Apple's Mac mini - Tempting PC Users Everywhere
by Anand Lal Shimpi on January 25, 2005 7:39 AM EST- Posted in
- Mac
Final Words
Three points for mini purchasers:
As I've sternly recommended before, do not purchase the Mac mini with 256MB of memory - 512MB is not only the sweet spot, but it's absolutely necessary.
Second, save yourself the headache and either purchase Apple's keyboard or a keyboard with Mac OS specific key labels on it. If you're a keyboard junky, you will appreciate it. Apple's keyboard has two low-powered USB ports on the keyboard, which do come in handy, and it's actually pretty decent to type on. It does get dirty quickly, so if you eat around your computer, you may want to be a bit more careful. You also get the benefit of the Eject button on Apple's keyboard.
Third and final, don't purchase Apple's mouse. Bluetooth or not, just don't do it. Get a good two-button mouse and be done with it. My personal preference is the Logitech MX1000 not only because it tracks extremely well on high resolution displays, but the additional buttons on the mouse work under OS X.
The three points above are obviously assuming that you're looking to buy the mini, which brings us to the next point - what is a PC user to think of the mini?
As a means to play around with Mac OS X, you can't beat the Mac mini in terms of affordability. Armed with 512MB of memory, the mini is an excellent platform to gain experience with and get exposed to Mac OS X. With OS X Tiger due out by the middle of this year, the platform will become even more attractive, introducing features like a fully GPU rendered GUI as well as fully indexed system-wide search. My recommendation still stands that if you are a notebook user, you are better suited to get your exposure to Mac OS X through a PowerBook; but if you aren't in the market for a notebook, then the Mac mini is the next best thing.
The performance of the Mac mini with 512MB of memory (or more) is more than enough for OS X and the majority of tasks involving the iLife suite. Once you get into more serious video editing, however, you'll quickly outgrow the power of the G4.
As a machine to recommend to the computer illiterate, you'll find that many will appreciate the styling of the mini and thus, will be more willing to give it a try. The OS itself can be just as intimidating as Windows (while looking prettier), but it is less prone to the issues that often corrupt beginner systems - mainly becoming infected with spyware, malware, etc., which in turn reduces the burden on you to provide tech support.
Apple did a very good job with the mini. They effectively completed the transition of the entry-level computer into a commodity. To the average joe, the Mac mini isn't a computer - it's another iPod or DVD player, just a lot better and a lot more feature-filled. It's a DVD player that can edit and create DVDs, and it's an iPod that can make and play music, and it's a box that you can retrieve your email.
To the rest of us, it's a small, quiet, stylish looking box that finally breaks down the price barrier to Mac OS X. As a second system for any PC user, the Mac mini can't be beat.
And to any PC users who happen to give the Mac mini a try, have a look at our first two Mac articles for some pointers on things to do and try when using OS X for the first time.
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elvisizer - Tuesday, January 25, 2005 - link
also, someone needs to tall anand that you can get pictures out of iphoto via drag and drop, not just going to Share->Export.Saist - Tuesday, January 25, 2005 - link
Wanted to step in and comment that the Microsoft Office problem is also solved by a little application that you may or may not have heard of.It's called.
OPEN OFFICE.
http://www.openoffice.org
wilburpan - Tuesday, January 25, 2005 - link
#44Not to mention the lack of a need to buy an antivirus subscription, which kicks in at $25/year for Norton's antivirus program. If you keep your Windows PC for 4 years, that's an extra $75 in software updates you'll need to buy.
shuttleboi - Tuesday, January 25, 2005 - link
"The comparison above was very deliberately set up to focus on hardware alone, ignoring things like software differences and form factor differences. "Hello? The Mac Mini comes with over $100 worth of software. Where are you going to get a software suite on Wintel for $100? Kazaa?
edwardhchan - Tuesday, January 25, 2005 - link
#25: I used a Kingston ValueRAM PC2700 1GB DIMM... Works like a charm. Just a note on using as a media server: Divx and MPEG4 playback is fine with VLC. DVD is good too, but the DVD player doesn't have a very good de-interlacing algorithm. My Mini is being watched on a 43" Samsung DLP at 1280x720. Beautiful display for the compy :)Eug - Tuesday, January 25, 2005 - link
Apple has just dropped pricing on some of the BTO options:BlueTooth/Airport Express combo now $99.
1 GB RAM now $325.
80 GB hard drive upgrade now $50.
And now the SuperDrive option is 8X. Cool. :)
pbrice68 - Tuesday, January 25, 2005 - link
Just a quick FYI:TextEdit does open MicroSoft Word documents. Obviously, it doesn't support all of Word's features, but it will open and display the text and try to maintain all of the formatting.
Although you went over a great deal in iPhoto, you really didn't mention it's built in slideshow features, professionally printed books, and the ability to purchase prints directly from the application. The books really need to be seen to appreciate them.
Doormat - Tuesday, January 25, 2005 - link
#26: the mini takes a regular DIMM, not an SO-DIMM. 1GB PC2700 DIMM is under $200. Plus the putty knife you'll need to open and install it.And I was planning on getting one until I read that they had problems at 19x12. As someone who is going to hook this to a HDTV at 1920x1080, this is disappointing news. Maybe next years refresh with a 9600+ with 64MB framebuffer will do the trick.
barnett25 - Tuesday, January 25, 2005 - link
First I want to say that I loved the article. With that out of the way I have to ask, when you said that Pages exports well to html, what were you smoking? I just recieved iWork yesterday, I bought it becuase Pages seemed like an easy way to make good looking webpages. I saw the family newsletter template and knew my mom would love to have a webpage based around that. But try saving just the template, with no editing, to html. You get a big mess. Pages was not ready to be shipped. It's export to .doc format is messed up with the supplied templates too, but I can understand that being due to Word's lack of refinment and features. I do like pages, but it seems to only be good if you are either printing, exporting to pdf, or simply saving as a pages file. For any other kind of exporting it's next to worthless. (By the way, if you go to Apple discussions you will see dozens of people with similar compaints to mine.)jasonsRX7 - Tuesday, January 25, 2005 - link
Apple today lowered some of the prices on the BTO Mac Minis at the Apple store.http://www.macnn.com/articles/05/01/25/lower.mac.m...