the whole thing. I've got a
| 2017 Mac Mini, and an 2015 MBP in regular use. I have a G4
| iBook that was in active use by my parents from 2004 until
| _this Spring_ - they only gave it up because they couldn't
| upgrade Chrome on it any more, so it's about to become a retro
| Linux term for me, because the hardware is still sound (albeit
| too under-powered for anything modern).
|
| And lastly, they take old hardware in and recycle it back into
| the new stuff in the first step. They give relatively decent
| trade-in prices, and are one of the few consumer brands doing
| that.
|
| Given that they're shipping it with 16GB of RAM, which is fine
| for my needs, I think I'm confident in saying I could buy one,
| use it for 5-8 years, and then get it recycled when I upgrade
| at that point, while most PCs with upgradable RAM being sold
| today are going to landfill within 4 years, perhaps.
| shantara wrote:
| I think you're giving PCs way too little credit compared to
| Macs. AM4 motherboards from 2017 can have 5800x3d or 5700x3d
| CPU installed, the former of which is still #2 in the
| majority of gaming benchmarks beating anything Intel can
| offer for a fraction of price and power consumed.
| terramex wrote:
| How good are modern external hard drives? Is it worth paying for
| more internal SSD storage or is it more reasonable to get high
| quality USB one?
| vessenes wrote:
| What's your use case?
| kissiel wrote:
| I get 2GB/s+ with a USB4 NVME enclosure. If I buy this, this is
| where the main storage will be.
| ayewo wrote:
| Can you share more details about your external storage setup?
| sib wrote:
| I'm not the OP but I use this [1] enclosure and [2] NVME
| SSD on my MacBook Pro and get read & write speeds >
| 2,500MB/s.
|
| [1] enclosure:
| https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0BB74BQVN/
|
| [2] drive: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0B7CQ2CHH/
| kissiel wrote:
| Enclosure:
|
| https://www.unitek-products.com/products/solidforce-
| reefer-p...
|
| The SSD:
|
| https://www.crucial.com/ssd/t500/CT2000T500SSD5?_gl=1*1g4r3
| l...
| ErneX wrote:
| I have an NVME SSD on a TB enclosure and I get 2600MB/s read
| speeds on my Mac Studio.
| ayewo wrote:
| Mind sharing which brand you use for external storage?
| sib wrote:
| Not the OP but I use the following [1] enclosure and [2]
| NVME SSD on my MacBook Pro and get read / write speeds >
| 2,500MB/s.
|
| [1] enclosure:
| https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0BB74BQVN/
|
| [2] drive: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0B7CQ2CHH/
| ErneX wrote:
| Enclosure is: Acasis M.2 NVMe SSD Enclosure 40Gbps
|
| The disk I put in there is a SK Hynix Gold P31 2TB, I am
| not getting its full speed with this enclosure so you can
| probably get a slower one and get the same results.
| anentropic wrote:
| I've been using external drives for years and would love to get
| rid of them now internal ones of a decent size are available
|
| It's always been a slightly clunky experience - having to eject
| them before I can undock my laptop, or the way they never go to
| sleep (some issue with CalDigit TB dock...?)
|
| I used to think of them as a backup, but since moving house a
| couple of years ago my internet is fast enough to make
| Backblaze viable
|
| Next time I upgrade I'm just going to have less boxes on the
| desk, less power-drawing crap plugged in all the time
|
| I hate the price of 8TB storage on these though :(
| lawlessone wrote:
| The Dyson of PCs
| leetharris wrote:
| Love to see that it still starts at $599.
|
| My M2 Mac Mini that I got for $499 is my favorite gaming computer
| I've had in a long time. Runs many games like WoW, Dota, League
| of Legends, etc great. Anything that it doesn't run due to MacOS
| I use GeForce Now over ethernet. And this was with 8gb unified
| memory, now with 16gb it'll be even better value.
|
| Very excited to see how the GPU has improved in the M4,
| especially the Pro model.
| eamag wrote:
| Isn't steamdeck a better option for this use case?
| tom_ wrote:
| Assuming you don't want to use it for all the various other
| things you can also use a Mac for - sure, maybe.
| leetharris wrote:
| I have a Steam Deck, Asus ROG Ally, M2 Mac Mini, M1 Pro
| laptop, M2 Max laptop (work). All of this runs on either an
| LG C3 42" OLED or a 34" 1440p ultrawide.
|
| Linux GeForce Now can only do 720p or 1080p, can't remember
| which. Also, it's just kind of laggy in desktop mode. The
| Macs run so much smoother.
|
| My current "main" desktop is actually my Asus ROG Ally. I use
| one USB C hub that is capable of 4k120hz, and I can move it
| between my Mac laptops and Asus ROG Ally very seamlessly.
|
| The problem for me is Windows. Yesterday my start menu
| stopped loading for some reason and required a full reboot.
| Sometimes it refuses to go to sleep. Sometimes it refuses to
| come out of sleep. Sometimes a Windows update kicks off in
| the middle of a game and it slows everything to a crawl.
| Windows drives me crazy these days!
| talldayo wrote:
| Get rid of Windows on it! Digital Foundry put out a great
| video on this exact process the other day, weighing the
| pros and cons: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OwWRCrGoXV0
|
| Neither MacOS nor Windows are very good console OSes -
| you're really better off using Linux where anticheat isn't
| concerned. Even on the Ally.
| diggan wrote:
| > Neither MacOS nor Windows are very good console OSes
|
| They're great OSes for consumers who don't really work on
| their computers, and just want something that caters to
| the lowest common denominator.
|
| For professionals who use computers for work, Linux is
| really the only option that doesn't eventually get in
| your way. You can set it up and leave it as-is, with only
| security updates, and everything keeps working the same
| way, basically forever.
|
| I've tried to set up an experience like that on both
| macOS and Windows, but eventually, the company will find
| a way of forcing an update on your, intentionally or not.
| philistine wrote:
| Thank you so much for telling me that I am actually not
| managing my non-profit on my Mac. I was convinced I was
| working every day on a Mac in a business setting, but I
| guess I was mistaken.
| Veen wrote:
| What does "work on their computer" mean to you? I suspect
| it's not what it means to the vast majority of people.
| 1propionyl wrote:
| > For professionals who use computers for work, Linux is
| really the only option that doesn't eventually get in
| your way.
|
| I really hope you're not expecting anyone to take you
| seriously with this. On principle I get what you're
| saying but in practice no one who works as a professional
| in any field has the time (or expertise) to be worried
| about configuring their operating system.
|
| As a Linux evangelist who begrudgingly daily drives a
| Mac, this kind of attitude is what does us in. It's the
| cocksure "akshually Linux is best" even when it
| materially, experientially, just isn't.
|
| Denial is not a design ethos.
| talldayo wrote:
| I'll take him seriously on it. MacOS and Windows are
| terrible for professional purposes, for a number of
| reasons:
|
| 1. Requires Windows Pro or Apple Developer license to
| unlock full featureset
|
| 2. Cannot reasonably disable targeted advertising or ad
| data collection from either OS
|
| 3. Neither come with package managers and do not respect
| third-party packaging either
|
| 4. Can be "managed" insofar as your buggy CPM software
| allows, often glitched by the OS itself
|
| 5. The experience is always getting worse since Apple and
| Microsoft share a united front of making people spend as
| much money on useless shit as humanly possible
|
| Now, that's not to say nobody should use these OSes -
| certainly people are locked into them for some purposes.
| But as a programmer it's genuinely hard for me to be
| productive on these OSes because I end up fighting them
| just for everyday, non-programming purposes.
|
| I think it's entirely possible that MacOS and Windows can
| be inherently terrible experiences while also being
| mandatory for certain workflows.
| skydhash wrote:
| Most professionals use only a handful of software and
| don't really care about the OS other than what the OS
| should do (file management, connecting to the internet,
| launching software,...). Apple and Microsoft insists on
| doing other stuff that impedes you while not allowing you
| to do basic stuff you want. The main issue with Linux is
| hardware support (which no one other than the
| manufactures can solve properly) and professional
| development (The distributions are great, but monolithic
| development like FreeBSD would have been better).
|
| Linux is best because it lets you use your computer for
| whatever workflow you need.
| matheusmoreira wrote:
| I'm a professional who is often forced to suffer Windows
| nonsense. At work Windows routinely wastes my time with
| absolute bullshit I couldn't care less about and which
| makes me negative dollars, even though it is basically a
| glorified Chrome launcher.
|
| Professionals should absolutely take it seriously because
| time spent updating Windows or even just waiting around
| while it gets its shit together is time you could have
| spent doing your job and making money. In fact, Windows
| and its spontaneous updates with obnoxious focus stealing
| prompts are major risks to the integrity of your work and
| might cause you to have to redo it from scratch, lowering
| the value of your time even further.
|
| Linux boots in less than ten seconds and is already ready
| to use. There are distributions for all levels of
| expertise, and if there's an IT department it should be
| managing those boxes anyway. All that's missing is the
| Microsoft Office suite and in the end that's what the
| Windows vs Linux battle always boils down to. People put
| up with it because they just _need_ muh Excel.
| zamalek wrote:
| This isn't really the case anymore, Linux (specifically
| SteamOS and its kin) serve the console-like market very
| well. Arguably better than Windows.
|
| Even for non-Gaming use cases this idea is a bit dated.
| Printing is _by far_ the best experience on Linux. The
| "tweaking" that you need to do, that every Windows/MacOS
| user claims, isn't really a thing these days - sans
| NVIDIA (I'm not sure what the current status is, but it
| was bjorked somewhat recently). Sure, if you want to go
| beyond what Windows/MacOS can offer then tweaking my be
| required, but the current UIs are extremely
| comprehensive.
|
| I had a 80yr old lady up and running in one day with
| PopOS. If that's not lowest common denominator, I don't
| know what is.
|
| Professional work can be hit and miss. Depends on how
| draconian your workplace software is.
| bee_rider wrote:
| They listed WoW, DotA and League of Legends--I'm
| guessing, but the last two seem likely to have anti-cheat
| issues, right?
| Mustachio wrote:
| Vanguard AC is indeed incompatible with linux, but maybe
| that's for the better...
| diggan wrote:
| > Windows drives me crazy these days!
|
| At least it boots.
|
| I purchase a Surface Pro 8 a year ago or something,
| thinking Windows would surely work better than usual when
| it is Microsoft's own hardware too.
|
| But no, yesterday it got stuck in a boot loop, after a
| Windows update broke the audio drivers somehow. The Windows
| logs/reliability report can just tell me it "shut down
| abnormally" without any technical details what so ever.
|
| I still have to use Windows on my desktop because of
| Ableton, but I'll never purchase any Microsoft hardware
| again, and as soon as I can, I'll run Ableton on Linux like
| the rest of my software.
| influx wrote:
| What's the model of that USB C hub? Looking for one that I
| can switch between Windows and Mac (and maybe Linux)
| leetharris wrote:
| These Cable Matters ones work well, but need their
| firmware flashed. Luckily, it was extremely easy and
| worked great for me. Here's an Apple forum thread about
| it: https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/dp-usb-c-
| thunderbolt-3-...
|
| Here's the exact model I have:
| https://www.amazon.com/Cable-Matters-Ethernet-Delivery-
| Charg...
| jacktheturtle wrote:
| can you share the USB C hub? i need one of these and can't
| find one that makes it easy to swap between mac & gaming
| rig
| leetharris wrote:
| Posted in another comment:
|
| These Cable Matters ones work well, but need their
| firmware flashed. Luckily, it was extremely easy and
| worked great for me. Here's an Apple forum thread about
| it: https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/dp-usb-c-
| thunderbolt-3-...
|
| Here's the exact model I have:
| https://www.amazon.com/Cable-Matters-Ethernet-Delivery-
| Charg...
| insane_dreamer wrote:
| > The problem for me is Windows.
|
| Perennial truth since XP
| TiredOfLife wrote:
| On SteamDeck Geforce Now is limited to 1080p, due to NVIDIA
| being a tiny indie company with no resources to make a native
| client.
| davely wrote:
| This is, of course, a non issue as the resolution of the
| Steam Deck is 1280x800.
|
| Edit: I am silly. Of course, people mean hooking it up to a
| bigger screen.
| npsomaratna wrote:
| Are these games available on OSX? Or are you somehow booting
| Windows?
|
| (Apologies if this seems like a stupid question. I've not
| played games for a very long time, mainly because most stuff
| doesn't seem to be available on Macs).
| fckgw wrote:
| All those games listed have native Apple Silicon Mac ports
| now.
| sammyeatworld wrote:
| Only WoW, LoL and Dota are being translated through the
| Rosetta.
| int_19h wrote:
| In my experience with gaming on Macs, even when there is a
| native Mac port of a particular game, the experience is
| inferior to Windows more often than not. Many of them don't
| do 4K properly, for example (you get everything rendered at
| half-res in fullscreen). Things like Cmd+Tab don't work
| reliably, either.
| smileybarry wrote:
| Yes -- World of Warcraft, League of Legends and DotA 2 all
| have native macOS ports. WoW got an Apple Silicon port
| relatively recently IIRC (last expansion).
| sammyeatworld wrote:
| WoW was probably the first game that was ported to the ARM
| architecture (2020), so it's not that recent.
| leetharris wrote:
| It's not a dumb question. I actually used to use an iMac 27"
| with an Nvidia 680 that I would boot into Bootcamp / Windows
| for my primary gaming computer. I covered it in "built, not
| bought" stickers at Quakecon one year.
|
| You can't do x86/x64 Windows on M-series Macs without
| emulation and it is generally a poor experience. There's a
| few things like Crossover, Parallels, etc that can help you
| run Windows games.
|
| But I have found that most of the games I care about are
| either Mac native or on GeForce Now at this point. There's a
| surprisingly large game catalog on Mac now.
|
| So the short answer is that some of them run on some sort of
| Windows compatibility layer, some are Mac native, some I
| stream. But most of my favorites run native on Mac.
|
| To be honest, there are so many games to play these days that
| I don't mind missing out on a few titles. Valorant is a good
| example of a game that I can't play on Mac, GFN, or
| Crossover. But it's OK, I still have CS2.
| addandsubtract wrote:
| Whisky also does a great job at running Windows games with
| minimal setup / overhead.
| Apocryphon wrote:
| I'm wondering if it might actually be easier to install
| Asahi Linux (or some other distro) on Apple Silicon for
| gaming via Proton, until Game Porting Toolkit is adopted
| more.
| JKCalhoun wrote:
| My Intel Mac Mini is still my "tv content" machine. Since it
| has no problem driving my Samsung OLED TV and keeping up with
| typical video framerates I suspect I will be holding on to it
| for many more years to come.
| grahamj wrote:
| It's smaller and has their own chip so I should hope it's no
| more expensive.
| insane_dreamer wrote:
| > Anything that it doesn't run due to MacOS I use GeForce Now
| over ethernet.
|
| Can you elaborate? Thinking of setting up a MacMini for my kids
| but worried about lack of gaming options for them (I haven't
| gamed on a Mac in a dozen years and the state of gaming on
| MacOS was sad back then).
| tacoooooooo wrote:
| GeForce Now https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/geforce-now/
|
| nvidias cloud gaming offering. it works pretty well
| ojhughes wrote:
| Xbox cloud gaming also works great over ethernet on Mac
| theshrike79 wrote:
| Geforce Now is pretty much the only still viable game
| streaming service, you can run it on pretty much anything.
|
| The free tier is mostly crap (you only get to play if no paid
| users are using the capacity pretty much), but the paid tiers
| go from good to excellent.
|
| Its main selling point is that you don't need to buy games
| for it separately, you can use your existing Steam catalog
| for example.
| leetharris wrote:
| There's a lot of Mac games on Steam, Apple Arcade, and
| Battle.net these days. Anything that isn't supported there, I
| generally use Xbox streaming or GeForce Now streaming.
|
| Here's a list of my most played games on my Mac in the last
| couple of years:
|
| WoW, Hearthstone, Dota 2, League of Legends, Thronefall,
| Vampire Survivors, Baldur's Gate 3, Cult of the Lamb,
| Balatro, Death Must Die, Terraria, Dave the Diver,
| Mechabellum, Space Haven, Hades 2, Peglin, Stellaris,
| RimWorld, Dead Cells, Total War: Warhammer 2, Valheim,
| Civilization 6, Slay the Spire, Don't Starve Together,
| Cities: Skylines, Oxygen Not Included, SUPERHOT.
|
| Games I play through GeForce Now:
|
| Fortnite, Diablo 4, WoW, Apex Legends, Halo Infinite,
| Baldur's Gate 3, Cyberpunk 2077
|
| The point of such an annoying long comment is to demonstrate
| that there is a very substantial Mac gaming library. The
| problem is that a new shiny game comes out that doesn't
| support Mac and you don't want to be the ONE guy in your
| group who can't play it because you're on Mac. The latest one
| for me is Deadlock. Not on GeForce Now, not on console, not
| on Mac... so I needed to get a Windows PC.
|
| But if you're a kid and just looking for a general gaming
| machine, it plays a ton of cool stuff.
| shadowmanifold wrote:
| It will make me a mac owner for the first time in 25 years.
|
| I was just looking at a mac book air yesterday but I just can't
| get over the complete ripoff of a memory upgrade from the base
| model.
|
| 16 gig starting at $599. I honestly don't need to know anything
| else to buy one.
| allenu wrote:
| Putting the audio jack on the front is a strange design choice to
| me if you plan on hooking it up to wired speakers all the time.
| Did they run out of space to keep it in the back?
| wongarsu wrote:
| Probably for public computers and classroom settings (think
| libraries, schools, etc) for people to plug their wired
| headphone in.
|
| Would have been nice to have audio both in the front and rear,
| with front audio overriding rear audio (like in most desktops),
| but I guess that would have been too much maximalism for apple
| deergomoo wrote:
| On the front is far more practical for wired headphones. Plus
| you can always do something with USB-C pretty easily if you
| want to run it out of the back; if I had to choose a dongle for
| either fixed speakers or headphones, I'd pick them for the
| speakers.
| allenu wrote:
| It's definitely more practical for headphones. I'm curious as
| to why Apple decided to make this change now. Previous Mac
| Minis and the Mac Studios have always had them in the back.
| It seems uncharacteristic of them to go out of their way for
| wired headphone users after they removed the port entirely
| from the iPhone, so I wonder if it was a hardware/industrial
| design thing where it was simply more convenient to move it
| to the front for the new form factor.
|
| Edit: also I noticed they moved the power button to the
| bottom corner of the Mac Mini! (It used to be on the back as
| well.) This makes me think even more that they didn't want to
| crowd up the back too much.
| LegitShady wrote:
| its for headphones
| chronogram wrote:
| At the front is ideal for most usecases: headphones. Monitors
| with speakers, televisions, receivers, all use HDMI.
| allenu wrote:
| Yeah, good point about the HDMI carrying the audio from the
| back already. I think I'm out of touch since I use an old
| receiver that doesn't have HDMI. It's funny that this is the
| one place Apple considered the convenience to its wired
| headphone users.
| enaaem wrote:
| Many (I think most) monitors have an audio output port. I think
| that's good enough for most people. Audiophiles use external
| DACs anyway.
| mikepurvis wrote:
| There are a lot of options out there now for USB PC speakers
| that have the DAC/amp built in, eg these are $50 and natively
| USB-C: https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B08F57GSJ7
|
| But yeah, anyone "serious" would go discrete for all that
| stuff regardless. I guess this also lets Apple sidestep a
| bunch of fuss around non-stereo use-cases, for people who
| want quadraphonic or 5.1 at their workstation.
| astrange wrote:
| The built-in DACs are better than most audiophile DACs;
| audiophile companies are largely scams and either way don't
| have the budget to actually do much R&D.
|
| You may still need an amp for electrically incompatible (high
| impedance) headphones.
| mikepurvis wrote:
| Presumably servicing wired headphones, but agree it's an odd
| choice to not also include one in the back-- particularly when
| unlike a laptop there's no built in speakers, and Apple has
| been pushing hard on bluetooth audio since the iPhone 8 in
| 2017.
| hbn wrote:
| iPhone 7 in 2016 was the one that dropped the headphone jack.
| iPhone 8 launched alongside the X in 2017.
| mikepurvis wrote:
| Oh that's right yeah-- 6/7/8 all had the same form factor
| as that was the time that the off-year S versions were also
| dropped, so I always get confused.
|
| And to further muddy the waters, the space in the 7 chassis
| for the jack was mostly still available, which led to that
| one madlad bodging in his own headphone jack, for a one of
| a kind iPhone 7:
|
| https://hackaday.com/2017/09/07/bringing-back-the-
| iphone7-he...
| hbn wrote:
| The 6 actually had an S release, as well as the X.
|
| But yeah the headphone jack dropping was obviously just
| to get more people onboard with AirPods that launched at
| the same time. And you can't say it didn't work! I
| remember when the first images of people wearing AirPods
| came out and it was the laughing stock of the internet.
| People said it looked like you had Q-tips hanging out of
| your ears, or the tips of an electric toothbrush.
|
| A few years later and they're pulling in tens of billions
| of dollars per year, just on AirPods sales alone. AirPods
| could be pulled out into its own business and it would be
| seen as a wildly successful tech company.
| banana_giraffe wrote:
| There is a built in speaker. No clue how good it sounds,
| since previous Mac Mini speakers sound like they're
| underwater, but they are there.
| animal_spirits wrote:
| > Mac mini is made with over 50 percent recycled content overall,
| including 100 percent recycled aluminum in the enclosure, 100
| percent recycled gold plating in all Apple-designed printed
| circuit boards, and 100 percent recycled rare earth elements in
| all magnets. The electricity used to manufacture Mac mini is
| sourced from 100 percent renewable electricity. And, to address
| 100 percent of the electricity customers use to power Mac mini,
| Apple has invested in clean energy projects around the world.
| Apple has also prioritized lower-carbon modes of shipping, like
| ocean freight, to further reduce emissions from transportation.
| Together, these actions have reduced the carbon footprint of Mac
| mini by over 80 percent.
|
| I'm inclined to trust Apple with this information but the
| skeptical side of me is questioning, how can we fact check this
| data? If it's true it is very cool.
| eddieroger wrote:
| Third party auditors that come in to verify it. "We" probably
| can't verify it, but Apple more than likely has these claims
| audited so they are prepared when they get sued over them.
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| If they're lying, it's also securities fraud if you're an
| Apple investor, so I am inclined to believe them.
| infecto wrote:
| https://www.supplychainreports.apple
|
| But ultimately its down to the third-party auditors they hire.
| xhkkffbf wrote:
| What does it mean for the gold to be "recycled"? I get that the
| aluminum probably came for a pile of cans, but does this mean
| that the gold definitely came from a pile of electronics? Or
| could it be that they melted down a few old $20 coins from the
| US? It's not like a lot of gold ends up in landfills.
| sib wrote:
| Per the New York Times:
|
| "According to the World Gold Council, recycled gold accounted
| for 28 percent of the total global gold supply of 4,633
| metric tons in 2020; 90 percent of that recycled gold comes
| from discarded jewelry and the rest from a growing mountain
| of electronic waste such as cellphones and laptops."
| hollerith wrote:
| The Apple employees who worked on this product cause a lot of
| CO2 emissions just living their lives. I'm guessing Apple
| didn't try to offset that CO2.
| collinmanderson wrote:
| If we truly want to achieve zero emissions globally we need
| to take seriously all sources of CO2 emissions, the full
| carbon footprint of companies. Not just energy use.
|
| It's not entirely unreasonable to ask companies to be
| responsible for carbon capture or in the short term an offset
| for their employees breathing on the clock, as funny as that
| sounds.
|
| We need to take all sources of carbon emissions seriously.
| This shouldn't be downvoted.
| sib wrote:
| >> "ask companies to be responsible for carbon capture or
| in the short term an offset for their employees breathing
| on the clock"
|
| Unless you think their employees breathe more when they are
| on the clock than off it, I'm not sure this makes sense.
| When they're off the clock, they might be exercising or
| playing with their kids, so perhaps they actually breathe
| less when sitting at their desks on the clock.
| hollerith wrote:
| Yikes, I hope folks don't think I was referring to CO2
| caused by human respiration! I was referring to the CO2
| emitted for example in growing the employee's food and
| getting it to him, his shelter (cement production being
| particularly high in CO2 emissions), transportation, home
| heating, the CO2 emitted by the people who educated him
| and provided his medical care.
|
| Like someone else said, spending is a very good proxy for
| CO2 emissions, and about 68% of all spending is "consumer
| spending", which basically means keeping people alive,
| somewhat happy and somewhat productive.
| tonyedgecombe wrote:
| Just like all of us. Your spending is a pretty good measure
| of your impact on the climate.
| hollerith wrote:
| Agree. Well put.
| collinmanderson wrote:
| I don't know why you're getting downvoted. I think it's a fair
| question.
|
| The fine print says:
|
| > Carbon reductions are calculated against a business-as-usual
| baseline scenario: No use of clean electricity for
| manufacturing or product use, beyond what is already available
| on the latest modeled grid; Apple's carbon intensity of key
| materials as of 2015; and Apple's average mix of transportation
| modes by product line across three years. Learn more at
| apple.com/2030.
|
| https://www.apple.com/2030 which mostly seems to focus on the
| goal of being 100% carbon neutral in energy use.
|
| It sounds like they're generally only looking at carbon
| emissions from _energy_ use in transportation and
| manufacturing, and they're probably using some sort of carbon
| offset to achieve that "net zero". They're probably also not
| counting carbon emissions from building construction and
| they're probably not counting carbon emissions from meat served
| at corporate events, etc.
|
| Update: I found a breakdown for the Mac Mini (linked from the
| apple.com/2030 page).
|
| https://www.apple.com/environment/pdf/products/desktops/Mac_...
|
| > 100 percent of manufacturing electricity is sourced from
| renewable energy
|
| > For Mac mini, we are matching 100 percent of expected
| customer product use electricity with electricity from low-
| carbon sources.
|
| They are counting transportation in the "100 percent", but are
| offsetting it with carbon credits.
| nickthegreek wrote:
| Max 64gb. Was hoping they would allow it to go a bit higher.
| wongarsu wrote:
| I thought the same. But that would cannibalize those juicy Mac
| Pro and Mac Studio sales
| PaulRobinson wrote:
| Apart from the huge price jump from M4 to M4 Pro, I really like
| this product line-up.
|
| Last time I bought a Mac Mini was before the 2018 model got
| introduced, and I almost took it back in to get it exchanged (I
| was within 30 days of purchase when the 2018 model dropped), but
| it's been plugging away doing everything I have asked of it for 6
| years, and it's still going strong. All the upgrades since have
| left me a little cool, but this genuinely looks like a contender
| for an upgrade. Only thing stopping me from getting the credit
| card ready is waiting to see what the M4 MacBook Air - which is
| inevitably going to be announced in the next 72 hours - looks
| like in comparison.
| samcat116 wrote:
| M4 MacBook Air is rumored for the spring. Last announcement
| tomorrow is rumored to be the MacBook Pros.
| PaulRobinson wrote:
| Seems weird to stagger it like that, unless they have a huge
| amount of M3 Air stock they're hoping to shift over the
| holidays.
| samcat116 wrote:
| The M3 airs came out in March of this year, so it's a bit
| soon.
| vvvvvvvvvvvvv wrote:
| The release cycle is the same every year, aside from
| occasional refresh omissions and delays. It would be weird
| if they actually did release the M4 Air tomorrow.
| adastra22 wrote:
| They never released in that order, no? That would mean
| perfecting the highly integrated M4 Pro and Max before
| releasing a regular M4 laptop.
| samcat116 wrote:
| There will be a regular M4 MacBook Pro I assume, just like
| how there's a regular M3 MacBook Pro now. They did this
| same release order last year (Pros in the fall and Air this
| spring)
| geewee wrote:
| Does anyone have any idea if we can expect a MacBook Pro with M4
| release announcement this week as well?
| ErneX wrote:
| Yes, tomorrow.
| svantana wrote:
| Pretty much guaranteed. They explicitly said there would be 3
| announcements, and the remaining one is almost surely MBPs.
|
| https://www.macrumors.com/2024/10/28/apple-promises-two-more...
| GeekyBear wrote:
| The MacBook Pros with either a base M4, M4 Pro, or M4 Max are
| said to be due for announcement tomorrow.
| victorbjorklund wrote:
| It is all but guaranteed. But I think no big news are to
| expected. It is most just a spec bumb. The macbook pro m4
| already leaked on youtube.
| jumperabg wrote:
| Can those live in a data center rack?
| wongarsu wrote:
| People made rack mount kits for the previous generations. Not
| sure if the dimensions changed, if they did I'm sure products
| will be updated and you will be able to 3d print your own or
| buy a professional version from Amazon shortly
| BXlnt2EachOther wrote:
| Front ports: 2 USB-C, headphone
|
| Back ports: 3 Thunderbolt 4 ports (Thunderbolt 5 on the top $1399
| tier), HDMI, Gigabit Ethernet
|
| RAM can be upgraded to 32GB on M4, to 64GB on M4 Pro
|
| 10 GbE looks selectable on any of these, +$100
| rapfaria wrote:
| From the specs: Up to three displays: Two
| displays with up to 6K resolution at 60Hz over Thunderbolt and
| one display with up to 5K resolution at 60Hz over Thunderbolt or
| 4K resolution at 60Hz over HDMI Up to two displays:
| One display with up to 5K resolution at 60Hz over Thunderbolt and
| one display with up to 8K resolution at 60Hz or 4K resolution at
| 240Hz over Thunderbolt or HDMI
|
| Are these set in stone? Would it be enough to run say, two
| external 2560 x 1440 at 144hz?
| _ph_ wrote:
| I can't say it from first hand experience, but usually that are
| just example stats. The limit usually is pixels/sec for the
| bandwidth, so any configuration which requires less bandwidth
| should work too.
| unpopularopp wrote:
| >Delivers up to 13.3x faster gaming performance in World of
| Warcraft: The War Within
|
| This is such an Apple stat especially for a game. What does
| "faster gaming performance" even mean? Every zone and city hub
| loads 13.3x faster so loading screens are quicker? They don't say
| anything about FPS and no one would use "faster" as a synonym for
| higher FPS.
|
| An MMO is really not the best benchmark tbh
|
| Edit: notes has the compared spec "Results are compared to
| previous-generation 3.2GHz 6-core Intel Core i7-based Mac mini
| systems with Intel Iris UHD Graphics 630, 64GB of RAM, and 2TB
| SSD."
|
| So they compared the 2024 M4 to a 2018 8th gen Intel i7
| (i7-8700B). Take that as you will
| madeofpalk wrote:
| You didn't see the "1.7x more Excel productivity" chart from
| yesterday's new iMac?
|
| https://youtu.be/eaB7nCdId0Y?t=364
|
| https://www.theverge.com/2024/10/28/24281965/honestly-this-i...
| jeffbee wrote:
| It's funny that they advertise this because a Mac comes with
| a spreadsheet application that is hard to use and
| unbelievably slow. If they sent some engineers to work on
| that program they could get a 10x-100x improvement on the
| software side instead of grinding it out on the hardware
| side.
| OnionBlender wrote:
| It's also funny because Visicalc was a big contributor to
| the Apple II's popularity.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VisiCalc
| hggigg wrote:
| While that sounds pretty funny I know people who actually
| burn the CPU on Excel so that might be significant. Granted
| they should not be using Excel for what they do but you know,
| it's easier than learning something new!
| nxobject wrote:
| Once people learn Goal Seek and the matrix extensions to
| Excel's macro language, it's game over for corporate
| standard-issue Dell 11" laptops, that's for sure.
| dsv3099i wrote:
| I just assumed they were running one of the many "Office
| Productivity" benchmarks that are possible.
|
| For example: https://support.benchmarks.ul.com/support/soluti
| ons/articles...
| duxup wrote:
| With such small footprints for these things now. I wish they were
| a little more creative with case design.
|
| The mini seems like the perfect thing to have a mini version and
| a ... creative design, bring back the trash can!
| luis8 wrote:
| Bandwidth it's at 273 GB/s for the m4 pro. I hope the m4 max is
| two times that. It will allow using llama 70b a little bit faster
| _han wrote:
| > Mac mini is Apple's first carbon neutral Mac
|
| Hats off! I didn't expect the Mac to be next in line for the
| carbon neutral goals. But they did it!
| sureIy wrote:
| Easy if you just buy meaningless carbon credits.
| makeitdouble wrote:
| Given how Apple is pushing the carbon neutral narrative while
| still not reaching the goal on all its products, I assume
| just buying the credits would tank their margins enough to
| push them to actually reduce the footprint first.
|
| This looks to me like one instance where the incentives are
| decently working, at least to some point.
| erur wrote:
| Maybe. Alternatively it could just be the marketing
| department milking the narrative over an extended amount of
| time. Going instantly 100% "carbon neutral" through carbon
| credits is certainly a worse move in this regard.
| Kon-Peki wrote:
| You can find this on their website with a bit of clicking
| around and looking at footnotes:
|
| https://www.apple.com/environment/pdf/products/desktops/M
| ac_...
|
| > Only after these efforts do we cover residual emissions
| through high-quality carbon credits that are real,
| additional, measurable, quantified, and have systems in
| place to avoid double-counting and ensure permanence.
|
| Better than nothing...
|
| Also interesting:
|
| Maxed out: Mac mini with M4 Pro (64GB memory, 8TB SSD):
| Product footprint before carbon credits 121 kg CO2e
|
| Min spec: Mac mini with M4 (16GB memory, 256GB SSD):
| Product footprint before carbon credits 32 kg CO2e
|
| I wouldn't have thought that there is this much of a
| difference in electronics!
| mmiyer wrote:
| Mac minis are going to be one of the smaller selling product
| lines, so it's probably easier to offset the carbon emissions
| with the carbon credits they buy.
| etempleton wrote:
| What a great little computer at a very reasonable price. A few
| interesting things with this announcement:
|
| 1. Interesting that they did not have this as part of an event. I
| think this either means they do not have much else to share
| around the Mac right now or the opposite, there just won't be
| room to talk about the iMac or Mac Mini. I am leaning towards the
| former as a I suspect the other computers in their lineup will
| just receive a spec bump soon.
|
| 2. On the product page (https://www.apple.com/mac-mini/) Apple
| highlights a number of third party accessories. Notably the PS5
| controller and several keyboards and mice from different
| manufacturers. This seems small, but it would have been almost
| blasphemy under the jobs era.
|
| 3. This is quite the little powerhouse. Honestly it is so good it
| eliminates the need for most people to even consider the Mac
| Studio.
| Writingdorky wrote:
| Thats actually a really good price.
|
| The mac book air with the M chip was absolutly a steal already.
| I'm surprised by this.
|
| Is that some thing to allow cheaper MX / Arm architecture in
| DCs? Is getting Apple affordable oO?!
| detourdog wrote:
| This whole week will see a Mac annoucement according to what
| this Greg Joswiak said last week.
|
| https://www.apple.com/leadership/greg-joswiak/
| ErneX wrote:
| iMac was yesterday, Mini today and MacBook Pro tomorrow.
|
| Mac Studio and Mac Pro are getting upgrades next year
| apparently.
| makeitdouble wrote:
| > This seems small, but it would have been almost blasphemy
| under the jobs era.
|
| I feel like Jobs was a lot more pragmatic than we give him
| credit for. I mean we had the HP iPods, iTunes on Windows etc.
|
| And the iMac's catch copy was "BYODKM" at the very start, fully
| putting the spotlight on third parties and composability.
| ethagknight wrote:
| I've followed Apple all my life and never heard of HP iPods!
| etempleton wrote:
| It was a weird win-win for Apple if I remember correctly.
| They were able to sell more iPods, get iTunes installed on
| all HP machines, and block HP from creating a rival music
| player. I honestly am not sure what HP got beyond the logo
| on the back of some iPods and the ability to try and
| associate themselves with a popular and cool product.
| sgerenser wrote:
| I think HP in that era was definitely trying to be more
| "popular and cool." Not sure how much it really helped
| though.
| throwaway48476 wrote:
| HP of the era was falling apart and making stupid
| acquisitions.
| hbn wrote:
| Apple has shown people gaming with PS5 controllers at events
| for I believe a few years now. Someone can fact check me on
| that but it's not the first time I've seen it.
| pdimitar wrote:
| I've been pondering giving up on Macs for a while and this blind
| and rather stupid deferral to "AI" is going to accelerate the
| process.
|
| Almost nobody asked for this. I personally would have wanted one
| program to not stop starting with a cryptic message after
| upgrading to macOS 15.1 earlier today. But hey, crazies like me
| who want a decently working software are apparently not welcome
| in the customer base.
|
| The only reason I am still staying with Apple for my desktop
| needs is that I paid $8000 for my iMac Pro and that was just some
| short 5 years ago.
|
| But as time goes by, buying 1-2 specialized text rendering
| displays and going full Linux looks more and more attractive,
| especially with Fedora and Manjaro now offering the "immutable"
| distros i.e. you can frak around with your environment but then
| revert everything if you don't like it (or the contrary, do a DB
| commit of sorts i.e. have your changes persist after reboot) --
| those features make backing up entire workstations even easier.
|
| Sprinkle an external ZFS server and the ability to just zfs
| send/recv entire disks with encryption and compression and I
| think just some 2-3 short years into the future I'll be laughing
| at Macs.
|
| Apple keeps dropping the ball. iOS 18 lost all my tab groups in
| Safari as well. And Photos randomly chooses not to show pictures
| in the big Photos feed; you have to know which day they were
| saved to be able to see them.
|
| /facepalm
|
| Apple is now in decline, it can't be more obvious by these fairly
| outrageous bugs + the fact that they are now regular followers
| like everyone else and are jumping on the "AI" bandwagon.
| diggan wrote:
| > Apple is now in decline
|
| I've been saying this since the butterfly-keyboard fiasco. At
| that point it was clear that professional users weren't the
| focus anymore, and I promptly left the ecosystem. I still have
| a iPhone (12 mini) that I only keep because it still works, but
| every time CarPlay tries to murder me in traffic, I get one
| step closer to just yeeting that phone into the sea.
| kstrauser wrote:
| That was the low point for MacBooks. The newer models are
| much better.
| pdimitar wrote:
| Hardware-wise they undoubtedly are. That's not contested
| and it's easy to check and prove.
|
| Software though? Not at all impressed. They still check
| every program you ever start and it's very noticeable by
| the performance.
|
| Or they don't care about Intel Macs anymore, that's also a
| real possibility.
| pdimitar wrote:
| Oh I agree, I cringed hard back then as well but at least the
| Mac software and speed was decent so I figured the beginning
| of their slow downfall will not affect me for a while, and I
| was right.
|
| Nowadays though... I am stuck with a former workstation-grade
| hardware where Neovim needs FIVE SECONDS TO START because
| macOS is auditing each and every of its syscalls. I switch to
| my (now allegedly ancient) full-AMD laptop with 5500U CPU and
| the only thing that needs more than 0.5 secs to start is
| Firefox. I was not able to find one thing that did not react
| instantly. I am seriously considering just plugging my 35"
| gaming display to the Linux laptop and make that my main work
| setup.
|
| And you are right -- pro users made Apple rich but are now
| undesired because they apparently demand too much ("Who needs
| stable software, bleeeerrrrgh! Am I right guys?"). Yeah,
| screw Apple. I am back on the hamster-wheel employment grind
| now, sadly, but once I stabilize a bit more I'll just move to
| 2 HiDPI display and assemble a future-proof Linux workstation
| to go wit them. Pretty sure that with periodical thermal
| paste maintenance it can easily last me 10 years and I'd only
| change it if there's something seriously tempting out there
| (about which I am very doubtful; the tech giants were only
| worried about becoming oligopolists and they care not about
| their users' needs).
|
| Apple had its opportunities. They wasted them. Sure, many
| people will consider them the top for a while still and will
| keep buying, but their pricing policy has made it blindingly
| obvious that less people are buying and they are now doing
| their damnedest to compensate for this by either including
| less in the package, making the carton package itself
| cheaper, or just making all products except the base models
| outrageously overpriced. That's how they keep the profit
| margins. The curse of being a public-traded company and all
| that.
|
| Those policies will work for them. For some time more. I
| wonder what happens after.
| kstrauser wrote:
| Something's seriously wrong with your system. I just
| launched nvim on mine and couldn't measurably detect the
| interval between hitting enter to exec the command and
| seeing the welcome screen. Even opening and immediately
| quitting my substantially customized Emacs took 1.7s.
|
| Your setup should not be taking many seconds to do those
| routine things. Last time I experienced something like
| that, I had a dying harddrive that was logging a continual
| series of read timeouts.
| pdimitar wrote:
| That it shouldn't be like that we all agree with.
|
| My Neovim is heavily customized (AstroNvim) but again, it
| starts instantly on a supposedly weaker CPU.
|
| Any pointers on how do I find those read timeout events
| or any signs of dying hardware?
| kstrauser wrote:
| I don't have that one anymore to test it. I'd suggest
| using Disk Utility to check the entire drive for errors
| and ruling that out first.
|
| I don't want to sound like "it works on my machine", but
| what you're describing is so far out of expectations that
| I've gotta wonder if it's an error condition.
| pdimitar wrote:
| I think it's likely the impact of the mitigations against
| Spectre and Meltdown (iMac Pro uses older-generation Xeon
| W CPUs).
|
| And yeah I'll do the usual checks, disk health included.
| Been putting it off for a while anyway.
| kstrauser wrote:
| I really don't think it'd be those mitigations. Estimates
| I've seen floating around estimate it to be a total
| 15-25% performance hit when heavily loaded.
|
| For additional context, last weekend I went around to
| every old Intel Mac in a medical office to upgrade their
| OSes and some of the apps on them. None of them were
| speed demons, but they were all just proportionally
| slower than my much newer Mx Macs. Regular "small" apps
| still loaded quickly and were perfectly usable. This is
| in a busy office where any slowdowns that kept people
| from working at full speed would be fixed.
|
| And just because it works for me doesn't automatically
| mean it's got to work for you, of course. I'm not going
| to doubt your experience. It's more that what you're
| describing is so very different than what I'm seeing that
| it feels like there's got to be something more at play
| here.
| tonyedgecombe wrote:
| >> Apple is now in decline
|
| >I've been saying this since the butterfly-keyboard fiasco.
|
| It doesn't look like it: https://www.google.com/search?client
| =safari&rls=en&q=aapl&ie...
| diggan wrote:
| Obviously, by the context, it should be clear we're not
| talking about the stock price, probably the least
| interesting data point.
| tonyedgecombe wrote:
| What are you talking about then, market share? unit
| numbers? gross profit? net profit?
|
| If I was judging by the context I'd say it's just a good
| old cynical whinge which is OK but very subjective.
| diggan wrote:
| Quality, robustness, stability and longevity, especially
| important for developers and other professionals
| requiring quality hardware and software.
| pdimitar wrote:
| User goodwill. I'm a programmer and I can easily accept
| they don't care about us. Fine. But I've been hearing
| very casual users loudly complaining as well.
|
| At one point sales drop below what executives find
| acceptable. It has already started for iPhones and has
| been like that for several years.
| pdimitar wrote:
| There is a long tail of consequences for short-sighted
| policies and people monitoring stock prices always seem to
| be taken by surprise by them when they occur.
|
| You should include additional factors in your analysis.
| hbn wrote:
| Apple silicon Macs have been many people's favorite computers
| they've ever purchased (myself included) and blew out the
| value proposition for buying practically any other computer,
| unless you specifically need Windows for some reason.
|
| iPhones have gotten so good they can barely come up with
| anything new to add year-over-year. Young people in the west
| are almost exclusively buying iPhones because people like
| them.
|
| They basically own the tablet space, if you're looking for a
| tablet there's almost no reason to go with anything other
| than an iPad. Same for smart watches, they make the best
| selling watching in the world.
|
| For the amount of devices they move, they're shockingly
| reliable and have a smoother customer support / coverage
| system than any other company I've had to deal with. That's
| why people keep coming back.
|
| It's pretty bizarre to say they're in decline. The only area
| I can see active decline is how badly they let Spotify eat
| their lunch with music streaming when they used to basically
| own digital music distribution.
| fourfour3 wrote:
| Exactly. The 2016-2018 models were the low point, but Apple
| _has_ listened and _has_ improved since then.
|
| The 2019 16" was a step in the right direction. More ports,
| better cooling, better keyboard.
|
| The M1 Pro/Max line up brought back HDMI, MagSafe, SD card
| slots, and are seriously fast, quiet, & cool. The M2 and M3
| releases have been iterative performance improvements and
| haven't made any stupid decisions.
|
| Apple's also invested development effort into useful
| tooling for developers like their virtualisation framework
| - this has made Docker on Mac vastly more pleasant for
| instance.
| pdimitar wrote:
| If you find my statement bizarre then you're either super
| lucky or haven't paid much attention. Even their Photos app
| started making mistakes since iOS 18.
| rsync wrote:
| How many 4k screens can be attached?
|
| The published specs call out 3 6k screens but is that a display
| bandwidth limit or an arbitrary "screen" limit ?
|
| I'd like to drive four displays and 4k is sufficient for me ...
| possible? Perhaps with Number four on the HDMI port?
| ErneX wrote:
| Website says it supports 3 6K displays, here you go:
|
| M4 (Thunderbolt 4): - Up to three displays: Two displays with
| up to 6K resolution at 60Hz over Thunderbolt and one display
| with up to 5K resolution at 60Hz over Thunderbolt or 4K
| resolution at 60Hz over HDMI - Up to two displays: One display
| with up to 5K resolution at 60Hz over Thunderbolt and one
| display with up to 8K resolution at 60Hz or 4K resolution at
| 240Hz over Thunderbolt or HDMI
|
| M4 Pro (this one has Thunderbolt 5): - Up to three displays:
| Three displays with up to 6K resolution at 60Hz over
| Thunderbolt or HDMI - Up to two displays: One display with up
| to 6K resolution at 60Hz over Thunderbolt and one display with
| up to 8K resolution at 60Hz or 4K resolution at 240Hz over
| Thunderbolt or HDMI
| rsync wrote:
| OK, so unnecessary and arbitrary restrictions on screen
| numbers, once again.
|
| There is really no reason you couldn't drive four (or more)
| lower resolution (4k) screens, given the array of ports.
|
| In case anyone is wondering, the use-case here is a triple-
| monitor configuration at a desk with a much larger "TV"
| positioned, or hung, elsewhere in the room.
| wtallis wrote:
| USB PHYs aren't the same thing as display controller IP
| blocks. It's obviously possible to design a chip with more
| of the former than latter. At the hardware level, nothing
| is actually an arbitrarily-subdividible budget of display
| bandwidth.
| spiderfarmer wrote:
| Ergonomically one 6k display beats 4 displays by a mile.
| donatj wrote:
| It would appear the air intake is on the bottom like the Mac
| Studio.
|
| As someone who lives in a very dusty 150 year old house, My Mac
| Studio does not appreciate the air input being directly on the
| desk. It collects all the dust that lands anywhere near it.
|
| I have a large levoit air filter running 24/7 in my office and
| still end up with this[1] regularly. I wish I could at least
| reasonably take the thing apart to clean it out.
|
| 1. https://imgur.com/a/GSubONa
| perch56 wrote:
| Many people are eager to plug in their air purifiers and get
| started, but they often miss the fine print about checking
| inside the unit. Leaving the plastic bag on the filter
| basically turns the purifier into a fan, without any actual
| filtering. I saw someone post that they ran theirs like that
| for months before realizing it--no air getting filtered the
| whole time! Your dust photo reminded me, so just wanted to
| mention it in case you hadn't checked for the bag inside.
| donatj wrote:
| I replace the filter on mine every couple months. It's clear
| of bags and the filters are regularly filthy.
| xyst wrote:
| That's a shit ton of dust. Is this in an industrial factory?
|
| I agree that mine also gets dirty as well but nothing like your
| picture where it's caked there.
|
| I typically just wipe it clean after a couple of weeks. Can
| even go a month without any issues. I even have a dog that
| sheds like a mofo
| Hamuko wrote:
| My Mac Studio definitely has had a mat of dust surrounding
| the base intake.
| Someone1234 wrote:
| Three points:
|
| - Running an Air Filter 24/7 has huge diminishing returns (i.e.
| waste of electricity). They are best run at max fan speed for
| short durations instead.
|
| - Elevate it with a platform.
|
| - Get a vacuum (or even a robo vacuum). I grew up in a 100+
| year old house, it wasn't dusty, and had hard-woods/brick
| everywhere.
| Etheryte wrote:
| In many big cities, getting a lot of dust is nearly out of
| your control, the only factor you can control is how often
| you gather it all up. I used to live practically next to a
| four-lane road when I was younger and even if you kept the
| windows closed, the dust would still creep in with every
| coming and going. If you ever opened a window, you'd know
| you'd need to vacuum soon.
| gandalfgreybeer wrote:
| > Running an Air Filter 24/7 has huge diminishing returns
| (i.e. waste of electricity). They are best run at max fan
| speed for short durations instead.
|
| I did this experiment in two locations. If I'm in the more
| urban area, running the air filter 24/7 was necessary.
| graeme wrote:
| Agree on dust removal. But if you have a constant source of
| pollutant input such as air pollution, dust or pollen, you
| want to be running a filter 24/7.
|
| Large buildings don't run their HVACs in burst and then turn
| them off.
| spiderfarmer wrote:
| Maybe don't rely on air filters too much. I vacuum my office
| like every 2 days. Not even my air filter gets this dirty.
| Y-bar wrote:
| That's a lot of dust.
|
| However, I don't see how this leads to more dust going into the
| computer compared to e.g. front-facing ventilation.
|
| The dust landing on the desk next to the computer will slowly
| drift down onto the surface, passing right in front of any
| opening and being sucked into the device anyway.
| alberth wrote:
| If your Mac Studio is breathing that in, so are you.
|
| Please take care of your health. Just saying as a fellow HN
| friend.
| JKCalhoun wrote:
| I'm imagining Apple building a Dusty Old House in the middle of
| Apple Park ... for testing.
| dvk13 wrote:
| Does The barn [1] count? :)
|
| [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_Park#Historic_barn
| fraXis wrote:
| You need to buy this ASAP:
|
| Spigen LD202 Designed for Mac Studio Desktop Stand Mount with
| built-in Air Filter - Crystal Clear
|
| https://www.amazon.com/Spigen-Designed-Desktop-FIlter-Crysta...
| donatj wrote:
| Oh, I've looked at it. I'm not sure how much it would
| actually help? The holes of the filter seem rather large.
|
| This one from the related products actually looks maybe a
| little more promising
|
| https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0CL257227/
| pier25 wrote:
| wouldn't you have the same issue regardless of where the intake
| was positioned?
| BobAliceInATree wrote:
| I know it won't look great, but what if you run the studio
| upside down or on its side.
| xyst wrote:
| Positives:
|
| + form factor
|
| + ARM/Apple silicon/SoC
|
| Negatives:
|
| - Apple tax on memory, storage
|
| - non-upgradeable
|
| - Apple tax on 1GbE to 10 GbE ($100 surcharge lol)
|
| - maxes out at 64G of configurable memory w/ m4 pro
|
| Got to give it to Apple. The traunches between different
| configuration levels is "small" enough to convince buyers to
| enter the next level.
|
| It's like "hey, you are already at $4000 for m4 pro with 64g.
| Just spend an extra $400-$600 for that bump in storage. It's no
| biggy. We losing money at this point".
|
| I wonder how many consumers fall into this sunk cost fallacy
| scenario that Apple has designed.
| wwweston wrote:
| I'm at the point where I wonder what my options are for
| unauthorized capacity-expanding repairs.
| xyst wrote:
| I sub to a content creator on YT that does exactly this. The
| amount of tools and expertise to undue the Apple soldering
| can be intensive.
|
| He has done this for nearly every product line (iPhone, Mac
| Mini, iPads, ...)
|
| * Mac Mini storage upgrade https://youtu.be/ApAffuPAl5A
| badrequest wrote:
| I would genuinely be buying one today if the memory upgrades
| were half as much and I could go to 128GB or even 96.
| fallat wrote:
| > I wonder how many consumers fall into this sunk cost fallacy
| scenario that Apple has designed.
|
| Millions. Let that sink in.
| pjmlp wrote:
| Millions, all of those not able to set up a desktop computer
| for themselves, or if they do know, not willing to spend the
| effort.
| whywhywhywhy wrote:
| >I wonder how many consumers fall into this sunk cost fallacy
| scenario that Apple has designed.
|
| Almost all of them, and the lowest tiers of the entire lineup
| are essentially ewaste in a box just there to push a few
| hundred $ on you.
| tempoponet wrote:
| I have to disagree - the baseline models satisfy the needs of
| many casual consumers and the price point puts it within
| their reach. For $600, most of us could give this to our
| parents and it would be great for 7-10 years.
|
| For those who need more performance, better value is found at
| higher rungs of the product lineup, and this has been Apple's
| strategy for decades.
| hggigg wrote:
| Storage is usually a non issue on the desktop macs. Just hang a
| TB disk off the back of it. I've got a 2TB disk hanging off my
| 512Gb unit.
|
| Just ordered the base M4 Pro so will just plug that into it and
| carry on.
| fourfour3 wrote:
| $100 for the 10GbE upgrade doesn't seem unreasonable to me.
|
| A PCIe 10GbE NIC using the same Aquantia chipset as existing
| Macs is $80-$90. https://www.amazon.com/ASUS-XG-C100C-Network-
| Adapter-Single/...
|
| edit: in fact, compared to Apple's usual price gouging for
| extra RAM/SSD/etc it is _downright reasonable_.
| tiltowait wrote:
| Not to mention, the vast majority of people don't need 10GbE.
| Most users use WiFi and never touch Ethernet. Adding the
| functionality would just drive up the cost unnecessarily.
| drexlspivey wrote:
| I want to buy one of these and run it headless as a plex server
| and a few other things. It can handle multiple transcodes without
| sweat.
|
| Is there a solution to log in to the OS GUI over wifi (like from
| an ipad or mac) if I need to use it as a computer? It won't have
| a screen attached.
| xnx wrote:
| https://remotedesktop.google.com/
| jamesfmilne wrote:
| Yes, Apple Screen Sharing is built in. It's based on VNC. You
| can definitely run it from another Mac, although it's not a
| great experience with other VNC clients on Windows or Linux.
| They appear to have their own encoding via VNC, based on H264
| or HEVC, and falling back to the encodings supported by other
| clients is pretty laggy.
|
| NoMachine runs alright on macOS.
| nickv wrote:
| I do this exact thing with my M2 Mac Mini (plex, a few home lab
| things with no display).
|
| I use Chrome Remote Desktop to get into the box remotely. If
| the box does end up losing power/restarting, I also make sure
| to have SSH on so I can ssh into the box and start remote
| desktop before being logged in (Google provides instructions).
|
| I found this to be the path of least resistance to getting it
| remotely accessible.
| conacts wrote:
| What are opinions on refurbished macs? I got one and love it so
| far
| orangecat wrote:
| I've gotten a few over the years and they've been
| indistinguishable from new.
| krackers wrote:
| Official apple refurbished might even be better than new, they
| probably undergo more stringent testing after whatever repairs
| are made.
| whatever1 wrote:
| With the inclusion of a Thunderbolt 5 port, I think that apple
| might have a new high resolution, high refresh rate monitor in
| the works.
| yapyap wrote:
| carbon neutral, HA what nonsense.
|
| edit to clarify: I don't think reducing out carbon emissions is
| nonsense, that should be our top priority as a society, that's
| also (part of) why AI is quite shit honestly, I couldn't care
| less if they were just burning money by developing nothing
| burgers but they're also burning through all our natural
| resources at insane rates.
|
| However I do think the term "carbon neutral" is quite nonsensical
| and just seems like a term to make the consumer feel less guilty
| about themselves, hell sometimes it's even used to make the
| company execs feel better about themselvss. I didn't forget about
| that HORRIBLE, TERRIBLE "mother earth" commercial apple ran.
| DISGUSTING.
| hggigg wrote:
| Ordered base M4 pro already. Can finally get rid of my macbooks.
| Much prefer desktop machines and only use my iPad when mobile.
| tonyedgecombe wrote:
| I'm leaning towards that, phones have got so good now that I
| think I can manage without a laptop.
| bergheim wrote:
| So that's why a tram just drove into an apple store today [1].
|
| (4 got just minor damages, miraculously)
|
| 1: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/oct/29/tram-
| derails-a...
| grahamj wrote:
| It's just a store that sells Apple products, but anyway, pretty
| crazy!
| gjvc wrote:
| 16GB still seems tight in 2024
| danieldk wrote:
| Depends on what you are doing? Our daughter has the original
| Mac Mini M1 with 8GiB, has a habit to keep everything
| (PowerPoint, Word, DTP, web browsers, etc.) open and the
| machine is still lightning-fast.
|
| Developer that wants to run IntelliJ, a load of Docker
| containers, etc.? Sure, that's going to be tight, better get 32
| or 64 GiB.
|
| Remember that _many_ Mac users are just folks that do web
| browsing, Office, and a bunch of other things and 16GiB is
| going to be enough for a few years.
| syndicatedjelly wrote:
| > With M4, Mac mini can support up to two 6K displays and up to
| one 5K display, and with M4 Pro, it can support up to three 6K
| displays at 60Hz for a total of over 60 million pixels.
|
| Okay so how many displays can the base model Mac mini m4 support?
| Is it one 5K over HDMI and then 2 6K over 2 separate Thunderbolt
| 4 connections, for a total of 3 displays?
| js2 wrote:
| Be interesting to see how long till M4 shows up here:
|
| https://aws.amazon.com/ec2/instance-types/mac/
|
| Amazon will have to accommodate the new form factor. They've
| already had to accommodate the previous mini and the Studio.
| stego-tech wrote:
| I _love_ its form factor, less so the price difference between
| the M4 and M4 Pro models ($800 USD, presumably so it doesn't
| cannibalize the Studio). It looks small, friendly, and inviting
| to the user, despite not breaking its industrial aesthetic.
|
| Honestly kind of want one as a desktop, even though my M1 Pro MBP
| is still insanely powerful for my needs.
| jhickok wrote:
| I feel the same way. I have a really nice MBP and I cannot
| justify a dedicated desktop when a single thunderbolt cable to
| my laptop does the job just fine, but I do love the value and
| design. Maybe I'll pick one up _for the kids_.
| tootie wrote:
| To me, it really is just an aesthetic thing. What purpose does
| this actually serve? It's small, but not portable. If it's
| going under my desk or on a rack never to be moved or looked
| at, why does it need to be cute?
| tmountain wrote:
| I wish there was a way to use my existing M1 iMac as the display
| in conjunction with the Mac Mini. Ironically, this is preventing
| me from buying one of these.
| stevenae wrote:
| Airplay? Lunadisplay?
| vyrotek wrote:
| Note. The power button is on the bottom now.
|
| Does this mess up datacenters using Mac Minis in racks now?
| Hamuko wrote:
| Well, the whole form factor is different, so you'd need to
| redesign your Mac Mini racks anyways.
| Jiahang wrote:
| 120Gb/s !
| taneliv wrote:
| The Pro model seems to have 273Gb/s as per
| https://www.apple.com/mac-mini/specs/
| wtallis wrote:
| Gb/s is not the same as GB/s. 120Gb/s could be referring to
| the speed of Thunderbolt 5. You misquoted 273GB/s, the memory
| bandwidth of the M4 Pro.
| mitjam wrote:
| The larger M4 Pro with 64g RAM, 1 TB, 10 GBit/s lan is a nice
| system for content production and local inference at 2499,-
| dcchambers wrote:
| Honestly a fantastic update for this machine. So much bang for
| your buck at the entry level now that they've FINALLY made 16GB
| of RAM the baseline. And fully specced out with M4 Pro + 64GB of
| Ram makes this a serious powerhouse in a tiny box. I love it.
|
| I really want to see what they're going to do with the Studio
| this/next year. M4 Ultra could be insane.
| xmly wrote:
| Need Mac studio...
| modeless wrote:
| > With M4, Mac mini delivers up to 1.8x faster CPU performance
| and 2.2x faster GPU performance over the M1 model
|
| They're comparing three generations back now?
|
| Oh, I see that they never updated the Mini for M3. So it's only
| two generations of Mini. Still, I prefer to see one generation
| comparisons. And it's kind of weird that Apple doesn't keep their
| smaller product lines more up to date. They certainly have the
| resources to do so.
| gandalfgreybeer wrote:
| > They're comparing three generations back now?
|
| My guess is the leap from intel to M1 was significant for an
| upgrade and M1 vs M2/M3 wasn't really. I'm personally on an M1
| and use it heavily but I don't think I need the M4 jump still.
|
| The mini hardware is appealing to me though.
| hbn wrote:
| The other consideration is people don't upgrade their Macs
| every year. They're selling to people with several year old
| Macs.
|
| Though honestly my M1 Pro MBP from 2021 still performs so
| incredibly well I have no desire to upgrade anytime soon.
| Best computer I've ever purchased.
| non-nil wrote:
| They may have higher ambitions for this generation! In the
| presentation (roughly at the 10-minute mark), they show off the
| standard target demographics and setups for creative work, then
| complementing that with some more enterprise-flirty stuff about
| making workers more productive and lowering office energy usage,
| only to finish off with this:
|
| "And with the industry-leading reliability of macOS, healthcare
| systems can count on mini when providing critical care."
|
| A bit out of character, and also - what?!
| vbezhenar wrote:
| I wish they would add small UPS inside (like super-capacitor or
| something like that) there to provide way for forced sleep when
| power is cut off. It's a neat small device which must be
| accompanied by huge bulky UPS for reliable operation.
|
| If someone didn't know, macOS ignores fsync, so without UPS your
| data is not safe. Not an issue for laptops, obviously, but issue
| for battery-less devices.
| HenloFive wrote:
| You could use an USB C power bank, because it seems to be usb-c
| powered
| nicce wrote:
| Does it work 24/7 or have two power sources? Can you charge
| the powerbank at the same time so it will rely on the battery
| only when the power is down?
| quux wrote:
| Many power banks support pass through charging where it
| powers attached devices while also charging the battery
| holycrapwhodat wrote:
| It is not USB-C powered.
|
| It needs 100-240V, 50hz-60hz AC power.
| adib wrote:
| A missed opportunity though. If it's USB-C powered, it
| could be even smaller and Apple could simplify its BOM by
| including a MacBook Pro charger with it.
| TheFuzzball wrote:
| If it was USB-C powered people would be complaining about
| the size of the external power supply.
| apitman wrote:
| How does macOS guarantee no data loss when shutting down
| normally?
| int_19h wrote:
| If you need to guarantee that data is, in fact, written
| permanently, you use fnctl(F_FULLFSYNC).
|
| FWIW while fsync() on Linux does request that the drive
| flushes its hardware cache, it's up to the drive whether to
| actually honor this request, and many don't do so
| synchronously (but still report success). So unless you
| control the whole setup end-to-end - hardware and software
| both - you don't actually have the guarantees.
| apitman wrote:
| Thanks for the explanation
| toasterlovin wrote:
| Is it common for desktop computers in this size to have a built
| in UPS?
| laweijfmvo wrote:
| Apple really is the kind of cherry picking comparisons. They seem
| to compare the new Mini with the M1 Mini, the Core i7 Mini, and
| the M2 Mini, all in different categories, whenever it benefits
| them.
| 39896880 wrote:
| Can you think of any examples where a company trying to sell
| you something made unfavorable comparisons between their
| product and a competing product?
| threatofrain wrote:
| HTMX, I guess.
| theshrike79 wrote:
| I have a M1 mini, didn't want to upgrade before. This one might
| be a big enough bump that I'm seriously considering it.
| thefz wrote:
| From yesterday's iMac announcement:
|
| > The M4 chip brings a boost in performance to iMac. Featuring
| a more capable CPU with the world's fastest CPU core,(4)
|
| Then, deeper in the footnotes where no one ever reads
|
| > (4) Testing was conducted by Apple in October 2024 using
| shipping competitive systems and select industry-standard
| benchmarks.
|
| Basically, this is The Fastest CPU Ever* *we tested it, trust
| us.
|
| How can anyone still give money to this company is a mystery to
| me.
| palijer wrote:
| Only USB-C in the back front and back? I suppose this is a
| "BYOKVM" machine that is going to need a dongle to connect the
| keyboard and mouse...
|
| Even the iKeyboard I bought from them last year was lightning to
| USB-A and needed a dongle to connect to my Apple laptop.
|
| At least it has an HDMI port.
| hocuspocus wrote:
| USB-C monitors with a bunch of A ports (so, not from Apple) are
| pretty handy if that's important to you.
| kylehotchkiss wrote:
| This seems like such a cool home server... BUT with all the disk
| encryption stuff, you'd need to be logged in to run things,
| right? If the power goes out, your server does too?
|
| Does anybody have a guide or tips on how to make one of these
| better for hosting a website with cloudflare tunnel and being
| resilient to power outages?
| mike-cardwell wrote:
| UPS
| evgen wrote:
| Macs run decently as headless servers except for the limit that
| you cannot use full disk encryption -- the boot process stops
| and waits for you to provide the decryption key via local
| keyboard and there is no way around this. If you are concerned
| about this then you can look at running an encrypted external
| disk or a partition of an internal disk as an encrypted volume.
| You still need to decrypt things before everything starts
| working again but at least the system can boot for remote
| access. Yes, yes, this is not a secure as having the system
| fully encrypted and we can all think of various ways something
| like this can be compromised. It all depends on the threat
| model you are looking at.
| xenadu02 wrote:
| FileVault is not required. Daemons can still start without an
| Aqua session or user logged in. You can also still configure
| Aqua session auto-login.
| e63f67dd-065b wrote:
| With educational pricing this thing starts as $500, and at 16GB
| of RAM (finally) I think this easily beats any sort of desktop PC
| you can buy at that price (let's exclude custom builds, they're
| not the same market).
|
| I think this just became the go-to recommendation I'll give to
| anybody wanting an entry-level desktop computer of any kind. In
| fact I might buy one for my parents right now to replace the old
| mac mini they have. I really can't think of any reasonable
| competition for it at that price.
| zackymacky wrote:
| Help me understand the $500 starting price? I see $1250
| starting price on pre-orders from the education store.
| plushpuffin wrote:
| That's for the model with the M4 Pro chip.
|
| Mac mini with M4 starts at $599 (U.S.) and $499 (U.S.) for
| education.
|
| Mac mini with M4 Pro starts at $1,399 (U.S.) and $1,299
| (U.S.) for education.
| zackymacky wrote:
| My mistake! I was looking at M4 iMac pricing. So you still
| need a monitor on top of the $500 price, but that is a good
| entry point.
| xiasongh wrote:
| From the article
|
| > Mac mini with M4 starts at $599 (U.S.) and $499 (U.S.) for
| education. Additional technical specifications are available
| at apple.com/mac-mini.
| zackymacky wrote:
| It is true, I was on the Apple edu page and looking at the
| wrong computer. Thanks for the correction!
| tharos47 wrote:
| IMHO it's not as NUC style mini PCs with x86-64 CPUs from AMD
| and intel are really cheap and the 256Gb storage is way too
| small making the "real" price $200 higher for any sort of
| moderate usage.
| HumblyTossed wrote:
| Wish I still had a .edu email address...
| ikety wrote:
| You don't need one. There's just a checkbox asking you to
| pinky promise that you actually are a student
| lenerdenator wrote:
| You really think someone would do that? Just go on the
| internet and tell lies?
| jsight wrote:
| Noone ever lies or says sarcastic things on the internet.
| huijzer wrote:
| Do note only 256 GB of storage. Should be enough for most
| people, but at the same time can become very annoying once it
| gets full.
| setgree wrote:
| We can reasonably expect
|
| 1) external storage to become faster and cheaper every year
| (subject to constraints around interface)
|
| 2) more and more digital assets to be cloud-native, e.g.
| photos stored exclusively on icloud and not on your computer
|
| So I'm less worried about storage than some. If Asahi Linux
| achieves Proton-like compatibility with games [0], then we're
| getting closer to the perfect general purpose game console.
|
| [0] https://asahilinux.org/2024/10/aaa-gaming-on-asahi-linux/
| kridsdale3 wrote:
| With Thunderbolt 5, once external SSD enclosures supporting
| it exist, there should be zero performance penalty for
| external vs internal storage speed, finally. Then you can
| built a 1PB array, if you want.
| canucker2016 wrote:
| M4-based mac mini's (256GB storage) have Thunderbolt 4.
|
| If you need/require Thunderbolt 5, you'll have to step up
| from $599 to $1399+ for the M4 Pro-based mac mini's.
| SoftTalker wrote:
| Cloud storage is still painfully slow compared to local.
| setgree wrote:
| We can expect different storage solutions by product
| depending on how fast things need to be. It doesn't need
| to be lightning quick to load a frame in a movie, for
| instance, which is why streaming dominates there.
| NBJack wrote:
| Latency is a big problem for cloud gaming, and not likely
| to be solved any time soon.
| drilbo wrote:
| i think M4 support in Asahi is quite a ways out
| isametry wrote:
| Indeed. Realistically if anything, one should consider the
| "physical world" hassles with permanent external storage
| arguably more than performance ones:
|
| * Risk of accidental unplugging.
|
| * Contacts may become wonky over time - see above.
|
| * The need to sacrifice a port (or the portion of one in
| the case of a dongle).
|
| * Enclosures tend to have annoying IO lights.
|
| * Takes a bit of space.
|
| All of these can be solved, especially when dealing with a
| desktop that stays in place. Paradoxically, there was never
| a better time to be modest with internal storage.
|
| Although I will say:
|
| > photos stored exclusively on icloud and not on your
| computer
|
| Over my dead body :) If there's one thing I'll _always_
| happily carve out SSD space for, it's local copies of my
| photo library!
| dlachausse wrote:
| It's a desktop, so plugging in a USB external hard drive
| isn't too painful or expensive.
| eastbound wrote:
| Dockers can't run off external drives.
| kridsdale3 wrote:
| Why? Thunderbolt is PCI-E. There shouldn't be any
| difference between TB attached storage and adding disks
| to a desktop tower.
| slashdave wrote:
| That's an interesting claim. An external drive is just
| another block device. Is this something you experienced?
| dlachausse wrote:
| Since macOS is a UNIX system, can't you just use a
| symlink to the external drive or is there something
| specific about Docker that prevents this?
| Phrodo_00 wrote:
| Docker in macOS (at least the useful one) just runs in a
| Linux VM, and I don't see why you couldn't run a VM off
| an image on an external drive. Maybe the UI doesn't let
| you select that location?
| echoangle wrote:
| This doesn't seem to be true, and I don't even get what
| it would change if it were true. Developers aren't the
| target demographic of the base version with low storage.
| adib wrote:
| Docker on Mac works fine on external drive. I moved the
| storage volume on a rotating USB 3 drive.
| dmd wrote:
| That's news to me, who's doing it right now on my imac
| m1.
| pjmlp wrote:
| Which is a Linux and Windows technology anyway, so better
| buy something that offers first class support for them.
| holografix wrote:
| This is a conscious tactic so X% of customers say yes to
| using iCloud storage
| semanticist wrote:
| Apple offering expensive upgrades for storage and memory
| pre-dates the existence of iCloud storage by decades. It
| was entirely standard before MobileMe, or Apple offering
| any kind of "cloud" services.
|
| Apple just charge a lot of money for upgrades, even did
| when it was trivial to do them yourself, and they're not
| going to change once they made it impossible to do any kind
| of internal upgrade.
| Wytwwww wrote:
| You could upgrade pretty much all(?) Macs yourself back
| in those days, though
| timeon wrote:
| > With educational pricing I think this easily beats any sort
| of desktop
|
| > go-to recommendation I'll give to anybody wanting an entry-
| level desktop
|
| Can anybody get it with educational pricing?
| kridsdale3 wrote:
| If you enroll in a college.
| rootusrootus wrote:
| Or if you are parent to a student, including when the
| student is homeschooled. Or if you are a teacher.
| ikety wrote:
| yes, there's no verification system. You simply just state
| that you are a student
| timeon wrote:
| I had no idea. I'm not going to abuse it but still
| interesting.
| goosedragons wrote:
| There's still good deals in mini PC land. Yes, the M4 is faster
| but there's loads of mini PCs with decent CPUs, 32GB RAM and a
| 1TB of SSD storage for under $600. I think for a lot of people
| for basic usage they'll get more value out of the larger and
| upgradable SSDs than the faster CPU.
|
| https://www.amazon.com/BOSGAME-5700U-Displays-Computers-Emul...
| https://www.amazon.com/Beelink-SER5-Desktop-Computer-Graphic...
| supportengineer wrote:
| But you have to run Windows, which is a deal breaker for most
| people.
| risho wrote:
| seeing as how windows overwhelmingly owns the desktop
| market i would suggest it is in fact not a deal breaker for
| most people.
| matheusmoreira wrote:
| Why would you need to run Windows? Linux should work mini
| computers just fine.
| cultofmetatron wrote:
| I have a minisforum minipc. first thing I did was wipe
| windows and put popos on it. super happy with it. That
| said, getting anyone who isn't used to linux to usd
| anything other than windows as easy as pulling your
| teeth. People go towards whats familiar; Even when what's
| familiar is objectively trash that spies on you.
| matheusmoreira wrote:
| I don't try to get others to use Linux anymore. "Anyone
| who isn't used to Linux" can keep doing whatever it is
| they're already doing. So long as _we_ can use it, I 'm
| happy. I care about Linux usage only as far as it makes
| it harder for companies to ignore or block us.
| nervousvarun wrote:
| Just looked and Windows is running 73% of desktops/laptops.
| Can you provide a source showing "most people" find Windows
| a deal breaker? https://gs.statcounter.com/os-market-
| share/desktop/worldwide...
| NBJack wrote:
| Says who?
|
| Install your favorite flavor of Linux then. Beelink devices
| have a good reputation for being quite happy with a new OS.
| It's more compatible that the latest Apple devices, that's
| for certain.
| Thomashuet wrote:
| You don't have to, you can run your favorite flavor of
| Linux. Unlike with the Mac Mini which can only run macOS.
| pa7ch wrote:
| Asahi Linux has changed that equation for M1/M2 mac
| minis. I'm sure M4 will be supported soon.
| samatman wrote:
| Apple has never put any technical or legal obstacles in
| the way of installing other operating systems on Mac
| hardware. Nor do they assist in any way, it's consistent
| benign neglect.
|
| The old Intel machines made excellent Linux boxes,
| excepting the TouchBar era because the TouchBar sucked
| (it was possible to install Linux, it would display the
| fake function keys, they worked, but not a good
| experience). I've converted two non-TouchBar Mac laptops
| into Linux machines, with zero complaints, one of them is
| in current use (not the laptop I'm typing on this instant
| however).
|
| Now there's Asahi, which as a sibling comment points out,
| will surely be supported for M4 eventually. This is a
| great time to buy the M2 Minis and put Linux on them, if
| that's what you're into. Or you can wait around for the
| M4 port, whatever suits your needs.
| Tempest1981 wrote:
| BOSGAME and Beelink... who makes the motherboards?
|
| Nice size. The Beelink has better reviews. Any name brands?
| throwaway48476 wrote:
| They're OEM's. They're becoming name brands if you're the
| kind of person that follows micro PCs.
| magnio wrote:
| Beelink is well-known in the mini PC market.
| srid wrote:
| Which mini PC is recommended for those looking to run Linux
| (as a server, not desktop) on them?
| asciimov wrote:
| Go look into the N100 mini pcs like:
| https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BYJ9BC15
|
| It's a nice little low wattage machine for running some
| docker containers.
| alargemoose wrote:
| I would second this! The N100 is super efficient., and
| can often be found for around $150. I can also recommend
| looking at used intel "NUC" mini PCs if you're budget
| conscience. I have a couple of 5th gen i5 NUCs i got for
| $60 that that run multiple VMs and LXC containers as part
| of a Proxmox cluster.
| dzhiurgis wrote:
| I use one of these for home assistant, it's perfect.
|
| Ryzen one I got 2 years ago for my dad outperforms my M1
| pro.
| nextos wrote:
| Minix if your budget is $200-400. Cirrus7 if your budget is
| $500-1000.
|
| There are many other manufacturers. I am biased towards
| fanless builds, like those two.
|
| NUCs are also a great option, especially if you replace the
| case with a fanless Akasa one.
| Wytwwww wrote:
| > Cirrus7
|
| It starts EUR599,00 for 2(!) core Celeron. Seems absurd
| when you can get a Mini for an extra EUR100 (you can run
| Linux/Windows in a VM and still get a magnitude or few
| better perf). Or even an used old NUC or something, you'd
| need to go back very far to get a crappier CPU...
|
| So the actual starting price seems to be EUR900-1000
| (i.e. if you want an i5..)
|
| The Celeron G6900 has a 46W TDP and seems to be around
| ~20% (multicore) slower than the <10W N100. Seems absurd
| that they are pushing garbage like that at such prices
| (even if its the base config)
| nextos wrote:
| Cirrus7 is expensive because you are paying for a very
| high quality machined chassis & case that act as a
| massive fanless heatsink. Those alone are pretty costly.
| The price cannot be compared with cheap NUC clones and
| mini PCs, nor with Apple.
|
| I am not endorsing any particular brand, but Cirrus7 is
| not that expensive within the fanless market and the
| quality of the entire build is very high. They also
| somtimes offer nice discounts for students and SMEs.
| There are quite a few comparable brands and also DIY
| options with cases from Streacom or Akasa. If you want
| something cheaper, Minix is pretty inexpensive,
| especially when you take into consideration they offer a
| decent fanless enclosure.
| gymbeaux wrote:
| I bought one of these once. The specs on paper look good, but
| the CPUs are weak. They're like those U series Intel CPUs
| where you could get say an i7-7700U, with 4 physical cores
| and 8 total threads, but at 15W TDP you were never really
| going to benefit from the 4 cores and 8 threads.
| celestialcheese wrote:
| From my experience, TCO on most apple products ends up being
| roughly the same when you factor in resale value.
|
| You'll be able to sell your M4 mac mini in 5 years for $150
| for an instant-cash offer from backmarket or any other
| reseller, while you'd be lucky to get $30 for the equivalent
| Beelink or BOSGAME after 6 months on ebay.
| mkagenius wrote:
| Is there a black market for old macbooks/minis?
|
| My macbook pro 15 inch, mid 2017 is valued at $195 by apple
| trade in. Bought for 2k iirc.
| graeme wrote:
| https://www.ebay.ca/b/2017-Apple-MacBook-Pro-15-4-Inch-
| Lapto...
| singhrac wrote:
| No need for a black market, there's plenty of public ones
| (Backmarket, eBay, etc.). That being said $200 seems not
| terrible given the step change in performance since then
| (I own a 2019 MBP and think we were very unlucky with our
| purchase timing). Backmarket seems to sell yours for
| ~$350-500, so maybe you'll get a little bit more trade-in
| for it.
|
| I owned a 2014 MBP (~$1200?) for a long time and as late
| as 2019 it was resellable for $500.
| sylens wrote:
| It's a casaulty of the Apple Silicon transition. The
| Intel Mac's are not worth much
| diffeomorphism wrote:
| So wait 6 months and buy the equivalent beelink for $30
| instead of wasting $600 on the mac?
| drcongo wrote:
| I just checked out backmarket as I've been shopping for a
| mini PC with oculink and hadn't thought of them. They have
| a primary nav across the top of the site which has 5
| generic categories (laptops, consoles etc.), one Google
| product (pixel), 4 Samsung items, and 20 Apple items - more
| than all the others put together. I guess this very much
| proves your point.
| nordsieck wrote:
| > You'll be able to sell your M4 mac mini in 5 years for
| $150 for an instant-cash offer from backmarket or any other
| reseller
|
| If you want to put in a bit of elbow grease, you can get a
| much better deal. M1 Mac Minis in my area are regularly
| selling for $350+ on FB Marketplace right now.
| paulcole wrote:
| > I think for a lot of people for basic usage they'll get
| more value out of the larger and upgradable SSDs than the
| faster CPU
|
| Why exactly?
|
| What are a "lot of people" storing on their computers these
| days? Photos are in the cloud or on our phones. Videos and
| music are streaming. Documents take up no space. Programs are
| in the cloud (for the most part).
| heraldgeezer wrote:
| I would agree, but try and buy Dell, HP and Lenovo instead
| imo.
| sangnoir wrote:
| > I think this easily beats any sort of desktop PC you can buy
| at that price (let's exclude custom builds, they're not the
| same market).
|
| This is squarely in the NUC/SFF/1l-pc territory, and there is
| plenty of competition here from Beelink and Minisforum.
|
| I just found the Beelink SER7 going for $509, and it has an
| 8-core/16-thread Ryzen 7 CPU, 32GB DDR4. The 8845 in the
| beelink is very competitive[1] with M4 (beaten, but not
| "easily"), and also supports memory upgrades of up to 256GB.
|
| 1. https://nanoreview.net/en/cpu-compare/apple-m4-vs-amd-
| ryzen-...
| tmikaeld wrote:
| When you factor in memory bandwidth (80GB/s for DDR4) -
| that's not even close to the M4 (120GB/s base model).
| sangnoir wrote:
| Which regular desktop tasks are kneecapped by 80GBps memory
| bandwidth?
| marci wrote:
| You really start taking into account bandwidth when you
| need 64GB or more (which is rarelly).
|
| If it's audio/video, spawning VMs, it doesn't matter
| much. If it's for generative software, it might become an
| issue.
| mysteria wrote:
| If local LLMs become mainstream then you want as much
| memory bandwidth as possible. For regular home and office
| use two channels of DDR4 is more than enough.
| SSLy wrote:
| Unironically, small LLMs
| Aleklart wrote:
| It is not more than 60 Gb/s for extreme overclocked
| DDR4-4000 and sometimes much less than 50Gb/s for regular
| 3200 DDR5 is reaching 100 Gb/s overclocked for Intel, and
| 50-70 Gb/s in stock.
| LeoPanthera wrote:
| There's a huge difference there. Those PCs have to be ordered
| from Aliexpress, or some other Chinese site, or else from
| Amazon via a third party resellers that adds their own markup
| on top.
|
| Neither gets you any kind of useful warranty, at least for
| most people, who are unwilling to deal with overseas
| companies.
|
| Apple has actual physical stores, and a phone number you can
| call.
| sangnoir wrote:
| > Those PCs have to be ordered from Aliexpress, or some
| other Chinese site, or else from Amazon via a third party
| resellers that adds their own markup on top
|
| I anticipated this concern, the $509 I gave earlier is the
| Amazon price that includes the mark-up. The Beelink SER7
| costs only $320 on AliExpress.
|
| Modern solid-state electronics are very reliable, most
| reliability issues for electronics are related to screens
| or batteries; which desktop computers lack. I guess there
| was a bad-capacitor problem over a decade ago, but nothing
| since then. If your risk-aversion for a desktop computer is
| high, you pay the Apple premium (possibly buying
| Applecare), or self-insure by buying _2_ SER7s for nearly
| the same price ($640) as one regular M4 Mac Mini and keep
| the other one as a spare.
| ericmay wrote:
| IF you're ordering them in the context of a larger buying
| program like a university or other office you'd at least
| get some sort of account rep and Apple support as well.
| I'm not sure if you could get that from Beelink, could
| you? I see some benefit in that use case.
|
| But that's aside from the main topic which was the
| personal and home use case. On that topic you get a
| decent set of products as well such as Pages/Numbers/etc.
| and others along with software support for the Mac Mini.
| I'm guessing the Beelink runs on Linux? That may be hard
| for some to work with (which is unfortunate since it's
| really not), or maybe they have to separately buy a
| Windows license? Something to consider in the comparison.
| TomatoTomato wrote:
| Where can you get 2x128gb sodimms?
| sangnoir wrote:
| Crucial.com is my go-to, but you can also get them from
| Amazon.
| wtallis wrote:
| I'm not sure 2x64GB SODIMM kits are available yet.
| 2x128GB SODIMM kits would require memory chips that
| definitely don't exist yet.
| architect64 wrote:
| One issue to watch out for: Sub-4K res monitors look
| _surprisingly bad_ on newer versions of macOS with Apple
| Silicon Macs. And no, it 's not simply a matter of non-Retina
| obviously not looking as nice as Retina monitors - something
| like a 1440p monitor will look much worse on macOS than it
| would on Windows or Linux. This is partly caused by a lack of
| subpixel rendering for text on macOS, but it doesn't affect
| just text, with app icon graphics and such seemingly optimized
| for High-DPI resolutions only and thus looking awful too. You
| commonly see people using 3rd party apps such as BetterDisplay
| to partially work around this problem by tricking the system to
| treat 1440p displays as 5K displays and then downscale, but it
| doesn't solve this completely. So yes, the price for the
| machine is fantastic, but you may want to budget for a basic 4K
| display as well.
| stalfosknight wrote:
| Non-Apple displays have awful PPI, even the allegedly high-
| DPI ones.
| tasty_freeze wrote:
| How does that address the point the person you are replying
| to make:
|
| > something like a 1440p monitor will look much worse on
| macOS than it would on Windows or Linux.
| anemoknee wrote:
| Is this with newer Apple Silicon Macs? My 2020 M1 Mac Mini
| looks unremarkably normal on my 1440p display. I'm also going
| between that and my 14" M1 Pro Macbook Pro, which of course
| looks beautiful but doesn't really make the 1440p on the Mini
| 'bad'.
|
| Edit: Adding that both of these machines are now running
| macOS 15.1 at this time.
| gymbeaux wrote:
| In my experience, you can't do any sort of scaling with
| sub-4K displays. This is "since M1". Intel Macs, even on
| the latest macOS, can do scaling eg 1.5x at say 1440p,
| which last time I bothered with an Intel Mac required a
| workaround via Terminal to re-enable.
|
| But that workaround is "patched" on Apple Silicon and won't
| work.
|
| So yes if you have an Apple Silicon Mac plugged into a
| 1440p display, it will look bad with any sort of "scaling"-
| because scaling is disabled on macOS for sub-4K displays.
| What you're actually doing when you're "scaling" on say a
| 1440p display is running that display at 1920x1080
| resolution- hence it looks like ass. Back before Apple
| Silicon, running that 1440p display at "1920x1080" was
| actually just scaling the UI elements up to appear as
| though you had a 1920x1080 display- since it was still
| utilizing the full ...x1440 pixels of the display,
| "1920x1080" looked nicer than it would now.
|
| So brass tacks it's just about how macOS/OS X would
| obfuscate the true display resolution in the System
| Preferences -> Displays menu. Now with Apple Silicon Macs,
| "1920x1080" means "2x scaling" for 4K monitors and
| literally "we'll run this higher-res monitor at literally
| 1920x1080" for any display under 4K resolution.
| mmcnl wrote:
| BetterDisplay does this. It adds HiDPI resolutions which
| render at 2x and then downscales.
| gymbeaux wrote:
| If your 1440p monitor looks "fine" or "good", it's because
| the scale is 1x - for many people, including myself, UI
| elements are too small at 1x 1440p. I had to buy a 4K
| monitor so I could have larger UI elements AND crisp UI
| elements.
| vondur wrote:
| If you have a 1440P 27" monitor, they work great.
| isametry wrote:
| Basically operating at standard pre-Retina Mac DPI levels.
| The 27" Apple Cinema Display had exactly this resolution,
| as well as the 27" iMac before it went to 5K.
|
| I agree, it works... fine. But sadly more and more elements
| of modern macOS will look blurry / aliased because they are
| only made with hi-DPI in mind.
|
| For example all SF Symbols, as far as I know, are not
| defined as pixel graphics but only stored as vectors and
| rasterized on the fly. Which works great at high res and
| makes them freely scalable, but on low-DPI displays they
| certainly look worse than a pixel-perfect icon would.
| calf wrote:
| Is there a review that demonstrates and corroborates this
| issue? Is it a difficult problem if choosing to buy a new
| display for a Mac mini? My old display is 10 years old and I
| would have to get a new one then.
| baq wrote:
| It's most visible with the macbooks because you have the
| retina display and the low dpi display next to each other.
|
| In short: you probably want to get at least a 4k display
| anyway, but if you want to delay that, you should buy
| BetterDisplay. The difference is night and day.
| bni wrote:
| No, it looks great on my 1440p OLED. Windows on the other
| hand in old Control Panel for example it looks like ass.
| stogot wrote:
| My silicon Mac is fine on 27" 1080 10 years old display
| dogcow wrote:
| Came here to echo this. Also, it always amazes me how many
| people respond to warnings like this (as seen in this thread
| as well) saying lower-resolution displays look just fine. I
| returned a M2 Mac Mini solely because it looked so awful on
| all of my monitors -- I tried 2 different 32" 2k displays,
| plus a handful of 24" displays. Everything was fuzzy and
| awful looking. Not something that could be tolerated or
| ignored... Completely unusable. I feel like this fact is not
| well known enough.
|
| The fact that so many seem to tolerate "low-res" or "mid-res"
| displays on the current M-series Macs is really puzzling to
| me... maybe my eyesight isn't as bad as I thought it was and
| everyone else's is a lot worse!?
|
| This new M4 mini is tempting enough that I might try a Mac
| again... but this time I am definitely going to have to
| budget for a 4k/5k display.
| baq wrote:
| Can confirm, you absolutely need BetterDisplay and a tiny bit
| of elbow grease to configure the 5k clone to downscale to
| your real monitor. Not rocket science, but could be more
| streamlined.
|
| If you say it looks fine without it, I don't know what to
| say.
| mr_toad wrote:
| > you may want to budget for a basic 4K display as well
|
| Best investment you'll ever make. They're not all that
| expensive. Having experienced 4k I feel impoverished having
| to return to lower resolutions.
|
| I feel it's a travesty that workplaces spend thousands on
| fancy desks and chairs and cheap out on bargain basement
| monitors.
| ChumpGPT wrote:
| >I think this just became the go-to recommendation I'll give to
| anybody wanting an entry-level desktop computer of any kind.
|
| Perhaps you should check out some Beelink and GMKTec Mini PC
| Systems.
| rootusrootus wrote:
| Then you have to factor in supporting those systems, because
| you will be the one they call. This is one of the major
| upsides to family & friends buying Macs.
| throwaway48476 wrote:
| It's only a good deal so long as you don't pay for any of the
| extortionate upgrades.
| anoncow wrote:
| Imagine the used market. An amazing computer for just 300 usd
| is possible. Apple is doing amazing.
| kwanbix wrote:
| Sure, if they are used to macOS, this is a great option.
|
| But I wouldn't recommend it to people who are not used to it.
|
| I tried to recommend Linux, with XFCE setup as basically
| windows, and people complain. Same for ChromeOS.
| brundolf wrote:
| Genuine question: why do your parents want a desktop?
|
| These days the only reasons I see to get a desktop are
|
| 1. You need some combination of power/thermals or expandability
|
| 2. Kiosks, public computers, etc
|
| 3. Cost? Maybe?
|
| For pretty much any regular person in my life who's open to a
| mac, I'd point them towards a MacBook Air
| heraldgeezer wrote:
| I thought the same, sadly regional pricing...
|
| For half that price I can get a used Dell/HP/Lenovo mico/tiny
| PC with a full i7 CPU, 16GB RAM, 256SSD.
|
| Still good to see. Great for an office PC or HTPC.
| ksec wrote:
| As far as I am aware, there isn't a single competitor from big
| brand manufacture at $599 price point regardless of size. M4,
| 16GB RAM, Thunderbolt 4. The SSD is the main failing point but
| with TB4 you can easily get an external SSD. You can also get
| 10Gbps for extra $100. With EDU or Staff pricing this thing stars
| at $499. Which is practically a steal.
|
| I am thinking it may be better for cooperate to buy this and run
| Windows on VM than buying a PC.
|
| Considering iPad and iPhone has been replacing 99% of my workflow
| outside of office I am thinking if my next computer could be a
| mini rather than a Laptop.
| xenospn wrote:
| I'm always confused as to why people are so paranoid about
| storage size. I got the base MacBook Air and an external 2TB
| drive for cheap. Super fast and I never worry about anything -
| I didn't even manage to get up to 50% of my 256GB drive.
| birdgoose wrote:
| I agree with your sentiment but I feel like many people just
| don't like the idea of carrying around
| dongles/cables/hdds/etc with their laptops.
| greenpresident wrote:
| There is a generation of tech users that downloaded TB of
| media for local storage. It's just not something a lot of
| people do anymore but it created a psychological need, even
| if it's not a technical necessity.
| heraldgeezer wrote:
| I mean have you noticed how bad streaming services have
| gotten...
| rafaelturk wrote:
| The presenters look so stiff and rehearsed, and the makeup and
| lighting are so bland that it feels like an AI-generated video!
| sroussey wrote:
| I was really hoping for upgraded monitors today.
| OnionBlender wrote:
| Is there a good performance benchmark website/channel for Mac
| hardware? (Once reviewers get their hands on the hardware)
|
| I'm trying to decide if I should get the Pro or the base model
| mini. I've been learning Swift and Metal using an old work
| Macbook and I want to get my own hardware. The only games I play
| recently at Factorio and Baldur's Gate 3, so I was thinking
| perhaps I should get the Pro and not bother upgrading my desktop
| (an i7 6700k from 2015).
| LargoLasskhyfv wrote:
| When will the 819.2 GB/s memory bandwith of the M2 Ultra be
| topped? With about one TB/s, say?
|
| Otherwise I'm unimpressed.
| int_19h wrote:
| Surely that won't show up in Mac Mini, though...
| franczesko wrote:
| Ryzen mini pcs seem to beat this in most of scenarios. Does
| anyone see clear advantages?
| srid wrote:
| Is there a particular brand recommended for someone looking to
| run Linux server (not Windows or Linux desktop)?
| Flux159 wrote:
| I have a Minisforum UM690S, it's about the same size
| (5x5x2.25 inches) and works well as a small machine. They
| just announced the EliteMini AI370 today that has the latest
| AMD laptop chip with 12 cores/24 threads - I assume that
| would also be a decent linux server (note that ram is
| soldered on that one).
| farawayea wrote:
| Does this still have soldered flash chips for the SSD? This
| would've looked a lot better without the soldered non-upgradable
| SSD. It's not great at all.
|
| This guy will probably have a lot of clients
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E3N-z-Y8cuw.
| ErneX wrote:
| Yes, but that's easy to solve via USB
| farawayea wrote:
| That's not a solution when your main SSD dies. The system no
| longer boots. The guy from the youtube video explains that as
| well.
|
| Normal computers with NVMe storage will always be more
| repairable than Apple's hardware with everything soldered on
| the board.
| reaperducer wrote:
| _That 's not a solution when your main SSD dies. The system
| no longer boots._
|
| Is that new? I ran an iMac with a dead internal drive off
| of an external Thunderbolt drive for several years.
| farawayea wrote:
| I've watched that guy's video. The Apple arm64 Macbook
| Pro doesn't even charge without a functional SSD. I
| suspect it also doesn't boot off anything else if its
| main SSD is dead.
| xenospn wrote:
| You can boot Macs from external drives.
| farawayea wrote:
| Yes, you can. Can you boot them from external drives when
| their internal SSD is dead? This isn't about booting them
| when their OS is wiped out.
|
| Having a dead SSD seems to kill these computers. That's
| expected for something with soldered flash chips.
| ErneX wrote:
| No that's not a solution for that. I meant it if you need
| more space down the road.
| klum wrote:
| Somewhat unrelated but Apple are mainly focusing on Apple
| Intelligence in these new announcements.
|
| The first version of OS X I used was Mavericks. In hindsight,
| that was the last great version of OS X for me -- the last
| version where it seems the priorities of the people deciding the
| direction of development where somewhat aligned with mine.
|
| Many have written about the decline in usability and attention to
| detail in OS X since then -- I guess Apple Intelligence
| represents this shift in focus perfectly: a black-box interface
| that may or may not do something along the lines of what you were
| intending.
| diimdeep wrote:
| From what I gather from x.com gamedev corner of the web and
| elsewhere [1] is that Apple hardware is completely unusable for
| them still, or even more so after switching to alien ARM arch
| relative to desktop x86-64 PC.
|
| I wish Apple would invest in gaming, so that we won't have such a
| capable hardware allocating puny market-share of only 2%
| according to Steam survey. [2]
|
| [1] https://gamesbymason.com/2023/08/21/way-of-rhea-
| linux/#way-o...
|
| [2] https://store.steampowered.com/hwsurvey
| znpy wrote:
| > just 5 by 5 inches
|
| It's basically an Intel NUC, 12 years later.
| lenerdenator wrote:
| _sigh_
|
| C'monnnn. Give us custom colors, like you already do for the
| iMac.
|
| Otherwise seems like a fine machine for those who want UNIX and
| energy efficiency.
| not_your_vase wrote:
| Funny thing that when I look at it, $600 is objectively cheap,
| not only by Apple standards - I remember 8 or 9 years ago I
| really-really wanted a Mac Mini, but just couldn't afford the 320
| EUR (including like 10 EUR IBMer discount) they asked for the
| base model back then, new. Inflation happens on strange ways...
| objclxt wrote:
| The entry-level 2014 Mac Mini had a launch price of 499 EUR,
| I'm not sure it was ever that cheap new. If anything the price
| has deflated.
| echoangle wrote:
| With the iMac yesterday and this now, what are the odds of new
| MacBooks (Air?) in the coming days?
| c0nsumer wrote:
| I'm finding this monitor:
|
| https://press.asus.com/news/press-releases/asus-proart-5k-pa...
|
| ...to be looking really appealing to pair with one of these new
| Mac Minis.
|
| $899 MSRP in the US, 5120 x 2880, same dimensions as an Apple
| Studio Display but a lot cheaper... And B&H just got them in
| stock.
|
| Just ordered one myself, now I need to pick which variant of the
| Mac Mini M4 to pair it with. (My goal here is replacing a 27"
| Intel iMac for map making / CAD / DTP type stuff.)
| crakhamster01 wrote:
| I've always loved the form factor/pricing of the Mac Mini, but
| I've never been able to convince myself to buy it. If you're able
| to afford a Macbook/MBP, is there any reason why someone would
| purchase the Mini? Seems like the former gets you the same
| performance with the benefit of portability.
| sharno wrote:
| It's portability for a price especially if you already have
| your own peripherals
| rootusrootus wrote:
| The MBP is over twice as much and you're still going to buy a
| keyboard, mouse, and screen for your desk. Portability is nice,
| but for many people I suspect the use case is too narrow -- for
| most things you need to do when you are not at your desk
| computer, the smartphone suffices.
| crakhamster01 wrote:
| Yea that's a fair point. I live in a small apt so I often
| find myself working anywhere other than my desk, but I
| imagine there's a lot of folks that prefer the niceties of a
| dedicated workspace (monitor, keyboard, etc).
| vid wrote:
| So Apple just released their new caste-defined product line.
| Sure, they're technically good. But I don't know how they can
| claim any vision aligned with any legacy, they're basically a
| shiny walled-garden Dell.
| wslh wrote:
| Does this new Mac Mini is fanless?
| bilsbie wrote:
| Can I train LLM with this?
| bilsbie wrote:
| Would this make a good gaming computer?
| nicce wrote:
| Depends on what you play. It can probably play most games
| already. For high-end graphics, you would need GeForce Now
| (which works on M series Macs flawlessly btw).
| fourfour3 wrote:
| Not really.
|
| Most games are still released for Windows + x86 (AMD/Intel).
|
| Proton on Linux works wonders on AMD/Intel CPUs, but your best
| bet is still Windows.
| Reubend wrote:
| No. Game compatibility is still a big issue for many AAA
| titles, and the GPU is still not nearly as powerful as a
| dedicated graphics card from NVIDIA or AMD.
|
| However, this is a fantastic general purpose machine for things
| like light web browsing, text editing, coding, etc.
| catlikesshrimp wrote:
| Duplicate of:
|
| New iMac with M4 (apple.com) 509 points by tosh 1 day ago | flag
| | hide | past | favorite | 1058 comments
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41971726
| albastru wrote:
| Buyers beware: the current Apple cloth is not compatible with the
| new Mac Mini.
| newman314 wrote:
| Looks like it is not a big price differential to get 4x the
| cheapest Mac mini vs. a fully loaded 64GB mem version with the
| Mac mini Pro. That and we would end up getting more GPU cores
| (4x10 vs. 20).
|
| And if this is cross connected with TB4 networking and using
| exolab, might be good for a nice local setup.
|
| Anyone up to try this out?
| pixelready wrote:
| Does anyone know how well Asahi Linux supports M4? I only see M1
| and M2 listed on the website, but I'm not sure how often it gets
| updated. I think thunderbolt displays are still a pain point as
| well?
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