mac mini

i'm thinking about buying a mac mini. by default it comes with an intel processor. can i later just replace the intel cpu it comes with, with say, a common boxed intel cpu? (a q9650)

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Nope. There is one were you can upgrade 1.83ghz core to 2ghz core, but going to a quad requires the right chipset to support it.

And besides, Apple doesn't want its users upgrading their products. They want them to purchase a new rig for an upgrade.

I've read that apple didn't even want user to upgrade even the memory on a mini mac. :lol:

Mac mini "Core" Q&A - Revised September 3, 2007

^older article back in 2007

Message quoted 1 times
Message edited by Grimmy on 08-24-2008 at 11:38:39 AM

Reply to Grimmy

I wouldn't ever buy something like that. Just not.

Reply to aziraphale

Why would you spend $600 on a screen-less laptop (Yes, that's all the Mac Mini really is. It's a laptop without a screen.) to put a $600 deskop CPU in it? That makes no sense at all, and also impossible to do due to hardware incompatibilities. Why not spend the $1,200 on a custom built desktop unless there is some reason you need OSX?

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Reply to runswindows95

of course there is one. i need/want to see the real thing working. i am up to here with windows...

Reply to jvc08

Try linux. It's free, and the hardware is cheaper than Mac hardware. Plus, the Mac mini performs like a $250 computer. The CPU isn't its only problem.

Message edited by cjl on 08-25-2008 at 07:31:00 AM

Reply to cjl

runswindows95 wrote :

Why would you spend $600 on a screen-less laptop (Yes, that's all the Mac Mini really is. It's a laptop without a screen.) to put a $600 deskop CPU in it? That makes no sense at all, and also impossible to do due to hardware incompatibilities. Why not spend the $1,200 on a custom built desktop unless there is some reason you need OSX?

I don't think you can upgrade the mobile CPU of the mac mini... its like soldered for something...

If you are buying a mac mini, please wait for the refresh.

If you wish to DIY OSX86 I won't help you publicly.

Try building a Linux rig.

Reply to amdfangirl

mac make me cringe, under specced and overpriced. (including the mac pro's which up until they put a 8800gs (256) had a 7300gt, adn the 8800gs inst great, so count out any GPU rendering). then bit in the bullet is the factit is god damn impossible to upgrade the damn thing, (especially the iMac and Mini). the reason they look apealing is that everyone who has on gets a new one each year.

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Reply to dobby

^If only I had the money to build a new PC every year.

For the OP, not worth it. That and you really need to learn to control Windows. Its not hard and once you learn the ins and outs you can make it do what you want.

In the end spend that $600 on a decent rig setup (mobo, GPU, RAM) and then get the Q9450 and try Linux (although if you have trouble controlling Windows, Linux may give you a tussle).

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http://www.steamcalculator.com/76561197970703804/camo_sig.png

Reply to jimmysmitty

My brother gave me a G4 Macintosh that had OSX 10.3.9 Panther installed on it.
If you want to play around with the Macintosh Operating system perhaps a good choice would be for you to find a fast (1 Ghz) used Macintosh G4 and install Tiger or Leopard on it.
Panther requirements
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT2176?viewlocale=en_US
Tiger requirements
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1514
Leopard requirements
http://www.apple.com/macosx/techspecs/

Reply to jj463rd

dobby wrote :

mac make me cringe, under specced and overpriced. (including the mac pro's which up until they put a 8800gs (256) had a 7300gt, adn the 8800gs inst great, so count out any GPU rendering). then bit in the bullet is the factit is god damn impossible to upgrade the damn thing, (especially the iMac and Mini). the reason they look apealing is that everyone who has on gets a new one each year.

Macs are getting better value... but still stink abit...

I'm a mac, windows and linux user... I still cringe at my black Macbook and think "Why did I even want this if I could get 7 of my rigs for the same price?"

Reply to amdfangirl

^Because you fell prey to Apples marketing. It happens to everyone.

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Reply to jimmysmitty

Macs will bring upon the apocalypse... They're in the same boat as gay ppl and AIDs

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Reply to Drip50291

If you want a Mac, fully upgradeable, that you can build/upgrade yourself, then please google 'Hackintosh' and see if that's the way you want to go. Do Your Research before your commit.

Otherwise, just give Apple your money and forget this conversation ever took place....

(Yes, that was *Friendly* sarcasm. If I was being nasty, there would be no doubt..)

Message edited by Scotteq on 08-26-2008 at 07:41:51 PM

------------------------------ Which Chip? Well, it depends on which set of thieving b@stardz you choose to support: The ones who use insider trading to enrich themselves while running their company into the ground, or the ones who illegally pay vendors to not support the first group.
Reply to Scotteq

Drip50291 wrote :

Macs will bring upon the apocalypse... They're in the same boat as gay ppl and AIDs

I don't think this is the appropriate forum for hate comments against people in any way, shape or form.

Additionally, AIDS do not only affect gay people and research is still being done as to the origins of the disease.

I would have to agree that you should only buy a Mac of any sort if you want to use OSX.

It depends, the 1099 macbook would not be that bad if apple actually gave you a freaking dvd burner and 2 gigs of ram for over a thousand bucks.

Although shopping most windows notebooks in retail stores they seem to come with much more ram and HD storage than the regular macbook line, but slightly slower processors.

I use XP, Vista, OSX 10.4/5 and linux. generally I use my macbookpro the most out of all my systems; but it was definitely overpriced.
*edit* I should say I use it the most for web-surfing and photoshop; everything else I do in windows or linux

Message edited by wonderingwhatis on 08-27-2008 at 02:19:32 AM

Reply to wonderingwhatis

dobby wrote :

mac make me cringe, under specced and overpriced. (including the mac pro's which up until they put a 8800gs (256) had a 7300gt, adn the 8800gs inst great, so count out any GPU rendering).

your an idiot if you just say that. The mac Pro has had the full line of Quadro FX cards, x1000, x000 since the original g5 Power Mac came out.....

next time look at the upgrade paths under configure........

please take your anti mac trollish comments elsewhere.

Reply to macer1

^Actually in the Mac Pro configuration system they only have one card (like you listed) and thats a Quadro FX 5600 another $2850 and thats not much choice.

Macs are very over priced for what you are getting, thats not untrue. But they still have horrible non workstation options. You can get 4 HD2600 XTs.....whoop de freakin do. Best non workstation nvidia GPU is the 8800GS.

http://store.apple.com/us_smb_7831 [...] o=NzQ3Njkz

Quote :

Graphics Choose from a selection of PCI Express graphics cards from both NVIDIA and ATI, each able to support up to two 30-inch Apple Cinema HD Displays. Select a higher-performance card for more advanced graphics work, or add more than one card to power an array of displays simultaneously for visualization projects and large display walls. Please note: The Mac Pro provides a total of four PCI Express expansion slots. If both the Mac Pro RAID Card and Fibre Channel card options are selected, up to two graphics cards can be installed.
Learn more
A 16-lane, double-wide PCI Express 2.0 graphics slot supports the latest graphics cards for up to 8 GBps of data throughput, up to twice that of a previous-generation PCI Express slot. And by supplying up to 300 watts of total power to all PCI Express slots, the Mac Pro provides the headroom for high-performance, next-generation graphics cards.

Choose among these graphics card options.

ATI Radeon HD 2600 XT
For excellent all-around performance in creative and productivity applications, choose one or more ATI Radeon HD 2600 XT cards. This card features a 256MB GDDR3 frame buffer, PCI Express 2.0 interface, and two dual-link DVI ports. With up to four ATI Radeon HD 2600 XT graphics cards installed, a Mac Pro can support up to 8 30-inch Apple Cinema HD Displays.

NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GT
For even greater graphics performance, choose the latest-generation NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GT with 512MB of GDDR3 video memory. With a unified shader core and massive memory bandwidth, the NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GT brings advanced performance to graphics-intensive applications like motion graphics, 3D modeling, rendering and animation. Featuring a PCI Express 2.0 interface for high bandwidth connection to the Mac Pro and two dual-link DVI ports for connecting up to two 30-inch Apple Cinema HD Displays.

NVIDIA Quadro FX 5600
Featuring a massive 1.5GB frame buffer of GDDR3 memory, the NVIDIA Quadro FX 5600 is the ultimate workstation-level graphics card. It’s ideal for industrial-strength 3D design work, modeling, animation, and stereo 3D visualization. One of the most advanced graphics cards available, it has an integrated stereo 3D port, so you can use stereo goggles for stereo-in-a-window visualization applications. With two dual-link DVI ports, you can connect two 30-inch Apple Cinema HD Displays.

Dual-Display Modes
Each graphics card offers built-in dual-display support in two modes. Extended Desktop mode allows you to work on two monitors at once for increased desktop real estate and enhanced productivity. Video mirroring mode is useful when presenting to groups — the same image that you see on your local display also appears on a projector or auxiliary display. Simply attach two monitors and the Mac OS will recognize both displays. Use the Displays system preference to configure your monitors in either extended desktop or video mirroring modes.

You can attach multiple Apple flat panels with DVI connectors to your Mac Pro graphics card directly. If you have an Apple flat panel with an ADC connector, the optional Apple DVI to ADC Adapter is required (sold separately).

Graphics
ATI Radeon HD 2600 XT 256MB 2 x ATI Radeon HD 2600 XT 256MB [Add $130.00] 3 x ATI Radeon HD 2600 XT 256MB [Add $260.00] 4 x ATI Radeon HD 2600 XT 256MB [Add $390.00] NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GT 512MB [Add $150.00]

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Reply to jimmysmitty

Look at the price of memory that jimmysmitty provided a link to.Add $1,500 for 4 X 2 GB sticks of DDR2 -800 Buffered RAM.$1,500 ouch what a HUGE rip off.
I see some cheaper RAM for the Mac Pro here.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] %206400%29

Reply to jj463rd

^That memory cost as much as my PC did. Wow. Thats crazy. $1500 dollars for freaking DDR2 800 from Apple. Talk about profit$.

Ohhh I wounder if it is special RAM. You know cleans my house, cooks me food and makes it smell like apples or something for that price....

Message quoted 1 times
Message edited by jimmysmitty on 08-27-2008 at 05:31:44 PM

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Reply to jimmysmitty

It's a special RAM that puts your wallet on a diet... a very big one indeed.

Reply to amdfangirl

jimmysmitty wrote :

^That memory cost as much as my PC did. Wow. Thats crazy. $1500 dollars for freaking DDR2 800 from Apple. Talk about profit$.

Ohhh I wounder if it is special RAM. You know cleans my house, cooks me food and makes it smell like apples or something for that price....

Well, it is DDR2-800 FBDIMMs. That bumps the price up a bit. They still overcharge though. Here's about what it should really cost.

Message edited by cjl on 08-29-2008 at 11:21:59 PM

Reply to cjl

^Thats my point. $219 dollars compared to $1500....hmmm.....I wounder how much one would pay....plus you can probably get a better vendor quality of RAM buying from Newegg than from Apple.

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Reply to jimmysmitty

Reading the title and then what you guys post on memory just makes me.. giggle. Well.. the Q9650 on the other hand, just puts tears of laughter in my eyes...

STOP IT!! :lol: . o O (your making me thing people actually put server memory in a mini mac)

Reply to Grimmy

^We got onto the Mac Pro. The whole "Mac is overpriced" thingy. Which they are. Some guy said they are not and have plenty of GPU choice, which they don't and then the memory got posted.

The point is though Mac is not worth it unless you only want to mes with OSX. Then again its not worth that even sicne you can make a much better PC for the price and install from your choice of FREE Linux/Unix based OSes that offer the same thing OSX offers.

So in short, OSX is just a glorified Unix OS.

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Reply to jimmysmitty

Grimmy wrote :

Nope. There is one were you can upgrade 1.83ghz core to 2ghz core, but going to a quad requires the right chipset to support it.

And besides, Apple doesn't want its users upgrading their products. They want them to purchase a new rig for an upgrade.

I've read that apple didn't even want user to upgrade even the memory on a mini mac. :lol:

Mac mini "Core" Q&A - Revised September 3, 2007

^older article back in 2007

You can upgrade the memory or have the dealer do it. It's the same with all Mac products, a question of warranty. Memory should be added by an "Apple Authorized Service Provider".

The mini is a closed system designed for home use and, as such not like the professional Mac's which have more potential for re-configuring by self engineering.

Reply to arthmawr

runswindows95 wrote :

Why would you spend $600 on a screen-less laptop (Yes, that's all the Mac Mini really is. It's a laptop without a screen.) to put a $600 deskop CPU in it? That makes no sense at all, and also impossible to do due to hardware incompatibilities. Why not spend the $1,200 on a custom built desktop unless there is some reason you need OSX?

You need OSX to avoid Windows related nightmares

Reply to arthmawr

Considering it took 6 months to come up with that, I think we deserve a more thoughtful and thorough rebuttal...

------------------------------ Which Chip? Well, it depends on which set of thieving b@stardz you choose to support: The ones who use insider trading to enrich themselves while running their company into the ground, or the ones who illegally pay vendors to not support the first group.
Reply to Scotteq

@arthmawr

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z2HPxZygU6g

Message edited by B-Unit on 03-12-2009 at 11:44:08 PM

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Reply to B-Unit

Forum CPU & Components : CPUs - mac mini

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