CrimeMouse
Contributor
You can buy two Mac minis with 16GB/256GB each for the price it costs to upgrade a single one to 32GB/512GB.
News Apple Announces Redesigned Mac Mini With M4 and M4 Pro Chips
- Thread starter TinTinSnowy
- Start date
rsaeon
Herald
Wow. This just blew my mind. You meant to jest but I'm serious.
Buy two, connect them together with Thunderbolt networking.
And then connect one of them to my M1 with Thunderbolt.
Boom, eight extra P cores with 20% IPC uplift for ~110K.
Automator could divide out the files over two machines.
Syncthing could consolidate the output into a single folder.
I mean, I could even just use regular ethernet since they're only JPGs.
Not as flashy as a custom 9950X compute box, but wow.
And it's scalable! ahah
CrimeMouse
Contributor
That's why the power button is on the bottom. What if someone turns off one in your server farm?
Apple has truly thought of everything. The ghost of Steve "Apple Incorporated" Jobs still guides us all in these troubling times. God bless Apple, god bless aluminium, sorry, "Aluminum". God bless Bharat.
DrkLord
Galvanizer
Bashing apple here or praising it here won't do anything. Don't follow brand, see if a machine is best for your usecase if yes, either apple or not, get it.
If not, get some other machine.
Companies are not here for customer's betterment at the detriment of their profit margin. They are here to make profits and we can only pray that profit making approach aligns with beneficial to customers approach.
If not, get some other machine.
Companies are not here for customer's betterment at the detriment of their profit margin. They are here to make profits and we can only pray that profit making approach aligns with beneficial to customers approach.
?dOuBtFiRe?
Galvanizer
You can change SSD Storage in new Mac Mini 4
Apple's New Mac mini Comes with Removable Storage
Apple may finally let you replace and upgrade parts in your brand new Mac mini M4
Will leave this to you for further inputs from you all.
Basically this is Super Good News.
Apple's New Mac mini Comes with Removable Storage
Apple may finally let you replace and upgrade parts in your brand new Mac mini M4
Will leave this to you for further inputs from you all.
Basically this is Super Good News.
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desiibond
Keymaster
But it is custom SSD that only Apple will have. Not clear whether they will let users replace SSD with bigger storage through official channels. Hope they allow this going forward.
?dOuBtFiRe?
Galvanizer
Pretty sure that some time down the line, some one will start selling adapters for allowing normal SSD to Mac mini. But keep on the look out for news in this regard.
For now 16G Ram with 256G SSD is best at that price point.
codwapeace
Forerunner
Normal SSDs cannot work even with an adapter. They don't have nvme controllers on the SSD module in the Mac mini. They just have the storage chips. The controller is elsewhere. So, the only way to upgrade storage is to buy a SSD module specifically for Macs.
alekhkhanna
Innovator
Was about to post that dosdude video too.
Given the amount of work needed, saying that it is "Upgradable" is a stretch right now. But given that the module is detachable you could see a future where someone starts selling the part (board with NAND chips + whatever control circuits apple has on theirs) separately and a somewhat tech-savvy end user could replace it.
Given the amount of work needed, saying that it is "Upgradable" is a stretch right now. But given that the module is detachable you could see a future where someone starts selling the part (board with NAND chips + whatever control circuits apple has on theirs) separately and a somewhat tech-savvy end user could replace it.
I am not sure how many will be able to make most of this.
This does require some decent tech skills for sure.
Most folks including me will avoid this process in fear of damaging the Mac mini.
I may be able to do it but not taking the risk .
desiibond
Keymaster
This NAND replacement hack is not new. There are modders who did this with current crop of Apple Silicon Macs. How well it works and how safe it is, they will never reveal. Probably this is just like all those 'street food vidoes where person puts everything at hand into one and tops it with entire block of cheese and butter'.
alekhkhanna
Innovator
This NAND replacement hack is not new. There are modders who did this with current crop of Apple Silicon Macs. How well it works and how safe it is, they will never reveal. Probably this is just like all those 'street food vidoes where person puts everything at hand into one and tops it with entire block of cheese and butter'.
Quite sure this will become available at Nehru Place or Gaffar or Lamington Road sooner than later. And if someone has the luxury of visiting China for work, they can do such upgrades before you finish lunch.
superczar
Keymaster
A whole lot easier to just add a thunderbolt / USB 4 enclosure. (Not USB 3)
Macs will see the enclosed drive as a standard nvme drive over a pcie link.
I have a 2tb crucial added to my desktop setup and the R/W speeds are pretty much same as native (in the range of 3000-3500 MB/s)
Macs will see the enclosed drive as a standard nvme drive over a pcie link.
I have a 2tb crucial added to my desktop setup and the R/W speeds are pretty much same as native (in the range of 3000-3500 MB/s)
?dOuBtFiRe?
Galvanizer
Stand & Hub For Mac Mini / Studio With NVMe SSD Enclosure
This is an example to use with Mac Mini 1/2. I had seen this used with M1 and it was so useful. It also added all essential ports on the front side too. They had got it from US in some sale at 70$. Currently at 100$. Looking forward for some nice accessories from Satechi. In its current form Mac Mini 4 does not need these unless the above mentioned nVme drive.
Naa, it requires too much precision for those at these places to dabble in, especially for a very small market. Shenzen is another thing though, they would do it on the streets.
However, OCW has been working on upgradable storage specifically for Max's and they will definitely come out with a PCB with the blank NAND chips that can be installed directly, only that it will cost a bit more , but much lesser than what Apple charges.
Challenge might be needing another Mac to restore the OS.
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desiibond
Keymaster
if there is iCloud and/or Time Machine backup, recovery is super easy. MacOS has internet based reinstall of OS, IIRC. You can use recovery mode to setup APFS filesystem and then initiate OS installation. Once that is done, use iCloud backup to restore or use Time Machine for local restore.
Party Monger
Juggernaut
I have a 4tb ssd with a 40gbps case giving 3.5gbps speeds. 5yrs warranty on ssd, none on case. Price I got for both was below 20k. So works for me lol.
The problem comes with the laptop. I have an M2 max macbook with 512gb ssd. Was thinking of adding a 1tb sd card. But UHS2 1tb cards are expensive or not in high capacity. How are the uhs1 one cards with around 170-190 speeds ? Any other option that wont dangle from the macbook?
superczar
Keymaster
Just one point , more semantics than anything else.
A 40gbps enclosure is expected to give a theoretical 5 MB/s (bits vs bytes)
In reality , you can expect 3-4 due to overheads so I presume you are getting 3.5GB/s and not 3.5gbps.
With laptops, no easy way really.
Tiny 2230 enclosures are cheap now but they max out at 800-900 MB/s and also slow down if doing sustained writes.
Having said that, with both phones and laptops, I shifted to icloud long ago and just leave the optimize storage option on.
That way, something like even 128 on phones or 256 on laptops has been more than perfectly fine for me while continuing to retaining access to all my data whenevr needed.
Of course, this won’t work if your use case involves, for example, handling lots of large video files on the go.
But for the majority of scenarios, this does work very well