“A funny thing happened to the Mac mini last week. The single Mac model that’s the most long in the tooth surpassed 1,000 days without an update,” Jason Snell writes for Macworld. “But this shouldn’t be too surprising to Mac mini fans: that update, in October 2014, was 723 days after the previous Mac mini update, in October 2012. The quad-core Mac mini released in 2012 (and discontinued in 2014) still stands as the fastest Mac mini ever made, since the 2014 models maxed out at two processor cores.”
“I don’t think the Mac mini is going away,” Snell writes. “I suspect that at some point we will see a new model based on an updated Intel chipset and supporting Apple’s latest connection technologies — and that model will probably also sit without an update for a few years. This seems to be the Mac mini’s lot in life.”
“I suppose it’s possible that Apple will release a new Mac mini one day in a version of its familiar aluminum enclosure, the same general look it’s had since it was first released in 2005,” Snell writes. “But once I got a look at an Intel NUC (short for Next Unit of Computing), my belief in a next-generation Mac mini got a lot stronger.”
Much more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Intel’s NUC mini-desktops cry out in desperation for Jony Ive’s touch!
As a lucky owner of the last 4 core mini, I’m starting to hope for a new Mac Pro mini or something. I use it for plex and other home services.
Apple needs a home server of some kind. For audio multiplexing ala Sonos, plex or HomeKit. Lots of applications.
Time to release an A-Series iOS server ??
I just wet my seat.
I most consciously purchased a six core mini to replace my 2 core mini. It’s called the 2013 Mac Pro…
Apple needs a server in the worst way but why would anyone constrain a non-mobile device to have a crippled mobile OS???????
Mac for all desktops, workstations, servers, and laptops.
Keep your iOS for phone, games and art, please.
The cheapest Mac mini is $500. I doubt a refurbed unit would be less than $400.
Do the problems and/or applications you wish to solve really need a $500 computer. Even a non-atom Nuc board is $350.
I know the Mac OS, the OS, etc. but for simple fire sharing and a media box why would anyone buy a new Mac mini as a solution.
They are expensive little buggers. Sold with no memory or processor.
I would like a MacMini that can do 4K at 60FPS. No current MacMini can manage 4K and that’s pretty damn sad when some of the cheapest Android streaming boxes can easily do that much. I have a late 2012 quad-core i7 MacMini and it’s only good for 1080P which my HD TV supports. I’m looking at 4K HD TVs as I would like to put one in my basement. A MacMini that supports 4K is really what I want to drive that HD TV. Why is it so difficult for Apple to manage something like that? Hopefully, a new MacMini will have a Kaby Lake processor with Intel Graphics that can drive a 4K HD TV.
Honestly, AppleTV doesn’t support 4K and no MacMini supports 4K at 60FPS. For such a wealthy company, Apple seems to be so slow at certain things. I’m not asking for anything unusual because a $60 Android streaming box can do that much. Apple designs some of the best ARM chips around and they’d rather use some reject chips for AppleTV. Absolutely pathetic.
Look at HP’s slick Elite Slice Mini. Tons of options, quad-core, etc. You mean to tell me Apple can’t do better than HP? That’s sad. I’m not sure if the Elite Slice does 4K, though. Apple should be able to do a lot better than HP.
1,000 days. That is friggin’ unbelievable in the IT (Tech) industry. This is almost considered Vintage now. Astounding. And pretty damn pathetic Apple. Well, we definitely see where your priorities are. No doubt about that.
I love my 2012 4-core i7 2.6GHz that I use for my Roon Music server only. Modified to run on 12VDC and powered by an outboard LPS it works great. I put in a 1TB SSD and 1TB HDD for Backup, cranked the memory to 16 GB and it works great. Hope they come out with a new one soon!
PLEASE make a new mac mini. i’ll buy 2. oh, and high end please, i need them with at least quad core +hyperthreads (appears as 8 core) and 64gigs of ram. please apple. pretty please. pretty please with $5,000 worth of sugar on top.
In reference to the MDN take, I really do not care about the styling. I want a nice quad core Mac mini with a great GPU (enough to drive 4k video at 60fps to replace my old one as a Living Room HTPC. It would be nice if Apple sold an Apple TV package on the Mac Mini as Front Row for Living Room use.
I keep another as an emergency backup. When my Mac Pro’s power supply died and I had to get it fixed, I just plugged my mini into my ProBox with 4 internal drives and keep on going. Not keen on using my MacBook Pro for desktop duty.
We want a Mac Mini Pro with Intel Xeon processor, 8 cores please, w/64GB RAM and 2 TB .M2 SSD.
What we will get is an Intel Celeron U CPU, HD integrated video, and a 512 GB HHD with 8 GB of non-upgradable RAM.
I gave up and went back to Windows. Not as painful as I thought it would be.
Clueless in Cupertino… missing out on a lot of money here…
2018 bucket list? Please?