Apple's Mac mini - Tempting PC Users Everywhere
by Anand Lal Shimpi on January 25, 2005 7:39 AM EST- Posted in
- Mac
Taking it Apart
Taking the Mac mini apart is pretty simple once you get the case off. An excellent video of doing just that has been circulating the net and the actual process is just as simple as the video makes it out to be.
The mini is put together much like an iPod, with plastic latches keeping the base of the chassis locked to the outer shell. Flip the mini over and use something like a thin putty knife to separate a few of the latches on each side, then just pull the two apart.
Once you're inside, there's still a little more work to do, but it thankfully requires no more prying, just a little unscrewing. The slot-loading optical drive and 2.5" hard drive are contained within a single removable assembly. There are four pegs that attach the assembly to the base of the mini, and three screws that need to be removed in order to lift it off (the fourth peg is just a peg, no screw in it).
After you unscrew those pegs, the assembly simply lifts up. Apple employed a single PCB that interfaces with both the hard drive and the optical drive as you can see in the picture below:
You simply have to lift the connector out of its slot in order to pull up the entire assembly from the case.
The assembly also houses the only fan in the entire system, attached to a duct that helps draw air in through the inlets at the bottom of the mini:
The final member of the optical drive/hard drive assembly is the built-in speaker, which is actually pretty reasonable as an entry-level sound solution. For someone who doesn't care about music too much, the internal speaker will suffice for whatever occasional audio that the user needs to hear:
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linuxOwnzIfUrLeet - Wednesday, January 26, 2005 - link
#104"
better in the long run when you consider the big picture of computing"
Buying and running a crap is better for computing?
Can you pass the pipe? That must be good $hite.
What has crapple given back to computing since they raped freebsd to magically come up with
os suX?
the mac cult act like they did something grand...
aPple and really any Evil corporation ( iBM, miCro$oft, sUn, etc ) are trying to bring a spoonfeed computing to you. Do as I say you will my slave. Do you want to hear music? Just buy
my black box and don't touch the music you already
paid for. It's not yours you're justing renting
it from me.
This new imini is probably apple's attempt to bring back a divx format.
TCP/IP is what you're running and that's open. We have the internet because TCP/IP is open.
What do we have with appletalk?
If you want to do what's best in the long run,
you need to buy open market x86 hardware and run open oses like freebsd or linux.
crap-ple : think stupid
Jorchi - Wednesday, January 26, 2005 - link
You says that photoshop is a lot, have you try graphic converter? Is a very nice application that can fit yours neededsbluebeetle - Wednesday, January 26, 2005 - link
msva$903 is Way too high, why the Airport card?-$79
sure $200 will buy you a good monitor, and i understand why the Apple needs 512 Ram.
But hey the PC only comes with 256 Ram no wait- less 32mb for it's videocard so you could argue the PC would be sluggish with only 256 too!!! especially as it's shared.
If we're gonna be fair
$499 mac mini
$180 15" monitor (BenQ)
$30 keyboard & mouse from Apple
Thats $709
maybe $750 tops if you don't want the mac mouse and factor delivery in.
Also remember the PC included $50 rebates, no CD-R, only 30 days warranty and FAR less software, no Firewire port etc
mino - Wednesday, January 26, 2005 - link
#110You are too good on DELL. You should have added components of DELL level(DELL has NO WiFi!):
Mini $499
512M RAM Upgrade $75
USB Keyboard + Mouse combo from WalMart or so $20
DELL class 15" LCD $170
that makes $765 for a complete DELL-like system
To put performance into perspective G4 1.25 will put Athlon 1.25 into dust (maybe even A64 1.25). G4 IS more powerfull designg than any X86 (probably except A64) CPU could offer. I will put also G5 into shame at the same clockspeed. The only but very big issue with G4 is that it doesn't scale high enough since Motorola gave up on its development long ago.
Thus 1.5 G4 should be approx. like P4 2.4C (except heavily optimized encoding apps).
mino - Wednesday, January 26, 2005 - link
#105 " Viruses have never been an issue for me, I haven't had an AV program installed since maybe Windows 95..."I'd bet my daily income, that if you would install a good AV SW, many ,even tens of, viruses would be found. And don't say no, because just 10 minutes ago my AV warned about virus that was inside javascript on the site of one PC chassis manufacturer - not a small one (I was looking for server case).
Sleep still;)
mino - Wednesday, January 26, 2005 - link
#96 Just to make things clear:1.) AVG is just a piece of crap(I have my reasons)
2.) AVG is NOT free. It costs around $50 per 2 years
from free avir F-Prot is OK, but from paid ones NOD32 has no competition (as far as avir part goes)
msva124 - Wednesday, January 26, 2005 - link
I forgot shipping for the mouse, keyboard and monitor. If you can find them all at the same place (I refuse to order lcd's from newegg because of their dead pixel policy) it would bring the total up by about $20, to $923.msva124 - Wednesday, January 26, 2005 - link
Mac Mini $499512 MB Ram upgrade $75
Airport Extreme upgrade $79
Keyboard that has apple keys and usb ports $30??
Logitech Wired USB Mouse $20
Decent 15" LCD Monitor $200
Total $903
With all of the above add-ons (which I would consider bare minimum to make this thing usable) it is still well below the $1000 mark.
bluebeetle - Wednesday, January 26, 2005 - link
Walt"Well, let's see...by the time you add for the keyboard, mouse, 15" lcd monitor and the 256-mbs of extra ram Anand states is needed to make the mini something useful, all of which is built in to the compared Wintel box...gosh, I guess we're talking at least $1,000"
What are you smoking walt?
A keyboard 15" LCD and KB&M for $500
try here:
www.newegg.com
they have LCDs for $175 keybord and mouse $20
mmm where did you get $1k from?
did you add the price of both together and chuck the Dell CPU?
Also factor in the software (ilfe & Applworks worth$150) and the fact the Dell only has a CD rom (how do you get your files off)? and only 90 day warranty
Still the mini is aimed at those PC users who already have monitors (KVM anyone)
No wonder Walt feels so threatened, the mini is the fastest selling PC ever!
epiv - Wednesday, January 26, 2005 - link