Customer Reviews

Apple Mac mini MA206LL/A (1.66 GHz Intel Core Duo, 512 MB RAM, 80 GB Hard Drive, SuperDrive)

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

The reviews I've seen, recently, on Mac Mini's seem to be geared to the non-Intel machines. The new Mac Mini's are unbelievable --- and this comes from a (now former) WinTel bigot! I am absolutely blown away with the speed, stability, and all that comes in a package smaller than a portable CD case! I've had my new Mac Mini about a week, and am having more fun than I deserve. I think this machine is the answer for those people looking for an inexpensive (and secure) way to do most of those things PC's have promised to do for us --- E-Mail, WEB browsing, word processing, music & movies. This is the most exceptional buy I've had in years, and I'm a techno-junkie who's been in this before Windows. I do want to make one point --- this is not a "gamer's" platform --- this machine is for the rest of us.

I have a Mac Mini Duo and I love it. It's fast. I'm a programmer who does a lot of compiles and it was an order of magnitude faster than my iBook. It's compact. There's nothing like free desk space and it's super silent too! Moreover, it's quite stylish. Most people don't realize that it's a full fledged computer. The remote control is awesome. Now if it could only tune television, this would be the ultimate home theater PC. I will definitely buy this again and probably another one soon.

I haven't seen any of the problems that others wrote about - and as a developer, I really stress out the system. I wonder if they ran "Software Update" or not. People who know the real history behind OS X (NextStep) know that it has been running on Intel for over 10 years. It's solid. Buy one (or two)! You'll love it.

UPDATE: 7/31/2006. The system is as solid as ever. WHAT A GREAT SYSTEM!!!

It's not only beautifull to see, it's also most afordable for beginning Mac users.
Mac OS X Tiger really is the best OS I've ever worked with, I love it. It's so smooth, especially with the Intel Core Duo processor.

You can place this little Mac everywhere you want, because it's so little and lightweighted! It fits every room, cause it's so styleful.

It's also perfect for people who love to work with Graphic stuff, like editing photo's and video's. With iDVD, which is included with the Mac Mini with iLife '06, you can make professional DVDs with flashing menus in minutes! You click the 'Make DVD'-button and it just works! It runs so smooth that you can do like everything in one time! For example, I'm watching Monsters Inc, typing this message and am chatting on iChat.

With this Mac you can also make your room a Media Centre with Front Row! Just place the Mac Mini everywhere you want, maybe even next to your TV, and connect it to the TV or beamer. If you don't have a LCD TV, you can buy a Apple DVI to Video Adapter for $19.00 and connect it to an 'old'/standard TV. It's amazing! The quality stays the same, whatever screen you use!

If you wanna use a Mac for school, this is also perfect! You can make presentations or shows on your Mac Mini and burn it on iDVD! Or you just bring the whole Mac Mini in your schoolbag to scool, because it's so little, and connect it to a TV, computerscreen or beamer there. Everyone loves it.

With the 4 2.0 USB Ports you can connect eveything to it, so you don't have to worry about things like printers or such.

Conclusion: This Mac fits everyone! Whether you're a student, Graphic designer, someone who tries Mac the first time or just a Mac lover!
It's fantastic!

I actually bought the mac mini at a local Apple store because Amazon does not carry the configuration that I wanted, which is:
Core duo 1.66 GHz with superdrive
1 GB RAM
100 GB hard drive

I mostly use Windows PCs but used to own an iBook G3. I bought the Mac mini mainly to edit home videos using iMovie, and burn to DVD using iDVD. Hence the 1 GB RAM makes the tasks speedier than the 512 MB version. The resulting DVDs are very slick, better than any consumer grade software from Windows. I get beautiful and professional looking DVD menus. The video editing and DVD design are very user friendly. It takes less time and effort than all Windows software I've used, including Roxio Media Creator 8.0.

The Mac mini is even faster than my hulking PC with 2.4GHz Pentium 4 with 1 GB RAM. Video encoding that took 2 hours in Roxio Media Creator, took only 40 minutes in iMovie/iDVD.

The Mac mini is also very quiet. The fan is always at low speed, and has never ramped up to high speed. Right now, I'm typing this review in Safari, listening to songs in iTunes, and doing video encoding in iDVD simultaneously without any slowdown. If you plan to multitask, I recommend getting at least 1GB RAM. Unfortunately, Apple did not make it easy to upgrade RAM on your own. To do so requires using a putty knife to pry open the case.

In summary, the Mac mini is highly recommeded for people who already own a monitor, keyboard, and mouse. Otherwise, an iMac or MacBook should also be considered.

The Mac mini is a great little machine if you want something that is cute, compact, quiet and very connected to the outside world. Don't get it if you really need a high-performance desktop machine -- it is not for World-o-Warcraft. But it's perfect for web surfing, photo retouching, ripping music, editing video and burning DVDs.
I have concerns about Amazon, though. The mini I ordered was packed in Apple's adorable little box inside a rather large Amazon box with no padding... it rattled around a lot in there. It was basically DOA, but the nice folks at the Apple store replaced it under warranty without a fuss.
My takeaway is that Apple is fantastic, but Amazon may not be the best place to order breakable stuff. Still recommend them for non-breakables, though.

The only problem I have had with my Mac Mini relates to the base memory configuration of 512 MB. This is way too little if you want to run 3 or more applications simultaneously. By that I mean a combination of Mail, Safari, Photoshop, Preview, iPhoto, or iTunes. The machine will swap pages in and out of core and disk. It is like asking a mouse to pull a car. Go with 1 GB or more especially if you like big graphics programs.

Otherwise, this is a fantastic machine and a great bargain. Oh, and please don't run Windows on your Mini. Not only is it ugly but you invite the wrath of the Computer Gods.

Macs are well known for ease of use and capabilities, but they have managed all that for years, with processors that are not always top-notch. That all changed in January 2006, with the introduction of Intel processors inside Macintosh computers.

Processor in the new Mac Mini

This particular Mac Mini features an intel Core Duo processor, which is Intel's latest technology. The power of two processor cores, on a single die. Amazing performance. The Duo takes computing to another level. It has blown me away. There is a gigantic increase in performance over the G4, which was previously included with the Mac Mini. The Mac Mini Core Duo can even play 1080p H264 videos, which the Mac Mini G4 could only dream about doing.

Design - The Mac Mini is beautiful. I just love looking at this computer. One of the most beautiful computer form factors ever. You will immediately notice how nicely Apple packages the computer, in an impossibly small box. It may be a small form factor, but it has a lot of features. There are plenty of ports too: 4 USB 2.0 ports, 1 Firewire 400 port, DVI Video out, Audio In, Audio Out.

Video Card -

The new Mac Mini has Intel integrated graphics, which isn't usually a great feature. However, it is still a step-up from the graphics on the previous Mac Mini. The graphics on this machine supports Core Image technology, which the previous Mini did not. It does share your system's memory, for video memory, which is even more of a reason why you should upgrade this system's memory.

Video - The Mac Mini includes a DVI-output connector on the back, which can also output VGA, with the included adapter. An analog video out adapter is also available, separately. The DVI and VGA connectors will allow you to connect the Mini to virtually any display.

Memory - The Mac Mini has a very capable processor, but you may not realize its full potential with the limited memory in the machine, 512 MB. Consider upgrading your memory, once your machine arrives. Other World Computing and Crucial are two companies that sale memory, with online selector tools to easily find the right kind.

Applications -

Apple does include iLife '06, which has iPhoto, iMovie, iWeb, iDVD, and Garageband. There is the Safari web browser, some board games, the always useful iCal, AddressBook, iChat, etc. Overall, I was pleased with the included software.

iLife 06 is particularly great. I love the new full-screen photo editing, photo comparing, etc. You can now also order calendars and greeting cards made with your photos, direct from Apple, by using the iPhoto software. iMovie has new themes, which helps make professional-looking home movies, and iDVD now supports widescreen DVDs. iWeb is a brand-new applications, which makes it easy to create professional quality webpages, quickly. I can't wait to rebuild by site using iWeb. Apple continues to make it easy to create music, manage your digital images, make movies, and create web sites. This Mac Mini can even burn dual-layer DVDs.

A trial (30 day) of iWork '06 is also included, which includes the page layout program Pages, and the presentation program Keynote (which makes presentations that blow away presentations made by rival PowerPoint).

Hard Drive-

This Mac Mini supports a 80 GB hard drive, which will be sufficient for a lot of people. You can certainly hold a lot of documents and music on it. However, you won't fit much video.

Super Drive-

The Super Drive in this Mac Mini will allow you to burn music and data CDs, plus watch and burn DVDs. You can even burn dual-layer DVDs!

PowerPC Applications on Intel Machine

If you own a lot of software for Mac, then most of it is probably compiled for PowerPC. Developers are working hard to make titles run natively on both Intel and PowerPC, but many titles are not yet ready. However, many titles you can use on an Intel Mac because Apple has included Rosetta, which translates the PowerPC code into something the Intel machine can read. However, you never see Rosetta for it works quietly in the background and makes running PowerPC applications seamless. Microsoft Office, for example, works perfect under Rosetta. Intensive applications such as Photoshop will run under Rosetta, but it will be slower until Adobe has an Intel compiled version of Photoshop. Rosetta does work and if you add memory to your Mac, Rosetta works even better.

Two titles I use EyeTV and Toast 7 are not yet compiled for Intel, but they run fine on my Intel Mac, under Rosetta. Again, you don't have to open anything special to use Rosetta. Your Mac knows when it needs it and uses it.

Wireless - This Mac Mini includes bluetooth and Airport wireless technologies, standard. Connect wireless keyboards, mice with Bluetooth, and log-onto the Internet with Airport.

Overall, I am blown away by the Mac Mini Core Duo. It should perhaps come with more memory standard, but it is a very impressive machine. It is incredibly fast on Intel-native applications, and it does a very good job running PowerPC applications. The Intel machines are the future of Apple, so there is no question this is a good machine, and this one has enough power to get most tasks completed in a very speedy manner. I'm happy with my Intel Mac, and I look forward to continue exploring it in the coming days

This is a nice machine. It's my first Mac in many years and I am still getting used to it. It's not perfect though. Memory upgrades are diffcult and need to be performed by qualified personnel. Would a memory door on the bottom similar to a notebook computer be that difficult? I realize that they want to keep the size to a minimum, but a small slot for a newer generation video card would be nice. Or the option to get the system with an ATI card or something other than the Intel video. If those two issues were "corrected", then I would give this system 5 stars and say it is the ultimate computer. It's ability to run either OSX or Windows XP makes switching from Windows a lot less painfull. You can still use the software you spent so much money on for Windows, and yet explore some of the apps that Apple has to offer. The included iLife suite is very nice. Power users may want to pass and wait for the next gen big box, but casual users and those curious about trying a Mac should give it a look. You can use the USB keyboard, USB mouse and monitor from your PC. I'm very pleased and my experience with it now has me looking looking at the MacBooks.

This machine does everything you need out of the box. Plus it is Quiet and Sexy. I love it.
Get 1GB of RAM though.

Great machine very weak Hard Drive. The core duo and Super Combo dvd burner is great. But since the hard drive is so slow 5200rpm, the average is 7200rpm and the faster machines are 15000rpm it is a slow machine in comparsion. I bought it with out knowing and wondered why my machine was crashing all the time... I also added ram 512 isn't very much ram.
PROBLEM NUMBER 1...
I upgraded the hard dive to a 7200rpm and it runs great. I fixed that problem no more crashing.

PROBLEM NUMBER 2...
There are constant operating system updates, you know update itunes, updated safari, updated firmware.
Will now my Super Combo Disc burner no longer works and it turns out it is a common problem other people are having. I don't know if apple is going to release an update to fix the problem.

DON'T BUY A MINI, if you want a mac I suggest a imac, you'll get a great monitor, faster hard drive and more ram, it's worth the extra money!