Prior to ordering
So I have been thinking about getting a mac for the past year or so, just to try out. I mean, let’s admit it, they are damn sexy. I wanted one.
I think, and still do, that the G4 iMac is, quite possibly, the coolest looking computer ever. I still like its style more than the G5 iMac. But that’s not the reason I wanted a mac. I want to try out their awesome video software. Editing movies, video, creating dvds, etc.. I’ve been making dvds for a year or so on my pc using Sony Dvd Architect and some other program, which name escapes me. I just don’t like it at all. And then there is OS X. Every time I have seen someone’s mac, wether it by an ibook or powerbook or whatnot, I was struck by not only its beuty, but the wonder that is OS X. It was just a blast to play with! So for the past few months I had been thinking about getting either a new or used eMac or a used, old school G3 iMac. A new eMac would set me back $700 or so, a used/refurbished one (through Apple’s site, awesome refurbs! Check it out….
http://store.apple.com/1-800-MY-APPL....0.6.7.1.0.1.1 And I’ve seen refurbed eMacs for around $550+. A CompUSA by my house had 2 display eMacs for around $500+. I came so close to buying one. Granted, the ram was only like 128 megs, and I would have spent a few bucks upgrading it, but I wanted one!
But then my brother told my about this new, super small mac that he heard about that was supposed to be coming out early next year. And for under $500. Wow. I was hooked. I researched all I could online, hopped onto some awesome mac forum sites, and found out what I could. There were rumors of this thing floating around like crazy! When I found about the BYOKDM (bring your own keyboard, display, and mouse) I was a little skeptical, but still very, very interested. I had seen so much about iLife and OS X by now, that I wanted one more than ever. Then Steve Job’s keynote came, and I watched it online. WOW! http://www.apple.com/quicktime/qtv/mwsf05/ I was never more excited! It looked cooler than what everyone thought it would like like, and iLofe 05 looked awesome! I bought one online the second I could (they went onsale immediately during the keynote, but apple’s site was getting overloaded like nothing I have ever seen. Took me a few hours).
My order
I placed my order over the phone that night, 1-11-05. I placed it over the phone to get my student discount, because the apple site was asking for some kind of id. All they asked on the phone was what school I went to, and that was that! Simple enough! I pimped out my mini quite a bit, turning that $499 into almost the price of a G5 iMac. I had second thoughts about that after placing the order, maybe I shoulda got the iMac, but I made the right choice.
My config:
1.42 GHz G4
512 MB Ram
80 GB Hard Drive
Superdrive
Bluetooth
Apple Bluetooth keyboard/mouse combo
Epson Stylus C86 Printer (free after rebate)
No monitor (hooked up to tv)
I went with the 1.42 upgrade (upgrades the processor and hard drive) specifically for the hard drive. 40 gigs wasn’t going to cut it for me. The processor upgrade isn’t huge, but couldn’t hurt. And the price was just a few bucks more between upping just the hard drive or the hard drive and processor. I still believe that the upgrade should include 512 megs of ram, but o well. I went with the super drive, even though I have a dvd burner in my desktop, so I could burn dvds quikly from the mac. Bluetooth so I can get rid of wires and because I bought this little baby, rather than the iMac, so I could hook it up to my tv, hence the Bluetooth combo. I didn’t even know about the printer, they told me about it on the phone, so I said sure, why not, even though I already have a photo printer.
So the order was placed on the 11th, with a promise of delivery by the 22nd. Why the hell did I get a “free printer” that I don’t need? I just temporarily spent $100 on something that couldn’t hurt, but don’t need. I looked online, and apparently I could have gotten any Epson printer and a $100 rebate, rather than this one free after rebate. Sweet! I called up apple on the 16th and asked if I could change the printer, they said sure. So I changed it to the Epson Picturemate. Nice! Now I have a photo/regular printer and a wee little 4x6 photo printer! And the Picturemate is Bluetooth capable! Score!
I chose to have apple ship the products as they became available. Free shipping rocks. I received the C86 on the 13th (I had called apple after it was shipped). SO I sent that back to them. I received the keyboard and mouse combo on the 19th. I got a little worried about when I would receive the mini. Fedex said it shipped on the 18th from China, sweet, I might get it by the 22nd! It left China, then went back! O no! Apparently this happened to a lot of people, I wonder why? I’m not getting this on time! I looked again the next day, and it was in Anchorage, AK. Yes!!! I woke up on the 20th at like 11, went to check online to see where she was, and it said at my door! Nice! Apple, you rock!
Arrival
Ok, now that I got that out of the way, let’s get serious here. For all you people that are skeptics, mac haters, whatever, go to an apple store and look at the size of the box. Insane. It’s smaller in height than my iPod box, but wider. And that’s only because of all the packaging so that my baby didn’t get hurt on her journey. Open it opn, and holy goodness, this thing is damn small! It’s insane! It puts my shuttle to shame in terms of size! Good thing I have the mini by my tv, or my shuttle might get jealous!
I had class that afternoon, and I actually went, and didn’t even hook It up until I got back. So I hook her up, got myself a little DVI to S-video adapter a few days before, so I was all set. Fired her up. Boooowoooomp! That internal speaker is so damn cool! Turning on the mini is just plain good, old fashion fun! OS X fires up, and I had this thing set up in like 10 minutes. Seriously. Take that, windows. And she recognized my windows network immediately!
First thing I did was install iLife 05 (04 comes installed, so you get o4 AND 05, you just have to install it). Shows how fast they tried to get these babies out! I installed everything except Garageband, I don’t need it, so why take up the hard drive space. I launched iTunes, loaded up my playlist from my desktop, and voila! Shared, networked music, playing through my stereo system. Nice! I fooled around with iChat (instant messenger, almost the same as AIM, looks much cooler though) and iPhote (awesome!) and the rest of iLife. I love it!
So I have had this baby for a little over a month now, and I must say, I am hooked. If it weren’t for the fact that I use AutoCadd A LOT, I would switch over to just macs, without a doubt. I don’t really care about games anymore, all I play are RTS’s , the Sims, and, when and if it ever comes out, the movies, on my pc. And half life 2 runs fine on my shuttle, and I don’t even play it anymore. I haven’t played any games on my computer in months. So the only thing holding my back is work programs.
So how does she run? I guess I could run some benchies, but I am still a mac noob and don’t know how. But I can say this. A 1.42 G4 processor with 512 megs of ram is more than enough to burn movies, dvd’s, or whatever, while listening to music and using iChat. I have yet to notice slowdown or hiccups, at all. I absolutely love the software.
Software
iLife is so great. Seriously. I love iPhoto. I spent so much damn time importing all of my pictures and organizing them in iPhoto and it was so worth it. That program is fantastic. And my girlfriend loves it! It’s like a videogame to her! I can just fire up iPhoto, give her that sweet one button mouse, show her the print button, and let her play for hours! Hell, I do the same also. I am addicted.
iDvd is fantastic. After sorting all of my photos in iPhoto, I fired up iDVD and starting making a dvd of my 2 month trip to Italy and England last summer. I have so many friggin pictures and video clips, it was a blast! After a few days of fooling around, I made my first dvd on my mac. It was so much easier and advanced than the crap I had been using on my pc (and the pc garbage would lock up on my 90% of the time when trying to actually burn the dvd). When I was finished, I set it to burn/created the dvd overnight while I was sleeping. I woke up, and I had me a quality dvd waiting to be watched.
I haven’t really used iMovie much, but from what I have played with, it looks awesome. It definitely rips apart and puts Windows Movie Maker to shame, along with any other movie program I have ever played with. I won’t say much about iTunes since I have been using it since it came out for windows, and I am sure that most people have used it. I will say that I have always loved it and think it’s the best player out there, imo.
Now, since I have always been a windows user, getting used to OS X has and will still take me some time. I am getting used to it, and I love it so much. I hate windows now (I always have, really, now that I think about it). I have used windowblinds and YZ dock on my laptop and desktop to make it look as close to OS X as I can. I love it that much. There is still so much about the os that I know nothing about, but I will say this- expose is the coolest thing ever. That, and the dock. Using multiple programs at the same time, and switching between them, has never been so easy. And fun.
I have also found some sweet programs for my mac. Clutter is awesome. You drag album art from iTunes onto your desktop. It looks cool having all these album art pics on your desktop, but they are functional. Click on one, and it fires up that album in iTunes. iSleep is an alarm clock/sleep timer program that I have been using. When a movie ends, it puts my mac in sleep mode, and then turns on iTunes at the specified time in the morning. Quality. Declicious Library is a cool program for categorizing/archiving all of your dvd’s and video games. And if you have an iSight (or any video camera) you can just scan the barcode using the camera and it automatically puts it into your library! Very cool, indeed.
Build Quality
Not really much to say here. The system is quite well built. It really is amazing how small it is. I really like the wireless keyboard, it is very comfortable,as is the mouse. I will admit, it will take me some time to get used to the one mouse button thing. I will say, though, that no mouse will ever be as good as the Logitech MX series (I have the mx 700 for my shuttle and the mx 500 for my laptop). But I really like the design of the apple mouse, wanted to keep the whole apple design thing going, and the one mouse button really doesn’t bother me. I have gotten quite used to using the keyboard and the mouse instead of using a 2 or 3 button mouse w/ a wheel.
Bluetooth
For the most part, Bluetooth has been working without a hitch. The keyboard and mouse work flawlessly. I have lost the keyboard a few times, but I think it has to do with the battery coming slightly loose. The mouse hasn’t given me any problems. The printer, though, is a pain. Epson sells a Bluetooth adapter for like $90, which is ridiculous. I bought a $40adapter from Best Buy, but could not get it to work. It would recognize the printer, but I couldn’t get it to print. Perhaps a driver issue? I don’t know. I’ll give it a try again someday, I returned the adapter for now. I will also be buying a sweet new cell phone soon, with a camera/videocamera, and that has Bluetooth, so I’ll post how that works out when I get it.
So, as you can see, I love my mac. I am very happy that I went with the mini even though I could have gotten a faster Imac with a display for a little bit more. But I love it. It’s only a matter of time before the product support that I need is there, and then I will permanently switch.
EDIT - picture link didn't work. I'll have to repost them later tonight.
So I have been thinking about getting a mac for the past year or so, just to try out. I mean, let’s admit it, they are damn sexy. I wanted one.
I think, and still do, that the G4 iMac is, quite possibly, the coolest looking computer ever. I still like its style more than the G5 iMac. But that’s not the reason I wanted a mac. I want to try out their awesome video software. Editing movies, video, creating dvds, etc.. I’ve been making dvds for a year or so on my pc using Sony Dvd Architect and some other program, which name escapes me. I just don’t like it at all. And then there is OS X. Every time I have seen someone’s mac, wether it by an ibook or powerbook or whatnot, I was struck by not only its beuty, but the wonder that is OS X. It was just a blast to play with! So for the past few months I had been thinking about getting either a new or used eMac or a used, old school G3 iMac. A new eMac would set me back $700 or so, a used/refurbished one (through Apple’s site, awesome refurbs! Check it out….http://store.apple.com/1-800-MY-APPL....0.6.7.1.0.1.1 And I’ve seen refurbed eMacs for around $550+. A CompUSA by my house had 2 display eMacs for around $500+. I came so close to buying one. Granted, the ram was only like 128 megs, and I would have spent a few bucks upgrading it, but I wanted one!
But then my brother told my about this new, super small mac that he heard about that was supposed to be coming out early next year. And for under $500. Wow. I was hooked. I researched all I could online, hopped onto some awesome mac forum sites, and found out what I could. There were rumors of this thing floating around like crazy! When I found about the BYOKDM (bring your own keyboard, display, and mouse) I was a little skeptical, but still very, very interested. I had seen so much about iLife and OS X by now, that I wanted one more than ever. Then Steve Job’s keynote came, and I watched it online. WOW! http://www.apple.com/quicktime/qtv/mwsf05/ I was never more excited! It looked cooler than what everyone thought it would like like, and iLofe 05 looked awesome! I bought one online the second I could (they went onsale immediately during the keynote, but apple’s site was getting overloaded like nothing I have ever seen. Took me a few hours).
My order
I placed my order over the phone that night, 1-11-05. I placed it over the phone to get my student discount, because the apple site was asking for some kind of id. All they asked on the phone was what school I went to, and that was that! Simple enough! I pimped out my mini quite a bit, turning that $499 into almost the price of a G5 iMac. I had second thoughts about that after placing the order, maybe I shoulda got the iMac, but I made the right choice.
My config:
1.42 GHz G4
512 MB Ram
80 GB Hard Drive
Superdrive
Bluetooth
Apple Bluetooth keyboard/mouse combo
Epson Stylus C86 Printer (free after rebate)
No monitor (hooked up to tv)
I went with the 1.42 upgrade (upgrades the processor and hard drive) specifically for the hard drive. 40 gigs wasn’t going to cut it for me. The processor upgrade isn’t huge, but couldn’t hurt. And the price was just a few bucks more between upping just the hard drive or the hard drive and processor. I still believe that the upgrade should include 512 megs of ram, but o well. I went with the super drive, even though I have a dvd burner in my desktop, so I could burn dvds quikly from the mac. Bluetooth so I can get rid of wires and because I bought this little baby, rather than the iMac, so I could hook it up to my tv, hence the Bluetooth combo. I didn’t even know about the printer, they told me about it on the phone, so I said sure, why not, even though I already have a photo printer.
So the order was placed on the 11th, with a promise of delivery by the 22nd. Why the hell did I get a “free printer” that I don’t need? I just temporarily spent $100 on something that couldn’t hurt, but don’t need. I looked online, and apparently I could have gotten any Epson printer and a $100 rebate, rather than this one free after rebate. Sweet! I called up apple on the 16th and asked if I could change the printer, they said sure. So I changed it to the Epson Picturemate. Nice! Now I have a photo/regular printer and a wee little 4x6 photo printer! And the Picturemate is Bluetooth capable! Score!
I chose to have apple ship the products as they became available. Free shipping rocks. I received the C86 on the 13th (I had called apple after it was shipped). SO I sent that back to them. I received the keyboard and mouse combo on the 19th. I got a little worried about when I would receive the mini. Fedex said it shipped on the 18th from China, sweet, I might get it by the 22nd! It left China, then went back! O no! Apparently this happened to a lot of people, I wonder why? I’m not getting this on time! I looked again the next day, and it was in Anchorage, AK. Yes!!! I woke up on the 20th at like 11, went to check online to see where she was, and it said at my door! Nice! Apple, you rock!
Arrival
Ok, now that I got that out of the way, let’s get serious here. For all you people that are skeptics, mac haters, whatever, go to an apple store and look at the size of the box. Insane. It’s smaller in height than my iPod box, but wider. And that’s only because of all the packaging so that my baby didn’t get hurt on her journey. Open it opn, and holy goodness, this thing is damn small! It’s insane! It puts my shuttle to shame in terms of size! Good thing I have the mini by my tv, or my shuttle might get jealous!
I had class that afternoon, and I actually went, and didn’t even hook It up until I got back. So I hook her up, got myself a little DVI to S-video adapter a few days before, so I was all set. Fired her up. Boooowoooomp! That internal speaker is so damn cool! Turning on the mini is just plain good, old fashion fun! OS X fires up, and I had this thing set up in like 10 minutes. Seriously. Take that, windows. And she recognized my windows network immediately!
First thing I did was install iLife 05 (04 comes installed, so you get o4 AND 05, you just have to install it). Shows how fast they tried to get these babies out! I installed everything except Garageband, I don’t need it, so why take up the hard drive space. I launched iTunes, loaded up my playlist from my desktop, and voila! Shared, networked music, playing through my stereo system. Nice! I fooled around with iChat (instant messenger, almost the same as AIM, looks much cooler though) and iPhote (awesome!) and the rest of iLife. I love it!
So I have had this baby for a little over a month now, and I must say, I am hooked. If it weren’t for the fact that I use AutoCadd A LOT, I would switch over to just macs, without a doubt. I don’t really care about games anymore, all I play are RTS’s , the Sims, and, when and if it ever comes out, the movies, on my pc. And half life 2 runs fine on my shuttle, and I don’t even play it anymore. I haven’t played any games on my computer in months. So the only thing holding my back is work programs.
So how does she run? I guess I could run some benchies, but I am still a mac noob and don’t know how. But I can say this. A 1.42 G4 processor with 512 megs of ram is more than enough to burn movies, dvd’s, or whatever, while listening to music and using iChat. I have yet to notice slowdown or hiccups, at all. I absolutely love the software.
Software
iLife is so great. Seriously. I love iPhoto. I spent so much damn time importing all of my pictures and organizing them in iPhoto and it was so worth it. That program is fantastic. And my girlfriend loves it! It’s like a videogame to her! I can just fire up iPhoto, give her that sweet one button mouse, show her the print button, and let her play for hours! Hell, I do the same also. I am addicted.
iDvd is fantastic. After sorting all of my photos in iPhoto, I fired up iDVD and starting making a dvd of my 2 month trip to Italy and England last summer. I have so many friggin pictures and video clips, it was a blast! After a few days of fooling around, I made my first dvd on my mac. It was so much easier and advanced than the crap I had been using on my pc (and the pc garbage would lock up on my 90% of the time when trying to actually burn the dvd). When I was finished, I set it to burn/created the dvd overnight while I was sleeping. I woke up, and I had me a quality dvd waiting to be watched.
I haven’t really used iMovie much, but from what I have played with, it looks awesome. It definitely rips apart and puts Windows Movie Maker to shame, along with any other movie program I have ever played with. I won’t say much about iTunes since I have been using it since it came out for windows, and I am sure that most people have used it. I will say that I have always loved it and think it’s the best player out there, imo.
Now, since I have always been a windows user, getting used to OS X has and will still take me some time. I am getting used to it, and I love it so much. I hate windows now (I always have, really, now that I think about it). I have used windowblinds and YZ dock on my laptop and desktop to make it look as close to OS X as I can. I love it that much. There is still so much about the os that I know nothing about, but I will say this- expose is the coolest thing ever. That, and the dock. Using multiple programs at the same time, and switching between them, has never been so easy. And fun.
I have also found some sweet programs for my mac. Clutter is awesome. You drag album art from iTunes onto your desktop. It looks cool having all these album art pics on your desktop, but they are functional. Click on one, and it fires up that album in iTunes. iSleep is an alarm clock/sleep timer program that I have been using. When a movie ends, it puts my mac in sleep mode, and then turns on iTunes at the specified time in the morning. Quality. Declicious Library is a cool program for categorizing/archiving all of your dvd’s and video games. And if you have an iSight (or any video camera) you can just scan the barcode using the camera and it automatically puts it into your library! Very cool, indeed.
Build Quality
Not really much to say here. The system is quite well built. It really is amazing how small it is. I really like the wireless keyboard, it is very comfortable,as is the mouse. I will admit, it will take me some time to get used to the one mouse button thing. I will say, though, that no mouse will ever be as good as the Logitech MX series (I have the mx 700 for my shuttle and the mx 500 for my laptop). But I really like the design of the apple mouse, wanted to keep the whole apple design thing going, and the one mouse button really doesn’t bother me. I have gotten quite used to using the keyboard and the mouse instead of using a 2 or 3 button mouse w/ a wheel.
Bluetooth
For the most part, Bluetooth has been working without a hitch. The keyboard and mouse work flawlessly. I have lost the keyboard a few times, but I think it has to do with the battery coming slightly loose. The mouse hasn’t given me any problems. The printer, though, is a pain. Epson sells a Bluetooth adapter for like $90, which is ridiculous. I bought a $40adapter from Best Buy, but could not get it to work. It would recognize the printer, but I couldn’t get it to print. Perhaps a driver issue? I don’t know. I’ll give it a try again someday, I returned the adapter for now. I will also be buying a sweet new cell phone soon, with a camera/videocamera, and that has Bluetooth, so I’ll post how that works out when I get it.
So, as you can see, I love my mac. I am very happy that I went with the mini even though I could have gotten a faster Imac with a display for a little bit more. But I love it. It’s only a matter of time before the product support that I need is there, and then I will permanently switch.
EDIT - picture link didn't work. I'll have to repost them later tonight.
i'm assuming that rendering in CAD is a pain on your shuttle, something to be done while u sleep and what not. is it one of those 100% resource hogs like divx or video encoding? if so give some extra tasks a shot while encoding a video on your mini, or perhaps u have already done it w/ mentioning the burning a dvd and itunes etc. it's freakin uncanny how well the system can multitask while under load (also noted in anandtech's review of the mini). give it a go some time while actually encoding a dvd, which we know is essentially mpeg-2 encoding. is crazy isn't it?
