# Buy a mac mini now, or wait?



## SupremeFist (Jan 27, 2020)

So my current machine is a relatively lowly 2017 Macbook Pro with dual 3.1Ghz i5 and 16Gb RAM. It's quite capable for my current (smallish) projects except that it struggles sometimes with realtime playing of heavy VIs like Heavyocity's Ascend or NI's Straylight. So I'm looking at an upgrade…

I'm not interested in PCs because I'm happy with Logic. I've ruled out the 16" Macbook Pro and iMacs because I'm allergic to fan noise/electronic whining, and the new Mac Pro is too much right now. So a Mac Mini it is. Of course we'd all like Apple to put an i9 in there but there's no way of knowing when/if they'll do so. The current i7 would get me nearly three times the multicore performance of my mbP but "only" a 35% improvement in single-core speed. So my question to people already using the 2018 i7 mini is: do you feel like this is a machine that will serve you well for, say, 3-5 years from now?

Thanks for any advice!


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## ridgero (Jan 27, 2020)

Wait for the WWDC (June)

There are alot rumors about the iMac / iMac Pro. Some rumors say that the iMac Pro may get discontinued and the regular iMac gets the cooling solution of the iMac Pro.


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## tav.one (Jan 27, 2020)

I bought my Mac Mini on release in 2018 but I won't buy the same machine in 2020, I'd wait for a Mac Mini or iMac/iMac Pro refresh.


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## dcoscina (Jan 27, 2020)

The new 8 core i9 iMac looks like a beast. Plus the regular iMacs can have their ram upgraded very easily tho I think they top off at 128gb of Ram. But seriously, how many of us need more than that? I have 64 and rarely get close to using that.


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## Paul Grymaud (Jan 27, 2020)

*The Big mac right now*. I'll wait for the Mac mini...


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## Jeremy Spencer (Jan 27, 2020)

I'm holding out to see if they will release an i9 Mini this year, that would be a good choice.

@dcoscina you'd be amazed how may composers use more than 128GB, I still don't understand the need, but to each his own.


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## BassClef (Jan 27, 2020)

ridgero said:


> Wait for the WWDC (June)
> 
> There are alot rumors about the iMac / iMac Pro. Some rumors say that the iMac Pro may get discontinued and the regular iMac gets the cooling solution of the iMac Pro.



Next year, I'm looking to upgrade my 6 year old iMac (4-core, i7, 4.0 Ghz) and would love to see the regular iMac get the iMac Pro cooling design.


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## dcoscina (Jan 27, 2020)

Wolfie2112 said:


> I'm holding out to see if they will release an i9 Mini this year, that would be a good choice.
> 
> @dcoscina you'd be amazed how may composers use more than 128GB, I still don't understand the need, but to each his own.


No doubt. I have maxed out at 70 tracks for a large action orchestral piece for a role playing game score and it didn’t take a lot of ram.


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## Nate Johnson (Feb 18, 2020)

I'd be leery of an i9 Mac Mini. Seems like the past couple of years, Apple has been putting high-powered CPUs into small boxes and almost all of them have had reports revealing major flaws with that concept - heat/throttling/noise. 

There's a thread as recent as the first page in this sub-forum reporting performance issues with the integrated graphics in the Mini. Again, the compromises of a small box. I don't see how adding more power to that equation fixes that.

I recently spent some time with a 2019 13" MBP/i7 quad core/16gb machine - it got crazy hot just with just a couple of Alchemy tracks loaded in Logic. Almost too hot to touch. My 2013 13"/i5 duo core/8gb machine rarely heats up, and I regularly run 25-30ish tracks with heavy automation and eq in my projects. The fan only kicks on when I render video in iMovie. Never in Logic. 

I've been considering the options to upgrade for almost a year now, and have a done quite a bit of user-impression based research on various Apple machines. At the moment, the 2013-2015 era options are the sweet spot, their one caveat being age. Whether or not that will really matter remains to be seen, as it depends on the future of Apple's official software support. The classic choice most revered here on ViC, the 5,1 cheese grater is now challenged by this concept, requiring workarounds (aka hacks) to run Catalina. Buying something brand new today, it sounds like the 27" i9 iMac is probably the best choice. Unless you can afford the new Mac Pro, which probably most of the people still reading this post cannot. 

Of course this is just my impression, along with all of the negative reviews out there, I've read some good ones too, just not enough for me to pull the trigger myself!


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## ptram (Feb 18, 2020)

A new Mac mini with an external power supply unit would be great!

Paolo


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