- Average user rating: 3.5 stars out of 405 reviews Back to product review
- My rating: 0 stars
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5 out of 7 people found this review helpful
4.5 stars
"Excellent first Mac for PC users - surprisingly powerful!"
Pros: Small, Quite, stable OS, VERY easy to use, reliable, inexpensive and attractive.
Cons: Minimally configured RAM is insufficient; Hard Drive is slow, VRAM is low, Firewire 400 outmoded.
Summary: While I chose the 1.42 mini maximally configured ($873 from Apple Store). The only thing different about the 1.25 is the CPU. All the options for larger HD, DVD/CD burning superdrive and RAM are the same.
The store had a 1.25 on display (with 512MBs) which had Adobe Photoshop installed. I played with it for a little bit and was quite surprised and impressed with it's performance.
I would have liked to see a couple things differently, but obviously, none were enough to prevent me from buying my first Mac in my Mac SE-30 that I retired about 15 years! Those suggestions, if Apple history is a good indicator, Apple will offer a refreshed Mac mini in some 6 months with some upgrades and improvements...
More Systems RAM - It's already been announced that following Tiger's release, all Macs will come with 512MB, so hopefully the 1GB upgrade will take the price point of the 512 now (Note, I upgraded to 1GB by purchasing a pqi 1GM memory module from newegg.com for $132, including shipping and installed it myself)
Faster Hard drive - At 4200rpm, the drive is the biggest hold-up in the performance of the system once the Ram has been increased. Making 5400rpm drives standard would be very welcome.
More Video RAM (VRAM) - At 32MBs is a little shy of todays standards. They should make this upgradable or standardise on at least 64MBs and preferably 128MBs. This would, by all accounts, be more noticeable with Tiger, so I do see one of these changes as likely.
Faster FireWire. - I really don't understand why they only implemented FireWire 400. They really should have done 800. Maybe with the refresh?
Other things I would like to see, and see likely in the refresh...
Faster CPU - While I have no complaints about the performance of the 1.42 (and the 1.25 seemed equally fine), I would still like to see them offer at least the 1.5Mhz and 1.67Mhz G4s as found in the current crop of PowerBooks as well. I have heard many gripe about Apple using the G4, but until the heat issue is resolved, the G5 in the Mini's case size is unlikely... Maybe if they come out with a taller version of the cae (a la Cube), it's feasible. They could call it the Mac midi (but maybe musicians would get confused and expect to see MIDI ports on the back... hehe).
All in all, I think the mini is awesome. I bought the Bluetooth Apple keyboard, but being an MS Windows user for the last 15 years, I needed a two-button mouse, so I got the Logitech MX1000 Wireless Laser mouse as an upgrade from my older, worn out MX500. I also bought new Altec Lansing speakers ($300), but stuck with my ViewSonic P90F 19" CRT for a display.
One thing is sure, I am totally bitten by the Mac bug and my very high end PC has been relegated primarily to acting as an overpowered file server!
Apple Mac Mini (1.25GHz):
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