BH: New Apple Mac Mini with Apple M1 Chip (8GB RAM, 256GB SSD Storage)

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11-19-2020 at 09:48 AM #2

Memory and SSD are soldered to the board. So 0 upgradeability here.

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11-19-2020 at 09:53 AM #3

Quote from newoldthing01 :

Memory and SSD are soldered to the board. So 0 upgradeability here.

As a person who has always preferred the UI of Android and Windows over anything Apple designs, I can honestly say that the RAM upgradeability is moot for most people in this budget range because of Apple's software and hardware integration/ecosystem. An iphone with 4gb of RAM is significantly more efficient than an Android phone running 12gb. I hate that their hardware is so good, because I really do hate their UI, but the M1 is an engineering marvel. I'll probably wait for the M2, but my days fighting Apple fans are waning.

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11-19-2020 at 10:04 AM #4

For Costco members, the Mac Mini is 669 and includes an extra year of Costco warranty.

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HIDDEN 11-19-2020 at 10:55 AM

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11-19-2020 at 11:00 AM #6

You're better off buying Apple giftcards at Best Buy, then buy the mac from Apple direct. It's effectively 20% back in best buy giftcards due to the promi at best buy

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11-19-2020 at 11:44 AM #7

Quote from armcollector :

You're better off buying Apple giftcards at Best Buy, then buy the mac from Apple direct. It's effectively 20% back in best buy giftcards due to the promi at best buy

And where is that promo?

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11-19-2020 at 12:04 PM #8

Quote from rndman :

And where is that promo?

https://www.bestbuy.com/site/blac...8908893088

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11-19-2020 at 12:11 PM #9

Quote from drehill :

https://www.bestbuy.com/site/blac...8908893088

Thanks..

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11-19-2020 at 03:37 PM #10

Quote from newoldthing01 :

Memory and SSD are soldered to the board. So 0 upgradeability here.

well memory is included on the chip die, so I don't think that's a concern at all since it's all a unified memory bank.

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11-19-2020 at 03:48 PM #11

Quote from ratbastard :

As a person who has always preferred the UI of Android and Windows over anything Apple designs, I can honestly say that the RAM upgradeability is moot for most people in this budget range because of Apple's software and hardware integration/ecosystem. An iphone with 4gb of RAM is significantly more efficient than an Android phone running 12gb. I hate that their hardware is so good, because I really do hate their UI, but the M1 is an engineering marvel. I'll probably wait for the M2, but my days fighting Apple fans are waning.

Upgradability is more important for most people in this budget range, because few years down the road when the machine starting to feel sluggish due to new macOS version, etc; the easiest & cheapest way to get instant relief is to add more memory if the hardware allows it. The last iteration of Intel Mac Mini still has 2 SODIMM slots.

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11-19-2020 at 06:21 PM #12

Quote from newoldthing01 :

Upgradability is more important for most people in this budget range, because few years down the road when the machine starting to feel sluggish due to new macOS version, etc; the easiest & cheapest way to get instant relief is to add more memory if the hardware allows it. The last iteration of Intel Mac Mini still has 2 SODIMM slots.

Reviews so far indicate simply incredible performance from the M1 chips, and indicate that application switching (ie multitasking with multiple Chrome tabs, etc) and other typical slowdowns on Intel chips don't seem to slow this down. In other words, the use case for 16GB may still exist, but running out of RAM / paging to the SSD isn't *near* the problem that it is with the Intel chips. As people have more time to try this design more details will come out on this. However, people are comparing performance to a (laptop) i9 CPU, which is outstanding..

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11-19-2020 at 06:30 PM #13

Says $699.00

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11-19-2020 at 07:43 PM #14

Quote from newoldthing01 :

few years down the road when the machine starting to feel sluggish due to new macOS version, etc; the easiest & cheapest way to get instant relief is to add more memory if the hardware allows it.

Actually "instant relief" most of time still comes from HD -> SSD upgrade nowadays.

Also if you look at the phone market, people are perfectly OK buying a $800+ new phone with more RAM better processor etc once every few years. They're clearly trying to replicate that and from business standpoint it makes perfect sense.

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11-19-2020 at 07:48 PM #15

Quote from armcollector :

You're better off buying Apple giftcards at Best Buy, then buy the mac from Apple direct. It's effectively 20% back in best buy giftcards due to the promi at best buy

You lose some benefits buying with credit card including additional warranty

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