I’m considering one of these in the 3.2GHz, i7, 6-core, 64GB flavor but am concerned about ventilation as my MBP can’t handle much processing without sounding like a helicopter is taking off. Any Mini users out there now with opinions?
Hello,
We use A LOT of older quad-core Minis for our DAWs and they have performed superbly. They are in Sonnet chassis with triple-Madi RME cards for Nuendo and HDX3/HDMadi interfaces for PT.
The old stock Mini airflow is overly restrictive, it’s possible through modification to improve that substantially with triple or more the airflow volume. When airflow is increased the Minis perform within their thermal parameters under heavy loads although we use them in controlled HVAC studio environments.
We have no idea how the new 6-core Minis will perform but if they end up not being buggy and run reasonably cool we’ll certainly be purchasing some. Apple advertises, I think, 2x the airflow of the old Mini which won’t be enough for what we do so we’ll be looking at modification to enhance it.
Hugh
Thanks Hugh - I’d be using this stand-alone without a chassis so hopefully for my modest needs 2X airflow improvement will suffice. At least the horsepower has been improved.
Hugh, thanks! I have the same problem. I’ll try, hope this will help
I had the exact same question. I’m a laptop user right now but Windows 10 is just about the buggiest thing I’ve ever used. Even though I have decent specs (i7, 16GB RAM, 940MX graphics card), the general system performance is horrible.
I read a benchmark report where the new MacMini outperformed the MBP on most tasks. Since I’m building out my studio, I figured I’d go for a Mac Mini instead of a iMac. I like the small footprint and I already have two 24-inch IPS monitors to hook it up to.
I should mention that I’m a newbie and don’t really use enough to push the system to the limits