Apple Mac Mini's...

[MattT]

Anybody have one of these?

I'm thinking of getting one and sticking it next to the TV. I only use my PC for internet and music/ipod so was thinking of getting one of these mac things - I've used macs before and love the usability you get - the software etc etc. Best of all no Windows either!

I see there are a few dual-core models knocking about now so they can't be too far behind pace wise - not that I'm looking to do anything taxing.

Just wondering what people thought of them - and without launching world war 3, what people thought of macs in general?
Cheers!

 

[Rich]

A few of us on here like Macs, most hate them!

 

[Karen]

I'm on my 3rd Mac since January... this one seems *touch wood* to be ok at the mo but I still struggle with getting certain stuff to work on it... lovely screen though!

 

[UncleGrumpy]

I use macs every day at work, they are, always have been and probably always will be a steaming pile of dogs jobbies.

 

[sn00p]

I use IBM compatible PC's every day at work, they are, always have been and probably always will be a steaming pile of dogs jobbies.

Couldn't agree more

Get yourself a mac, don't look back. I use PC's all day long and it's so nice to come home and use a computer which doesn't frustrate the hell out of me!

If you're wanting HD media playback then get a dual core mac mini.

 

[Turkish]

Love my mac, wouldnt go back.

 

[Andy A]

Once a mac is setup and running properley you will improve your productivity so much more on anything, they are so user friendly

 

[UncleGrumpy]

Get yourself a mac, and get used to filling in crash reports.

 

[Adam]

ive always fancy'd a mac but i just dont think i could get use to it....because i wouldnt trade in my pc

 

[sn00p]

Get yourself a mac, and get used to filling in crash reports.

I hardly ever see anything crash, certainly no more than I see under windows. I've never seen OS X crash apart from when I was writing a kernel mode device driver.

Microsoft decided in infinite wisdom that they'd be the one to receive application crash reports rather than the software vendor, most useless feature ever.

Fortuantely Apple aren't as dumb and the crashreporter can send the log to the application vendor.

 

[UncleGrumpy]

I hardly ever see anything crash, certainly no more than I see under windows. I've never seen OS X crash apart from when I was writing a kernel mode device driver.

Microsoft decided in infinite wisdom that they'd be the one to receive application crash reports rather than the software vendor, most useless feature ever.

Fortuantely Apple aren't as dumb and the crashreporter can send the log to the application vendor.

Erm i thought a properley set up mac didn't crash?

I must be halucinating then every time Illustrator CS2 bombs
Or Photoshop CS2
Or Artpro
Or Mac Barcoda
Or Filemaker
Or Quarkxpress

the list goes on, and on.

 

[sn00p]

Erm i thought a properley set up mac didn't crash?

I must be halucinating then every time Illustrator CS2 bombs
Or Photoshop CS2
Or Artpro
Or Mac Barcoda
Or Filemaker
Or Quarkxpress

the list goes on, and on.

Who said that?

They're application crashes, that's nothing to do with Apple. What's good with Apple is that the OS is capable of sending the information to the vendor who are the only people who can fix the problem. Under windows it's not possible to do this with the in-built crash reporting.

While we're listing stuff, these crash on me all day at work.

Visual Studio 2005
Microsoft Word
Microsoft Excel
Firefox
Crossworks
Explorer (maybe about 3 or 4 times a day)
Internet Explorer

:rasp:

 

[Rststevo]

Anybody have one of these?

I'm thinking of getting one
Cheers!

i've seen cheaper doorstops on the sunday market.

 

[sn00p]

i've seen cheaper doorstops on the sunday market.

Ahh...A use for my PC. Thanks, appreciated.

 

[UncleGrumpy]

Not true, a vendor cant do anything to stop OSX from trying to access memory that doesnt exist - severe memory exceptions is one of OSX's party pieces.

I also dont have to run windows ME or 98 or 95 to get some programs to run, i have to use classic on a mac, so i have to run an almost kind of unix like OS running a old OS which is a GUI slapped over a dos shell - woooo where do i sign up to pay through the nose for some of that!

 

[sn00p]

Not true, a vendor cant do anything to stop OSX from trying to access memory that doesnt exist - severe memory exceptions is one of OSX's party pieces.

I also dont have to run windows ME or 98 or 95 to get some programs to run, i have to use classic on a mac, so i have to run an almost kind of unix like OS running a old OS which is a GUI slapped over a dos shell - woooo where do i sign up to pay through the nose for some of that!

Erm. I'm a software engineer mate.

What you have described are application exceptions caused only by the vendors software, not by the OS. A memory exception in the kernel would cause a panic and that would be terminal for the operating system a memory exception in the application would cause a protection fault and the application would terminate (OS X would provide a register dump, including the program counter and a dump of the stack to facilitate a very basic trace). I've only ever seen a OS X kernel panic once and that was my fault when I was developing a kernel mode USB device driver.

If you're getting kernel panics all the time then something is *very* wrong with your OS X installation and I'd recommened a re-installation, of course that's a since as you install and hit the migrate user accounts button when prompted.

DOS programs only run under NT/2K/XP via a system called virtual device drivers (VDD's), these simulate hardware. Windows has a number of these built in, but many pieces of software fail to run under this environment because of their reliance on direct hardware access, VDD's only allow *so much* access, basically anything that did anything fancy under dos (graphics etc) isn't going to run.

Apple decided, and it was the right move, to start a-fresh and not be unencumbered with past mistakes, all OS's prior to X had a tendancy to crash - i'll give you that, but they'd been using code that had been around since the mid-80's. Apple bought NeXTSTEP and it then became OS X, they could have left all customers out in the dark and not provided the classic environment, but they did - infact I think in tiger it's not even installed by default, you have to go find it on one of the discs. Running anything under classic isn't going to be the best experience, but it's was a stop gap until application vendors carbonized their applications.

OS X is far better than anything to come of out redmond and given that the vista keeps being delayed and features dropped apple are still way ahead with tiger over vista and with leopard just around the corner.......

 

[Rich]

Erm i thought a properley set up mac didn't crash?

I must be halucinating then every time Illustrator CS2 bombs
Or Photoshop CS2
Or Artpro
Or Mac Barcoda
Or Filemaker
Or Quarkxpress

the list goes on, and on.

As much as I love Macs, I have to agree with one thing from the above.

Erm i thought a properley set up mac didn't crash?
I must be halucinating then every time Illustrator CS2 bombs

But if Illustrator does not crash at least once in day here I am doing well. But the thing is, the OS stays fine, so should we be slating the Mac or Adobe

 

[sn00p]

But the thing is, the OS stays fine, so should we be slating the Mac or Adobe

Hurrah! Somebody that understands that the OS is not the same as the application!

Have a :star:

 

[Turkish]

You're safe with Rich he doesnt own a pitchfork unlike some, lol.

 

[Rich]

Well you say that Si, but there are a couple in the garden, should I start using them!

 

[Turkish]

As long as they have an MS OS

 

[Rststevo]

Ahh...A use for my PC. Thanks, appreciated.

i've got nothing against macs, they look great, feel nice. the mac mini is a nice idea, basically the principle of a laptop without any interfaces, which is great for easily transporting your data around, and if it's used for what it is intended, like what MattT is.

only gripe i have with them is the smug clique of the geeky owners and their rediculously over inflated pricetag. never had a single problem with my pc desktop that i built or my laptop since i got it nearly 2 years ago, and the reason i bought that over a mac was simply the price, i would have to pay almost double for the mac equivalent

 

[MattT]

lol - thanks for the info guys.
I use almost the full range of adobe software at work everyday - no intentions of using it at home as well - literally be using the internet/dvd/music stuff - nothing else so it doesn't really bother me.

Is there a pc equivalent of the mac mini? It's not so much the fact it's a mac that's attracting me - more so the fact it doesn't take up anywhere near as much space as my current PC setup - which is overkill for what I use it for.

 

[Turkish]

IIRC Rasclart has a mini mac that he uses as a media centre (sounds like thats what you plan on using it for). Might be worth having a word with him and seeing how he finds it.I've got a Imac G5 so cant comment on the mini.

 

[UncleGrumpy]

Erm. I'm a software engineer mate.

What you have described are application exceptions caused only by the vendors software, not by the OS. A memory exception in the kernel would cause a panic and that would be terminal for the operating system a memory exception in the application w...sorry i nodded off at this point.


Hmm at this point i was going to list the finder and dock crash logs but i can only post 10 thousand characters in one go, i needed 48.66 times that amount.

But hell your a software engineer, you're bound to know more about using a mac in a real-world production environment than someone whos been doing it for 10+ years.

 

[Rststevo]

Is there a pc equivalent of the mac mini? It's not so much the fact it's a mac that's attracting me - more so the fact it doesn't take up anywhere near as much space as my current PC setup - which is overkill for what I use it for.

apple got the idea from 'barebones' pcs, http://www.ebuyer.com/UK/store/2/category/Barebones/rb/20760297640 which are of a similar size, and have been going for quite a few years, they're popular with gamers as they can take them easily to LAN parties and the such. that kind of system is what'd be favourable if you were doing an install, saves space, and is more flexible than a laptop.
thing with barebones pcs is you have to build them yourself, they usually come with power supplies and motherboards plus some optical drives, so end up cheaper than a mac mini and can be exactly to your spec, but it'll probably be more convienent to just buy the mac if you don't build pcs

 

[Longy]

Only stuff that crashes on my G5 powermac at work is Indesign CS2 and Quark. Dont have any other problems with it at all (except suitcase! which I hate). Photoshop hardly ever crashes and illustrator is very random. I think Adobe really need to make their Apps a lot better - bearing in mind Mac hardware isn't as wide range as x86 based so cant be hardware issues just sloppy programming? surely they get enough Crash Reports sent in to beable update CS2 quicker?

 

[MattT]

^^ Chill guys

Rsrstevo - Thanks for that - I had thought about building my own media pc thing but tbh I can't be bothered with the hassle of sourcing/fitting bits etc. Kind of looking for a simpler 'out-the-box' option.

 

[sn00p]

Erm. I'm a software engineer mate.

What you have described are application exceptions caused only by the vendors software, not by the OS. A memory exception in the kernel would cause a panic and that would be terminal for the operating system a memory exception in the application w...sorry i nodded off at this point.


Hmm at this point i was going to list the finder and dock crash logs but i can only post 10 thousand characters in one go, i needed 48.66 times that amount.

But hell your a software engineer, you're bound to know more about using a mac in a real-world production environment than someone whos been doing it for 10+ years.

Might want to use quote tags mate.

Sorry to have to explain the difference between the kernel crashes and the application crashes but your post from last night made it blatantly obvious that you don't know the difference, if you nearly nodded off it's your own fault.

Yeah, and I've used macs for 10+ years too I'm just glad that I don't have to ever turn the PC on at home.

At this point I was going to attach the memory dumps everytime XP bombs out, but they're 1GB each......

I guess you're just unlucky and I'm lucky that I don't get any of the problems you do.

 

[Rich]

Hmm at this point i was going to list the finder and dock crash logs but i can only post 10 thousand characters in one go, i needed 48.66 times that amount.

Since being under OS X I have not seen the Finder or Dock crash here at all. Applications yes - as said Illustrator is crap always crashes, Photoshop and shockingly Quark seem to be fine.

 

[sn00p]

^^ Chill guys

Rsrstevo - Thanks for that - I had thought about building my own media pc thing but tbh I can't be bothered with the hassle of sourcing/fitting bits etc. Kind of looking for a simpler 'out-the-box' option.

I'm chilled mate. Just trying to help the confused.

 

[sn00p]

Since being under OS X I have not seen the Finder or Dock crash here at all. Applications yes - as said Illustrator is crap always crashes, Photoshop and shockingly Quark seem to be fine.

Me neither and I've used it since cheetah! (and everything was really stripey!). Infact I can't ever remember seeing either crash.

If somebody is seeing that many crashes I'd suspect that the best thing would be to install and migrate.

 

[Rststevo]

Rsrstevo - Thanks for that - I had thought about building my own media pc thing but tbh I can't be bothered with the hassle of sourcing/fitting bits etc. Kind of looking for a simpler 'out-the-box' option.

best option'll be the mac mini then, can have yourself hooked up in the time it takes to get to and from an apple store pretty much. don't think you have to get he top of the range either if u're just using it for internet/multimedia. the basic 1.5gGHz intel core solo would probably suffice. as long as the processor and ram can cope u'll be fine.

 

[McBunny]

the cpu wont cope with hd decoding at 1080 really on the solo that is

 

[Daz]

the cpu wont cope with hd decoding at 1080 really on the solo that is

Yea, you need the Core Duo for that!

 

[McBunny]

yup just need something better than an intel 950 graphics card in them to make them great

 

[Rststevo]

the cpu wont cope with hd decoding at 1080 really on the solo that is

i should've paid more attention to what he actually wanted to put thru it i spose!

 

[UncleGrumpy]

Me neither and I've used it since cheetah! (and everything was really stripey!). Infact I can't ever remember seeing either crash.

If somebody is seeing that many crashes I'd suspect that the best thing would be to install and migrate.

If only it were that simple, my hands are tied unfortunately, as my company is part of a group owned by Americans we have to comply with Sarbanes and Oxley, and every single thing has to be documented and validated. I cant even change the desktop picture!

My point about the mac is simple, regardless of why, my daily job is made harder by a machine that one way or another falls on its arse with frightening regularity. Take this lunchtime when i was trying to open the crash log, double clicked it, console bounced away in the dock, i waited.........and waited, then right clicked in the dock to be told application not responding - hmm that hardly ever happens, ok i can tell it to force quit - each application sits in its own protected memory, what can go wrong?, well its stopped bouncing, but then i got the spinning beach ball of death as we like to call it. Try force quitting, oh the finders not responding either lets re launch it, bam nice multi languaged box pops in the middle of the screen - you need to restart your computer. Hmm ok then, hold down the button on the front of the case, nothing happens, wait some more, still nothing, ring systems, oh just pull the power lead, cant say i ever remember doing that to my pc to be honest.

And you expect me to believe that the Mac is a more stable platform? if all you do is surf the net and listen to iTunes then yeah its great, but if you actually want to do anything more complex than make wavy patterns you're in trouble.

 

[sn00p]

If only it were that simple, my hands are tied unfortunately, as my company is part of a group owned by Americans we have to comply with Sarbanes and Oxley, and every single thing has to be documented and validated. I cant even change the desktop picture!

My point about the mac is simple, regardless of why, my daily job is made harder by a machine that one way or another falls on its arse with frightening regularity. Take this lunchtime when i was trying to open the crash log, double clicked it, console bounced away in the dock, i waited.........and waited, then right clicked in the dock to be told application not responding - hmm that hardly ever happens, ok i can tell it to force quit - each application sits in its own protected memory, what can go wrong?, well its stopped bouncing, but then i got the spinning beach ball of death as we like to call it. Try force quitting, oh the finders not responding either lets re launch it, bam nice multi languaged box pops in the middle of the screen - you need to restart your computer. Hmm ok then, hold down the button on the front of the case, nothing happens, wait some more, still nothing, ring systems, oh just pull the power lead, cant say i ever remember doing that to my pc to be honest.

That's not a normal Mac experience mate, there's something very sick with your computer. You are getting kernel panics and that's definately not normal, I would hazard a bet that a fresh install (and migrate) and all updates applied would see your life improve by a massive factor, but as you say your hands are tied and there's nothing you can do about it!

And you expect me to believe that the Mac is a more stable platform? if all you do is surf the net and listen to iTunes then yeah its great, but if you actually want to do anything more complex than make wavy patterns you're in trouble.

What you experience with the finder is what I experience all the time on windows (multiple installations on multiple computers), explorer is a buggy piece of crap that either falls over of it's own free will (rather too frequently!) or has to be killed and then re-started. Because of IE's integration into it, IE has a tendancy to take out explorer when it goes belly up as well.

I do software development, surf, email, photo editing, audio recording (logic express/ableton) etc without any of the issues you get, OS X here is certainly no less stable than Windows at work (OS Wise), which is the opposite of what you're seeing.

I've never seen finder or the dock crash, and like I said above, I've used OS X since the day it was released.

Sorry that your experience isn't the same happy one as mine!

 

[Red Cup]

I've got an Intel Mac Mini at work and a G4 at home. I enjoy using them both more than any PCs I've used. Sure things go wrong from time to time, but that's unavoidable with anything as complex as a computer. They certainly seem to be a lot more stable than Windows PCs (for what I'm doing at least - music, graphics, web programming) and when something does go it can be relaunched and doesn't take down the OS with it like Windows does sometimes.

Yeah they are expensive but I think it's worth paying more for. Others might disagree but it doesn't matter. I'm happy using them and most people I've spoke to, or shown mine too are quite impressed and want to know more.

Give it a try. I don't know anyone who's bought one and not been happy! I spent a fair whack on a Dual G5 and cinema display without ever having used one, which could have been a huge gamble but worked out great.