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The Mac mini isn’t dead yet, says Tim Cook.

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It would appear that many people secretly love the Mac Mini. It's a pretty machine and it's super compact but it's just a bit dated and the value for money on the current models is extortionate even for a Mac.

 

A customer emailed Tim Cook and the response has been made public.

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More than 1,000 days have passed since Apple updated its Mac mini hardware. Since then, Apple has launched the Apple Watch, AirPods, the retina MacBook, and the Touch Bar MacBook Pro. Meanwhile, the Mac mini has existed in a state of arrested development. You'd be forgiven for considering the possibility that the product has been living its last days. But in an e-mail to an Apple customer today, Apple CEO Tim Cook said the Mac mini isn't going anywhere.

The customer, who goes by the name Krar, e-mailed Cook to note that the Mac mini hasn't seen an update in three years. Krar wanted to know, "Are we are going to see anything in the pipeline any time soon?" Cook's response, which was shared on MacRumors, said:

 

This is what Tim Cook had to say about the Mac Mini:

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I'm glad you love the Mac mini. We love it too. Our customers have found so many creative and interesting uses for the Mac mini. While it is not time to share any details, we do plan for Mac mini to be an important part of our product line going forward.

 

 

As Ars Technica further notes, the Mac Mini in it's current configuration and price isn't terribly appealing when so many other options exist at the same price.

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He's not saying much, but even confirmation that this product has a future is in some ways surprising. The entry-level Mac mini still runs on Haswell processors and Intel HD 5000 integrated graphics. It comes with only 4GB of RAM. It starts at $499, but other compact desktops offer much more current specs at that price point. The mini is clearly long overdue for an update, but because it's unclear which direction Apple might take the device with future iterations, it seemed like a safe bet that its time on the market was drawing to a close.

 

I personally thought the Mac Mini was on it's way out. The only way I could possibly see this having a future is in Education and possibly some consumers. I don't think professionals are purchasing Mac Minis in 2017.

 

So what do you guys and gals think?

 

Source:

https://arstechnica.co.uk/gadgets/2017/10/the-mac-mini-isnt-dead-yet-says-tim-cook/

Edited by AluminiumTech
Fixed error.

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11 minutes ago, patrick3027 said:

I stopped caring when they locked it down and removed all the modulable parts.

But why? Almost anything in the same price bracket isn't terribly upgradable if at all.

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He can say it all he want, it doesn't change the fact that it's ancient, was never a good deal in the first place, and is now worth about a third of its price. Apple clearly doesn't care internally either, since they haven't touched it in years. They may come out with a new product eventually, but they are obviously in no rush to do it. Perhaps they'll come out with an arm version, if they start designing their own cpus for macs as rumored.

Just now, AluminiumTech said:

But why? Almost anything in the same price bracket isn't terribly upgradable if at all.

NUCs let you pick your cpu, ram and storage. They also come with actual desktop cpus and not ULV garbage from 2013.

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Just now, Sauron said:

He can say it all he want, it doesn't change the fact that it's ancient, was never a good deal in the first place, and is now worth about a third of its price. Apple clearly doesn't care internally either, since they haven't touched it in years. They may come out with a new product eventually, but they are obviously in no rush to do it. Perhaps they'll come out with an arm version, if they start designing their own cpus for macs as rumored.

NUCs let you pick your cpu, ram and storage. They also come with actual desktop cpus and not ULV garbage from 2013.

Actually, for a while they haven't.

 

A lot of NUCs use U series ULV CPUs.

 

I suspect Apple will refresh the Mac Mini with a 4 Core 8 Thread Coffee Lake i5 and i7 soon enough.

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31 minutes ago, AluminiumTech said:

Actually, for a while they haven't.

 

A lot of NUCs use U series ULV CPUs.

Wait, really? Then they make no sense just as much as the MM.

 

Still, you can get something like this which at least has the option to pick your own ram and storage and has a cpu from last year instead of 4 years ago. Even with 8gb of ram and a good ssd it's over 100 bucks cheaper than the lowest end mac mini, which has 4gb of ram and a crappy hard disk (making it unusable by my standards).

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1 hour ago, AluminiumTech said:

snip

I really hope im not dreaming, but you seem to be unbiased against apple for the very first time (or the first one I've read) even though there were reasons for being biased. Well, I'd like to give you a cookie :P

 

Coming to the report, this is one of things that irritates me about Apple. It's not like they dont have enough man power or money to upgrade the bloody thing. And it's not like they even have a lot of products in the first place. Either scrap it or upgrade it. These stupid things are one of the reasons apple starts getting unwarranted hate.

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6 minutes ago, RedRound2 said:

Coming to the report, this is one of things that irritates me about Apple. It's not like they dont have enough man power or money to upgrade the bloody thing. And it's not like they even have a lot of products in the first place. Either scrap it or upgrade it. These stupid things are one of the reasons apple starts getting unwarranted hate.

How is it unwarranted if they are indeed doing something stupid or greedy? Isn't that warranted by definition? But I agree it's bad.

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Didn't they kill it with the removal of upgrade ability+the ODD?

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44 minutes ago, Sauron said:

How is it unwarranted if they are indeed doing something stupid or greedy? Isn't that warranted by definition? But I agree it's bad.

I mean they do alot of good things for the industry. Half the time, they're pushing forward the industry (and this is one company vs. 100 other we're talking about). But yet for some reason they still get hated on even if they do something legitimately good. You can't deny that. Apple haters are one of the worst people I've come across the internet.

My speculation is that these few stupid things are the reason for people hating them. There's a saying that no matter how much good you do, people will still point out in that one mistake you did. It's typical human nature and we need to grow out of it.

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4 minutes ago, RedRound2 said:

Apple haters are one of the worst people I've come across the internet. 

It goes the other way around for fanboys as well. The story has 2 sides. 

Either way we have a lot to be thankful to Apple. 

To come back to topic. I know quite a few Apple die hards and people that develop software for their platform as well as people who live exclusively in their ecosystem. Yet I've never even heard someone mentioning Mac Mini, or a person who knows a person who owns one. 

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1 minute ago, RedRound2 said:

I mean they do alot of good things for the industry. Half the time, they're pushing forward the industry (and this is one company vs. 100 other we're talking about). But yet for some reason they still get hated on even if they do something legitimately good. You can't deny that. Apple haters are one of the worst people I've come across the internet.

My speculation is that these few stupid things are the reason for people hating them. There's a saying that no matter how much good you do, people will still point out in that one mistake you did. It's typical human nature and we need to grow out of it.

I can point out things that I find stupid or greedy in almost every product they push out, as well as many things in the industry that I think are worse because of apple - some of it is certainly a matter of opinion, but the "hate" definitely doesn't come exclusively from the more blatant nonsense that even apple fans agree on.

 

With that said, rest assured I'm ready to blast any company for doing the same, stupid things. Just like I consider the macbook to be utter garbage, the same goes for every other overpriced ultrathin which sacrifices practicality and performance for the "paper cutter" record.

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With macbook's compact form factor and fanless design, just imagine what apple can do with the next gen "mac mini".

 

Just wait for next year, the whole mac desktop line up is gonna get a complete refresh. 

 

I hope they dont put a ridiculous price tag on it. But since it is apple.... the chance is THIN. 

If it is not broken, let's fix till it is. 

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I'd say it is dead as I've never heard of it until this thread, and given how apple's sales depend entirely on advertising rather than spec it clearly has failed.

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My dad is a Mac guy and only uses a Macbook Air, Mac Mini, or iMac, so this is good for him...I guess...

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1 hour ago, AresKrieger said:

I'd say it is dead as I've never heard of it until this thread, and given how apple's sales depend entirely on advertising rather than spec it clearly has failed.

I've heard of them. They're not super popular by any stretch of the imagination.

 

I've seen 2 or 3 IRL whereas I've seen over 30 iMacs in my life thus far.

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i always saw the mac mini as a good thing. its the cheapest way to get into mac os with a hacintosh. it is a good little machine for those who want to get mac os and keep their monitor. 

 

p.s. i have never owned a modern mac. my dad has a very old mac that doesn't have a graphical interface.

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2 hours ago, Bouzoo said:

Yet I've never even heard someone mentioning Mac Mini, or a person who knows a person who owns one.

I've seen quite a few of them. They're seldom used as personal computers, almost always just as a set top box with more functionality and storage, by businesses.

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1 hour ago, AresKrieger said:

I'd say it is dead as I've never heard of it until this thread, and given how apple's sales depend entirely on advertising rather than spec it clearly has failed.

Really? You've never even heard of a mac mini? I guess I'm just getting old then :P they used to be fairly popular 10 years ago or so.

9 minutes ago, SuperCookie78 said:

i always saw the mac mini as a good thing. its the cheapest way to get into mac os with a hacintosh. it is a good little machine for those who want to get mac os and keep their monitor. 

The question I would ask is, what do you specifically need mac os for that is worth going with a slow and outdated machine? The base model doesn't even have an ssd (or "fusion drive" for that matter)... I have a similar machine - bought by my parents almost 10 years ago, it has a core 2 duo and 4gb of ram, not too far from the current base mac mini's specs - which went from slow and frustrating to perfectly fine for basic use just by swapping the hard disk for a cheap ssd.

2 hours ago, mrchow19910319 said:

With macbook's compact form factor and fanless design, just imagine what apple can do with the next gen "mac mini".

 

Just wait for next year, the whole mac desktop line up is gonna get a complete refresh. 

 

I hope they dont put a ridiculous price tag on it. But since it is apple.... the chance is THIN. 

Honestly I'd take a macbook motherboard in a mac mini chassis as an insult if I were a fan :dry: what's the point of buying a desktop if it contains tablet level hardware? Might as well grab one of those core M convertibles that cost roughly the same, at least those come with a screen and a battery.

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2 minutes ago, Sauron said:

Really? You've never even heard of a mac mini? I guess I'm just getting old then :P they used to be fairly popular 10 years ago or so.

The question I would ask is, what do you specifically need mac os for that is worth going with a slow and outdated machine? The base model doesn't even have an ssd (or "fusion drive" for that matter)... I have a similar machine - bought by my parents almost 10 years ago, it has a core 2 duo and 4gb of ram, not too far from the current base mac mini's specs - which went from slow and frustrating to perfectly fine for basic use just by swapping the hard disk for a cheap ssd.

Honestly I'd take a macbook motherboard in a mac mini chassis as an insult if I were a fan :dry: what's the point of buying a desktop if it contains tablet level hardware? Might as well grab one of those core M convertibles that cost roughly the same, at least those come with a screen and a battery.

lets say you grew up a mac kid with you parents buying macs for you but then you are in college and you need to buy a computer and you don't feel comfortable with a windows pc so mac mini is a goid choice. its also good if you had a mac for long time and it finally dies and you need a new one with a limited budget. 

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1 minute ago, SuperCookie78 said:

lets say you grew up a mac kid with you parents buying macs for you but then you are in college and you need to buy a computer and you don't feel comfortable with a windows pc so mac mini is a goid choice. its also good if you had a mac for long time and it finally dies and you need a new one with a limited budget. 

It doesn't take long to get comfortable enough with windows to do office work... it sounds like a pretty contrived scenario with the guy making some pretty poor choices. I can see how someone might think that way, but I'd definitely consider it a mistake.

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3 hours ago, Bouzoo said:

It goes the other way around for fanboys as well. The story has 2 sides. 

Honestly, I'd say that Apple haters are generally far worse than Apple fanboys.

 

Back OT, it would be really nice if they'd upgrade the Mac Mini -- I also wouldn't complain about a bit of a lower price. There's a very good chance I would get my mom one. (2.6ghz 4c/4t i3 (mobile or not) option w/ 8GB ram around $500 please)

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4 hours ago, Sauron said:

I can point out things that I find stupid or greedy in almost every product they push out, as well as many things in the industry that I think are worse because of apple - some of it is certainly a matter of opinion, but the "hate" definitely doesn't come exclusively from the more blatant nonsense that even apple fans agree on.

Really? If you do, its probably same with all other companies. After all they're bushiness. But please also list the kind of moving industry forward things that that an specific competing company has done.

4 hours ago, Sauron said:

With that said, rest assured I'm ready to blast any company for doing the same, stupid things. Just like I consider the macbook to be utter garbage, the same goes for every other overpriced ultrathin which sacrifices practicality and performance for the "paper cutter" record.

You should realize that you nor I are not the entire consumer list. In fact we make up probably only 10%. I know so many people who would prefer a very thin and light with good battery life and great hardware as a serious choice for their next laptop. Not everyone needs the power of an i3 processors these days since almost 90% of usage scenario are web based and office productivity suites

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4 hours ago, Bouzoo said:

It goes the other way around for fanboys as well. The story has 2 sides. 

Can't really agree with that. Given what I've seen in the forums, most of them are religious. And there's alot of examples on this forum to illustrate the same

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