BUY The M2 Mac mini! (It's basically a $599 Mac Pro...) 

I guess you are enjoying being an Apple ambassador

Agreed. The slower speed SSD with 256 GB is completely overblown on many reviews. It is still very fast, faster than any external USB 3.2 SSD (which are not slow!).

You will regret not getting the 512 drive - you will deny that fact but it is always the case

It if plenty fast.

BuT LoOk At ThE BeNChMarKS!

I want one for my dedicated desktop

It's thriving

Seriously.

EXACTLY!!!!!

Meh. I’m an old geezer on a pension and I started saving when my original 2012 Mac Mini died a few months ago. I had enough for an M2 with 16GB RAM and a 1 TB internal drive, and next month I’m gonna get a 4K off-brand monitor, so… I’ll spare you the tedious boomer rant about how kids nowadays just don’t know how to manage their money, eh?

This is my issue with all Apple products. I try to buy each item looking at 5 years of service (at least) so far I’ve been successful. The pay for it up the wahzoo now bcuz u can’t upgrade. Apple charges $1000 for 4TB ssd and a Samsung 870 evo 4TB is $325. Insane profit margin. But if I want to future proof my device I have to eat it now. My programs and photos take over 1 Tb so I don’t even look at less than 2TB Overtime and my bonus for the win Mac Studio for the expandability or the m2 mini for the processor upgrade. ? Why I’m here

I'm an old geezer too, who spent his retirement on keeping his mom alive and going. FWIW, the apple tax on memory etc is damn high. They should compete on value!

Any updates?, im thinking about doing the same

@@calicancer661 I have one in my possession but I haven’t set it up yet. Pretty much just because the keyboard I ordered hasn’t arrived yet. Hopefully today or tomorrow.

@@christopheresser9330 I’d be on the same situation I’d have to buy the keyboard and mouse aswell

I thought the same thing!

I got one yesterday and its $799 cdn ... but no issues so far.

in Ireland it's 730 euro

We didn’t forget we just don’t care. Js

@@nq54 Yikes

@@omarbagent9829 Maybe it’s also because in most US states, taxes aren’t included in the MSRP.

yes, like you said - almost. For me, the issue with it is inability to play pretty much any games on a Mac. And then it does not make sense for me to switch from PC to Mac, since I would need the PC anyway to run newer games.

It’s not perfect because their monitors cost $1500+. You’ll need a magic keyboard and a Magic Mouse too. That’s already way over $2k. I’d be perfect if Apple had a cheaper monitor.

What do you use nowadays? I'm tempted to buy this computer just to be able to continue using Logic, cause these Mac Minis last and Logic is the best DAW for me. Because as my daily driver, I'd rather get a good PC with Linux and use Windows just for gaming. The ARM chips in the new Macs are really cool, but I don't really like using MacOS anymore, there are much better Linux distros out there and also miss being able to install whatever software I want in Windows.

the computers are inside the synthesisers now!

To be clear, on a large project, even a base MacPro would still handle that better than base MacMini as it has more resources (32 GB RAM, 512 GB...). But an upgraded MacMini (24 GB, 512 GB storage) would be very competitive for 1/6 of the price.

In 2023, no one should have a 256 storage or 8 gigs of ram. The base should be 512 of storage and 16gigs of ram.

Actual reason for price drop is that they have removed magic ssd which was used in M1 mac mini model

right there with you. I have a similar 2012 27" iMac that has started to feel slow on occasion. An M2 Mac Mini & a Samsung M8 seems like at good way to go. Thinking I'll continue to use my old wireless keyboard and trackpad. They're still working great.

is that right? Awesome, I was worried about latency issues since I would be using for music production.

Easy for you to say, but I (like most people) live outside the US - specifically, in New Zealand, where the 5,000,000 population is too small to support a market for refurb Macs. So Apple doesn’t offer them here. Oh well, at least we have a free-at-point-of-delivery state-run health system.

That only applies in the base models; they were referring to the pro version with 512gb ssd , to have full speed need to upgrade to 1tb. The Mac mini m2 to increase the speed you just need to upgrade from 256 to 512 GB ssd.

@@Conteudoemescala Hello, English is not my native language. Two questions. You mean that with the base model of 599 dollar with a upgrade to the internal 512 Gb SSD the speed will be faster? Second question, What if I buy a external SSD drive, will it be faster to? Hope to hear from you. greetings Richard

@@richardrem no worries, mine neither :) About your questions: 1) Yes if you upgrade from the basic model 256GB $599 to 512GB the speed almost doubles from 1400 MB/s to around 2600-2800 MB/s 2) It depends, if you buy an external USB-C SSD the speed will vary a lot, but the best brands like Samsung T7 or Sandisk will offer you around 800 MB/s write speed that is slower than the internal drive. But if you buy a thunderbolt 3 SSD case like the Acasis TB3 40 GBps NVME will cost you around $139 and if you add the Samsung 980 Pro you will get around 2800 MB/s like the upgraded version. Will be a cheaper solution than doing the upgrade. You can check amazon for those products It will depend on what you are going to do with your mac mini, because if you don't have a very extensive workflow you don't need to upgrade, but if you are doing video editing in 4K/8K , music production, or 3D rendering then I recommend to upgrade or buy an external Thunderbolt 3 option since its cheaper.

@@Conteudoemescala Thank's a lot for reply Paulo, I do appreciate it very much. I wanna do movie editing with cinema losses 12 bit DNG files on DaVinci Resolve. I wonder if the Mac mini 2 basic with the basic internal 256Gb drive, but 16 gig on memory instead off 8 gig and a extarnal Acasis TB3 drive will be powerful enough. I have no experience with Mac mini at all. In case this if it is powerful enough I wonder, would it be better to build the whole system on the external drive or do I use the external drive for the DNG 12 bit lossless cinema files only. The DNG's are about 5 mb each. 7 seconds off movie is 1 GB Again thank's a lot. greetings Richard

@@richardrem Well for video editing i recommend to go always with 16 GB of ram because ram you cannot change it afterward. Disk if you don't upgrade you buy later on an external SSD/NVME etc... If possible upgrading to 16GB of ram and 512 GB of internal SSD would be nice. If you have only a budget for one upgrade go for the RAM. About video editing, it depends on how many layers of videos you use in your workflow. Mac mini can handle up to 8 if I am not mistaken, so I believe that will be enough. but to be smooth 16GB of ram will help a lot.

My philosophy on everything

I think only 2.0. 2.1 will drive 8k monitor.

in that case why do they have the Max in the portable MBP 14”?

@@bashful228 The 14" isn't that much cheaper than the 16" or the Studio. In fact many say that that the 14" is worse value than the 16" for its price point. The thing is that if the Mini had the Max option it would be the best value with any of the M2s and Apple doesn't want people to have that. Lets wait for the Studio to surface and compare it to a decked out 16"

Thanks! Right in front? lol.

@@GregsGadgets yeah :) old school is cool.

i love that typewriter too 😊

@@rawmarrow I have a 1910 Underwood :)

@@GregsGadgets See Im not the only one :)

" I find the Mac OS like a toy still, and doesn’t have the flexibility I like in Windows." Yeah, people say that about certified Unix OSs (and macOS is the world's most popular certified Unix implementation) all the time…oh, wait… (Pssst, Mark-if you desperately want to feel like a tech he-man, feel free to use macOS's command line.)

You definitely can use one. I use my old keyboard and trackpad Bluetooth no problem.