Mac Mini

Deep Thought

Hi

Was thinking of selling my 2017 21 inch iMac and getting a mac mini ( i already have monitor)

is the new one any good ?

Was thinking of an older Mini - not new.

Any thoughts on which older model?

thanks

DT

Sad Professor

Apple barely ever update Mini, so older models tend to be even worse value. I wouldn't recommend anything older than the 2014 model (which was the last update before the current model) and only if you got it for a very good price. If it was me I'd just get the latest one (from 2018), though I think your mad to sell the iMac for it.

Deep Thought

Sad Professor wrote: »

Apple barely ever update Mini, so older models tend to be even worse value. I wouldn't recommend anything older than the 2014 model (which was the last update before the current model) and only if you got it for a very good price. If it was me I'd just get the latest one (from 2018), though I think your mad to sell the iMac for it.

Thanks for the advice, good points.

My iMac is very slow, I reckon it needs more ram.

It’s €250 for the upgrade. But probably better doing this than getting the Mac mini

DT

Sad Professor

How much RAM does it currently have? 8GB? Unless you are doing really heavy work, I doubt that's the problem. If it's recently gone slow it's probably the hard drive dying. Either that or a rogue background process.

Deep Thought

Sad Professor wrote: »

How much RAM does it currently have? 8GB? Unless you are doing really heavy work, I doubt that's the problem. If it's recently gone slow it's probably the hard drive dying. Either that or a rogue background process.

Yeah it has 8gb. Getting the beach ball a lot. Bit thought that was caused by the ram

Mactivate do 1TB SSD for €379

Is this better than ram upgrade?

What’s the best way to check rogue process?

Thanks

Sad Professor

Deep Thought wrote: »

Yeah it has 8gb. Getting the beach ball a lot. Bit thought that was caused by the ram

Mactivate do 1TB SSD for €379

Is this better than ram upgrade?

What’s the best way to check rogue process?

Thanks

You can check for rogue progresses in Activity Monitor. Click on the CPU tab.

I wouldn't generally attribute the spinning beachball to lack of RAM. If it's happening a lot, especially at startup, I'd be concerned the HDD is failing. Verify your drive in Disk Utility and check the SMART status, though it could check out and still be failing. Listen for noises. I'd recommend backing up any important files immediately just in case and then do a full backup if you don't have one already.

Upgrading from HDD to SSD is the best thing you can do for your Mac's performance. You'll never want to go back to a HDD.

Deep Thought

Sad Professor wrote: »

You can check for rogue progresses in Activity Monitor. Click on the CPU tab.

I wouldn't generally attribute the spinning beachball to lack of RAM. If it's happening a lot, especially at startup, I'd be concerned the HDD is failing. Verify your drive in Disk Utility and check the SMART status, though it could check out and still be failing. Listen for noises. I'd recommend backing up any important files immediately just in case and then do a full backup if you don't have one already.

Upgrading from HDD to SSD is the best thing you can do for your Mac's performance. You'll never want to go back to a HDD.

I was doing disk utility and even moving the scroll bars caused beach ball

Greentree_uk

The 21.5 is non user upgradeable for either ram or hdd. but if you are doing them, you had better do both. not sure about the hdd whether any can be fitted as they did have custom firmware on the disks and needed a kit to add a temp sensor cable. that was deffo for the 27" not sure about 21.5, imo 21.5 will always be better than a mac mini.

Doodah7

Trying booting from an external SSD connected by USB 3 or preferably thunderbolt. See how it performs and whether it is worth replacing.

Greentree_uk

Doodah7 wrote: »

Trying booting from an external SSD connected by USB 3 or preferably thunderbolt. See how it performs and whether it is worth replacing.

if doing that ensure you don't mount the damaged drive.

atilladehun

When that happened to me it was a faulty logic board, which I know can be a number of things but the whole thing had to be replaced.

Deep Thought

Thanks for all the advice.. will mull it over

Etre report says HDD is fine , but couple of months again said it was failing..

Sad Professor

Deep Thought wrote: »

Thanks for all the advice.. will mull it over

Etre report says HDD is fine , but couple of months again said it was failing..

Back up immediately if you haven't already. Important files first as it may not survive a full backup.

Deep Thought

Sad Professor wrote: »

Back up immediately if you haven't already. Important files first as it may not survive a full backup.

Done.. am going to chat with Mactivate.