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Desktops (Apple) Apple

Apple Announces a Mac Mini With the M2 and M2 Pro (theverge.com) 73

Posted by msmash from the moving-forward dept.
The Mac Mini is Apple's next computer to get the bump up to the M2 chip -- and this time around, it's being offered with the Pro version of Apple's processor, too. From a report: The new model was announced this morning in a press release, with a starting price of $599, and is available to order today, with availability beginning Tuesday, January 24th. The Mac Mini's baseline configuration includes the M2 chip, 8GB of RAM, and 256GB of storage. It features an HDMI port, Gigabit Ethernet, and a standard headphone jack, alongside two USB-A ports and two Thunderbolt 4 (USB-C) ports -- an upgrade from the Thunderbolt 3 ports on the previous generation.

The M2 Pro configuration of the new Mac Mini features 16GB of RAM, 512GB of SSD storage, and an additional two Thunderbolt 4 ports alongside the ports already available on the standard M2 model. This configuration will set you back $1,299, more than double the price of the baseline model. This is the first time Apple has brought Pro-tier chips to the Mini. The Mini was previously only offered with the entry-level M1 chip -- the same one used in MacBook Air. This time, it's being offered with one of Apple's more powerful chip series. The M2 Max, however, is so far only being offered in the MacBook Pro.
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Apple Announces a Mac Mini With the M2 and M2 Pro More

Apple Announces a Mac Mini With the M2 and M2 Pro

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  • I'm wondering how long I will be able to upgrade XCode on my six year old macbook. Apple has already cut me off of new OSes, so it can't be far and I'll probably have to get one of these. Well played Apple, well played. $800 a year for a laptop. At least the mini is cheaper. I just hope it supports two HDMI monitors.

    • I'm wondering how long I will be able to upgrade XCode on my six year old macbook. Apple has already cut me off of new OSes, so it can't be far and I'll probably have to get one of these. Well played Apple, well played. $800 a year for a laptop. At least the mini is cheaper. I just hope it supports two HDMI monitors.

      How much money did that $4800 (figuring your stated $800 x 6 years) MacBook earn you in those same six years as an iOS Developer?

      It's R&D Equipment, FFS. Quit whining and start Depreciating!

      • Nothing, I do it for a project I'm trying to get off the ground and its a free app.

        • Nothing, I do it for a project I'm trying to get off the ground and its a free app.

          Right.

          You have stated that you are a paid iOS Developer.

          Did that change?

          • When did I say I was paid? This is a side gig for me. I have business partners that bought the laptop in the beginning but pockets are not deep.

    • Catalina just went out of extended support a couple months ago. They usually support the two previous versions of macOS. When a new version comes out, the oldest version is dropped. So if you're on Catalina you're probably done with all updates now.

    • The M1 Minis do support two monitors and I doubt much has changed. One over USB-C (DP alt mode) and one over the built in HDMI. It's the only M1 device with support for more than one external screen and they still don't support more without a software solution like DisplayLink.

      The Mini is the only Mac I am going to be interested in for the foreseeable future.

      • I checked. The non-pro supports two monitors, one 6K Thunderbolt and one either Thunderbolt or hdmi. Pro supports three monitors, two 6K over Thunderbolt and one 5k over hdmi. So two huge monitors, and the pro does an additional large one.
    • Apple appear to be asking me to sink my costs and move on again when there's a whole slew of costs from the last time still defiantly bobbing around on the surface. This ornate walled garden of theirs beginning to feel more like the Raft of the Medusa.

    • I'm wondering how long I will be able to upgrade XCode on my six year old macbook. Apple has already cut me off of new OSes

      If you can run Xcode 14 today, you'll probably be good for at least four more years. Apple tends to be pretty slow with the Xcode required OS changing.

      10 years is a pretty good run for a laptop...

      • Still I would much prefer to use a laptop until the equipment dies or it is too slow to do what I need, rather than the vendor forcing me to buy something new from them. 10 years is nothing for a Thinkpad. I have a 14 year old Thinkpad I could still use to do Android development on if I wanted. It may be slow but it would still get the job done.

        • 10 years is nothing for a Thinkpad.

          It's also nothing for a Mac laptop (I have a number of laptops older than 10 years), it's more about the software you can use - could you realistically use Android Studio on a 10 year old Thinkpad? I am dubious.

          • It runs on Linux so yes.

            I won't be able to use this Macbook much longer, around ten of the keys have popped off of my second butterfly keyboard and I'm in Canada so not covered under the class action. Not that the class action pays enough to get another keyboard replacement anyway.
          • Comment removed based on user account deletion

    • With Thunderbolt you should be able to get an outboard GPU of some type.

    • The pro actually supports three monitors. But really, you spend 4800 bucks on a laptop (why? Rather pay pharmacist's prices for a big SSD than buying an external one?) but only have cheap monitors with an HDMI port?
      • I just wanted the cheapest mac system that I can develop with. I have two HDMI monitors because I also use them with a thinkpad that has an HDMI port.
    • Dupe! Why are you making the exact same post on two threads?
  • Two of essentially the same post in a row. Get that Apple promotion going!

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by hawk ( 1151 )

      "never attribute to marketing savvy that which can be explained by sloppiness."

      --someone famous (or perhaps me?)

      hawk

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by khchung ( 462899 )

      Apple Announces a Mac Mini With the M2 and M2 Pro

      Apple Announces MacBook Pros With M2 Pro and M2 Max Chips

      Since when is a desktop the same as a notebook? It some mods don't even bother checking before modding up.

      • Plus, one's a kind of grayish-silver & the other is a kind of silverish-gray. I feel so embarrassed about missing those crucial differences.
  • Does anybody want a 8GB computer anymore? Might as well buy a Raspberry Pi with that much RAM.
    • sigh typo in title.

    • Raspberry Pi's RAM bandwidth is 200GB/s? Who knew that an M2 and a shitty $10 SoC were the same! I gotta tell everyone about this revelation from Slashdot!

      • https://forums.raspberrypi.com... [raspberrypi.com]

        Mac mini M2 is 200GB/s
        Raspberry Pi 4 is 4GB/s

        Other than that, though, it is ridiculous that the brand-new base model of the Mac Mini M2 only has as much RAM as the high-end RPi4 in 2023.

        It's a shame they dropped the Mac mini M1 instead of keeping it at an even lower price.

        • Other than that, though, it is ridiculous that the brand-new base model of the Mac Mini M2 only has as much RAM as the high-end RPi4 in 2023.

          Do you not understand the concept of the term base model? Do you routinely go out and buy a Fiat 500 and complain you're getting overtaken by Ford Mustangs?

          8GB is too much. Many applications do not require it, a 4GB base model should still exist, especially considering OS X isn't anywhere the RAM hog that Windows 10 is.

          If you want to sit around generating AI pictures of sexy RAM then yeah a "base model" is probably not going to cut it ... for *you*.

          • I've been using a 2010 Mac mini with 16GB for half a decade now, websites use much more memory than they used to. Tons of images, Javascript librairies, frameworks, etc. A single browser tab can easily take hundreds of megabytes so don't tell me 8GB or even 4GB would be enough in 2023.

  • the base price looks good, but I understand that the memory is shared between cpu and gpu. So adding some memory would be good. But the version with 16GB memory is over double the price of the 8GB version.
    In my experience, running MSTeams on 8GB is an ordeal

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by ebh ( 116526 )

      The M2 (not M2 Pro) models can be upgraded from 8GB to 16GB for $200.

      Running Teams on anything is an ordeal.

      • Fast RAM or not, having to pay USD$200 for an extra 8GB feels like a rip-off.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Ubi_NL ( 313657 )

        Really, it has slots? Or do i hire someone to solder it on and lose warranty?

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by ebh ( 116526 )

          IIRC, the memory is on-die, i.e., part of the same chip as the CPU itself, and there's nothing on the board to accommodate additional RAM.

    • In my experience running msteams on 64gb is an ordeal as well and no amount of RAM is going to make that bloated, unwieldy POS any better.

  • I keep a Mac Mini around for the rare bit of iOS work I get interested in doing. It's the third one I've had over the years, but probably the last. When I got it I immediately upgraded the memory, which went perfectly. Now if you want to get the 32GB model, the price jump is crazy, and it has to be selected at purchase.

    The draw of the Mini previously was that it was enough to get the job done, but it wasn't too expensive. That's gone. So I'll hold on to that Mini until it fades into obscurity. Thankfully, t

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by ebh ( 116526 )

      Seven months ago, I bought a used bottom-end M1 Mac Mini for about $475 to dip my toes in MacOS and see if it could replace my nine-year-old Windows box as my daily driver. It turned out to be good enough that the Windows box that was running Linux in a VM is now running Linux natively. I won't need an M2 until Linux in a VM under MacOS is a bit more mature, maybe in a year or two.

      I imagine the price of M1 Mac Minis will drop some more now that the new ones are out.

      • The dilemma is finding one where the purchaser paid for the top end of memory... and the additional problem is that I think the top end of memory for even the new ones is too low.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by tlhIngan ( 30335 )

          The dilemma is finding one where the purchaser paid for the top end of memory...

          Yeah, that's really hard to ask. It's part of the basic specifications of the machine. It should be listed right there in the description of what the person is selling.

          And if not, there are many ways using built-in OS tools to figure it out. I think if you went to "About this Macintosh" you get information on how much memory and CPU is right there. Couple that with someone doing a "Get Info" on the "Macintosh HD" and that will g

          • I'm not sure how it was misinterpreted, but my point is not that you can't find the specs. Of course you can. It's finding one for sale where somebody opted for the largest amount of memory available. since it's an expensive upgrade.

  • Last April, when Apple announced the M2 MacBook and Mini, I was disappointed because I really wanted a machine with 32 GB RAM. So I "settled" for a Mac Studio with 64 GB RAM and a TB of flash storage, hoping that would be enough to last 8 1/2 years like my prior MacBook Pro. Yes, it was pricey, but I'm planning on using it for a long time. The M2 Pro Mini looks like it would have met my needs 8 months ago and saved me $1000. But with technology, there's always newer, better, faster machines that can do

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