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Apple's M6 Mac mini with 24GB RAM and a 512GB SSD is being framed as a strong compact desktop for everyday work, with fast, smooth performance that should handle daily office use for years. It also gets credit as a capable 1080p gaming machine, with 1440p possible through Metal upscaling, though macOS still limits game selection and native support for newer Steam titles. The main hesitation is price, since the same model appears cheaper at Costco with a 2-year warranty, and the value feels less compelling than the older $500 Mac mini era.
Developers running lightweight local coding assistants, because quantized small models can fit for realtime editor suggestions.
24GB RAM can be enough for local coding assistants and realtime editor suggestions, especially with quantized smaller models such as 1.5B and E4B. Heavier local LLM use may still feel limited, and one setup described using 6GB for coding autocomplete plus separate models for chat.
It can handle 1080p gaming well, and 1440p is possible with Metal upscaling. macOS game selection is still limited, so it is better suited to supported titles than to the latest Steam games natively.
Costco lists the same Mac mini M6 for $1149.99 and includes a 2-year warranty, so this Amazon price is not the lowest available. Apple also sells a 32GB/256GB configuration for $1300 before discounts, which shows how quickly pricing rises with more RAM.
thumbs upping because it is a good deal in the current climate but it is absolutely wild that 8gb of ram and 256gb of ssd space is $400. Even at no deal shopping you could pick up 16gb ddr5 and a 1 gig ssd for around $350 or $400.
Last edited by Vesp206 October 26, 2026 at 05:13 PM.
Not a deal folks. The appeal of a mac mini was great when th eprice was $500 for minimalist machine. At $1000, it needs to offer much more. Local LLM even with 24GB RAM is inadequate.
Not a deal folks. The appeal of a mac mini was great when th eprice was $500 for minimalist machine. At $1000, it needs to offer much more. Local LLM even with 24GB RAM is inadequate.
I'm running local coding assistants and auto complete inside 6GB, so define "inadequate"
Great deal for those of us that understand this machine is smooth and flies and will be fit for at least the next 5 years of daily/office/etc usage. Just not an ideal machine for gamers.
M6 has several YouTube videos of people playing red dead, rocket league, Minecraft, GTA V.
A guy even played cyberpunk on high res while DaVinci was running in the background with no charger or fan noise. And that was on an M5 macbook pro. https://youtube.com/shorts/As4xHh...cSctDj7ZPR
Not a terrible deal in the current market, but worth noting you can get the 32GB version of this with a 256GB drive (not so great) for $1300 directly from Apple's Store before any discounts (edu, military, etc).
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from TheVeganButcher
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I'm running local coding assistants and auto complete inside 6GB, so define "inadequate"
Not a terrible deal in the current market, but worth noting you can get the 32GB version of this with a 256GB drive (not so great) for $1300 directly from Apple's Store before any discounts (edu, military, etc).Mind sharing your setup details?
This one was just for proof of concept of doing transcription in a gpu vs cpu, and once that was done I put it to work with coding assist. Windows with WSL2, ollama, and then Qwen 1.5B for auto complete and Gemma 4 E4B for coding chat. Also tried Qwen 7b and that worked well too q4-k-m. VS code with continue.dev. It's a Gtx 1060 6GB
Last edited by TheVeganButcher October 29, 2026 at 07:37 AM.
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Interesting! Why WSL2 instead of the Ollama build for Windows? Issue with drivers?
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Qwen 1.5B for auto complete
Auto complete as in the inline suggestion feature (ghost text) or something else? And did you run both Qwen 1.5B and 4 E4B at the same time or have to unload one to run the other? If it's a memory issue, NVidia's Nemotron might be worth a shot. I think the model I tested was Nemotron 3 Nano 4B and it ran much better than I expected for a model under 3GB in size.
Last edited by shortList October 28, 2026 at 08:51 PM.
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Community Reviews
Apple's M6 Mac mini with 24GB RAM and a 512GB SSD is being framed as a strong compact desktop for everyday work, with fast, smooth performance that should handle daily office use for years. It also gets credit as a capable 1080p gaming machine, with 1440p possible through Metal upscaling, though macOS still limits game selection and native support for newer Steam titles. The main hesitation is price, since the same model appears cheaper at Costco with a 2-year warranty, and the value feels less compelling than the older $500 Mac mini era.
Local coding assistant workflows can run within limited memory using quantized models for autocomplete and coding chat.
The Mac mini can serve as a strong 1080p gaming machine with Metal upscaling enabling 1440p output.
The machine can feel smooth and fast for daily office and general usage over multiple years.
A local AI coding setup using WSL2, ollama, and VS Code continue.dev can work with small quantized models on this platform.
The Mac mini may be a poor fit for gaming because macOS can limit game selection and native Steam support.
The RAM and SSD configuration pricing can look inflated compared with comparable PC parts at similar capacities.
The deal price may be higher than a more reasonable baseline because multiple price increases reportedly pushed it upward.
A lower-cost alternative from Costco can undercut the deal price while including a 2-year warranty.
Common Questions (3)
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Just not an ideal machine for gamers.
A guy even played cyberpunk on high res while DaVinci was running in the background with no charger or fan noise. And that was on an M5 macbook pro.
https://youtube.com/shorts/As4xHh...cSctDj
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