Apple: You Bastards.

[Luke122]

I'll admit that I'm a sucker for Apple design. Simple, clean, small.

Sadly, that also means expensive, trendy, "metoo-ish".

I'm sure some of you know that I have a Mac Mini as my media PC in my living room. The small footprint and near silent operation were a welcome addition to my living room.

Well, just on a whim I hit up Apple's site today to see whats new.. and they've announced a new Mini. Dammit..

This one is packing a new Nvidia 9400M graphics chipset, a 120gb hdd, and a DVD burner. $729.. only $100 more than I paid for the Mac Mini last year when I bought it. I knew that it wouldnt be a powerhouse, but with it's 1.83ghz Core2 proc and 1gb ram, it was plenty powerful for what I needed.

The integrated Intel GMA930 graphics were pretty weak, even by integrated standards.. I had a heck of a time getting it to run Diablo 2: Lord of Destruction at 800x600, but I did finally manage it.. even though it's pretty choppy. There are stories out there of people more patient than I who run WoW on the mini.. i cant imagine it.

So now I find myself lusting for the new one.. $729 is nothing to sneeze at, especially since that only has a gig of ram in it.. $949 will get you 2gb and a 320gb hdd..

You bastards.

[Zephik]

For that much money, why not just build your own?

You could probably just take a strip of plexi, wrap it in the basic shape of a Mac Mini, then cover it with two rounded sheets of plexi. Viola, basically a plexiglass version of a Mac Mini. Might even look better than one if you do it right. ;)

[BuzzKillington]

I mean no disrespect whatsoever but didn't you just post a thread about a free gaming rig? If you're broke, already have a mini media box and now have reasonable gaming rig that would have no problem playing the games listed above, why drop another grand?

Again, no disrespect, just kinda seems like you're in the Apple trance. :P *snap* *snap*

[FuzzyPlushroom]

Intel onboard is plenty for a media-center machine, mind. Why not make a "maxi" with a spare micro-ATX dual-core system (you have to have one somewhere) and a discrete video card?

[TheGreatSatan]

2GB, you've got to be kidding me.

HP slimline has 320GB hard drive and 3GB RAM and is barely over $400

[jdbnsn]

I mean no disrespect whatsoever but didn't you just post a thread about a free gaming rig? If you're broke, already have a mini media box and now have reasonable gaming rig that would have no problem playing the games listed above, why drop another grand?

Again, no disrespect, just kinda seems like you're in the Apple trance. :P *snap* *snap*

Hahaha! The man has a point....frugal my ass!

[Luke122]

Lol.. I wasnt planning on buying one..

Ok here's the story.

I bought the Mac Mini for a customer of mine, who was going to use it as a till in his store. We bought the mini + Checkout (awesome point of sale software btw) for him. His staff abused the computer until he finally pulled it from the store and put a cash register back in. His wife hated the Mac because she wanted to run her PC software, so they asked me to trade for a PC, which I did (my media box).

I got the Mac Mini in trade, and my wife loves it. I dont mind it so much.. it does what we need, plus it's quiet and small. It just sucks for games, which disappoints me, since I'd rather have ONE pc in the living room for everything, rather than a pc + a console. I was planning on either selling the mini or moving it to our bedroom, and putting my free PC in there for gaming/media duties.

I was just upset that they came out with this new version, and I'm lusting after it, even though I dont need it and cant afford it. I certainly cant justify the price, since I could build a similarly powerful system for less than half that amount!

I was just bitching out loud, that's all. :)