2014年11月9日星期日

Not the upgrade we were on tenterhooks meant for: The 2014 Mac Mini reviewed

Not the upgrade we were on tenterhooks meant for: The 2014 Mac Mini reviewed

It's trouble-free to feel unhappy meant for the Mac Mini. Apple went through all of its Macs go on day, updating them with new to the job Intel Haswell CPUs and 802.11ac Wi-Fi adapters and more rapidly SSDs and (sometimes) Thunderbolt 2, while the Mini sat and waited meant for an upgrade to on no account came.

Apple quickly announced a new to the job Mini on its media event trendy October, two years in imitation of the 2012 Mac Mini was introduced. Desktops and laptops haven't higher a full allocation trendy the go on day, so meant for the mainly part the Mini is only getting 2013's upgrades a day in the wee small hours. If to was all to was phenomenon, the Mac Mini would come to pass a welcome-if-overdue bring up to date to the desktop. The 2014 Mac Mini is other attention-grabbing than to but unfortunately meant for ancestors who comprise been waiting meant for this refresh, it's other notable meant for the stuff it's missing than its upgrades.

We typically like to examination the build models of computers after workable, but trendy the Mac Mini's issue the upgraded $699 configuration is other attention-grabbing, and it's the individual you should to pick up if you carefulness something like performance (more on to later). We'll provide benchmarks delegate of the $499 Mini, too, but know in advance of instance to it uses the same guts the same as the base-model MacBook Airs and the $1,099 iMac. To evaluate the computer's SSD performance, we've besides equipped our examination division with a 1TB Fusion Drive, a $200 upgrade—we won't come to pass recapping how this present moving parts, but our deep dive is in excess of at this juncture.

What did you say? Hasn't misrepresented

Visually, the Mac Mini looks the same the same as it has since Apple stopped shipping SuperDrive-equipped models back trendy 2011. It's an plain, flattened aluminum box with astute edges and rounded corners. The front expression is ruined up by a insignificant pasty power LED and an IR receiver, and the sides are flawlessly smooth. A separate part of the pack of black plastic on the back of the division houses the fan vent and a sensibly impressive complement of ports, which has misrepresented solitary a small from go on day.
The FireWire 800 harbor has with no going back been jettisoned (the 2012 Mini was the go on of the Macs to include the aging interface, though Thunderbolt-to-FireWire dongles still exist), and there's a minute Thunderbolt 2 harbor trendy its place. Chronic from go on day are the gigabit Ethernet jack, HDMI harbor, four USB 3.0 ports, an SD tag bookworm, and audio trendy and headset jacks. It's still frustrating to Apple insists on insertion all of the ports meant for its desktops on the back of the computers. It's refusal dumbfound on all meant for longtime Mac users, but PC switchers (a come together the Mini specifically targets) could need to vary their behavior.

With no going back, the new to the job Mini is exactly the same size and burden the same as the old individual. If you were on tenterhooks meant for about kind of reduction at this juncture, keep on tenterhooks.

What did you say? Has improved

Delays to high-end Intel CPUs based on the new to the job Broadwell architecture mean to mainly of the 2014 Mini's improvements came to all other Mac trendy the lineup trendy 2013, so the box's insides execute small to dumbfound. We're looking on Intel Haswell CPUs in its place of Ivy connection, which ought to reduce power consumption while civilizing CPU and GPU performance. 802.11ac Wi-Fi bumps the utmost hypothetical link hustle to 1.3Gbps, roughly three period the 450Mbps 802.11n trendy the 2012 paradigm.

Thunderbolt 2 raises hand over speeds to 20Gbps, and the integrated DisplayPort 1.2 spec brings 30Hz 4K present support to the Mac Mini. The HDMI harbor can besides drive 3840×2160 displays on 30Hz and 4096×2160 displays on 24Hz. This Apple give proof has other in a row on outer present support, but the mainly critical fixation you ought to know is to the Mini does not support multi-stream ecstasy (MST) displays, significance to 4K output on 60Hz is difficult. The friendly DisplayPort 1.3 standard is needed to drive 60Hz displays using a single connector, and Thunderbolt 2 solitary includes support meant for DisplayPort 1.2. Bring up to date: Lack of 60Hz 4K support on the 2014 Mini is essentially an Intel GPU limitation, not a DisplayPort limitation. This give proof outlines the resolutions and refresh duty supported by various Intel GPUs.

Of the other substantive improvements, the GPUs and the improved storeroom speeds are probably the biggest. 2012's Minis all integrated Intel's HD 4000 GPU, the most excellent integrated GPU to shipped with Ivy connection processors. The GPU you pick up trendy the 2014 Mini depends on the configuration you spring for—the $499 build paradigm includes the Intel HD 5000, the same individual you'd pick up trendy the 2013 MacBook or else the $1,099 iMac. The $699 and $999 models include the Iris 5100, a somewhat more rapidly integrated GPU like what did you say? You'd think it over trendy a 13-inch Retina MacBook Pro. Unlike the Iris Pro 5200, the 5100 doesn't include whichever dyed-in-the-wool eDRAM, which limits its speeds. It's still probably worth the in addition ready money if you covet the fastest Mini you can pick up.

A quick hint something like these charts: The HD 5000 results move toward from a 2013 MacBook Air with a 1.7GHz plug i5-3317U trendy it, since we don't comprise records meant for the 1.4GHz paradigm on worker. The build Mini strength of character etch a small differently, but the records ought to come to pass more-or-less the same.

Neither of these new to the job integrated GPUs strength of character roll the Mac Mini into a gaming appliance, but they bring the kind of improvements we'd expect trendy a generational be surprised. The HD 5000 improves on the HD 4000 by something like 50 percent trendy the GFXBench T-Rex test and something like 25 percent more rapidly trendy the Cinebench R15 GPU test. The Iris 5100 spread improves folks records, beating the HD 4000 by 98 percent trendy the T-Rex test and something like 45 percent trendy the Cinebench test. Scores trendy the heavier GFXBench Manhattan test expand the same as well, though by a much less significant margin—obviously the amount you stop to advantage strength of character vary from game to game and task to task.

The be surprised from SATA III to PCI Express-based solid-state drives provides a finicky generational performance boost too, the same individual we proverb after the various iMacs and MacBooks made the same be surprised trendy 2013. Both our 2012 and 2014 Minis are equipped with 128GB SSDs from Samsung. The new to the job Mini has 48 percent better note down speeds and 62.2 percent better read speeds. These records could vary somewhat from division to division, since Apple sources SSDs from a variety of manufacturers.

The build paradigm Mini still comes with a revolving 5400RPM HDD by default, and scores expand by a negligible amount. Spring meant for the Fusion Drive refusal make a difference which paradigm you buy—the way the equipment moving parts ensures to you'll by and large think it over the SSD speeds more accurately than the brake HDD speeds. Saddling a new to the job central processing unit with an HDD trendy 2014 is cruel to consumer and central processing unit alike.

With no going back, the new to the job Mac Mini skin improved idle power consumption, likely attributable to both the Haswell CPUs the same as well the same as the move from standard DDR3 RAM to LPDDR3. Power consumption under CPU load is much let down, mostly for the reason that the 2014 Mini refusal longer includes a quad-core CPU option. Power consumption under GPU load is a crumb privileged for the reason that of the powerful Iris GPU (we'd expect power consumption records meant for the HD 5000 to come to pass somewhere trendy flanked by our 2012 and 2014 Minis). Apple says the new to the job Mini is "the world's mainly energy-efficient desktop." We can't vouch meant for to receive, but it's on slightest an change for the better in excess of its predecessor mainly of the instance.

Tags : Mac mini




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