Primate Labs Blog

I think it gonna buy Mac Mini 2.0 to use wit Final cut studio and Adobe After effect and for log in to VR world Second life also.
It can handle this ?

There is no mention of the Mac-Mini video upgrade. Surely that provides a big boost in performance.

Also a Superdrive is included in the $599 model, as well as an update to Firewire 800 from 400.

A used Mac-Mini may NOT be a better buy than a new Mac-Mini.

What about the 2.26GHz (P8400) 2009 Mac mini?

There is no results for the 2009 3.06 GHz iMac?

Results for some hardware configurations aren’t available yet (such as the faster Mini and the faster iMac). I’ll update the post when they are available.

You definitely need to take into consideration the new video hardware. The difference between a non-accelerated system like the old mini and an accelerated on like the new mini is considerable for many commonly-used functions. For example, make a texture-mapped 3D bar graph in Numbers on both systems. Now rotate it. See the difference? Any benchmark which doesn't take that into account is quite flawed.

I'd like to know exactly what tests were run because the entire architecture of the macs was revamped. Notice the lack of mention that all the systems moved to 1066mhz DDR3 memory from 800mhz DDR2. I think that is a rather large step in an overall more enjoyable computing experience. The integrated 9400m, at minimum, smokes the last generation of ATI cards and will actually save the consumer money! If these tests measure memory and processor performance then wouldn't there be a big difference? Especially because moving to the new nvidia architecture cleans up a lot of performance issues.

AND THEY LOWERED THE PRICES!!!

The older Mac Mini's can only take 2 gb ram maximum.

Anything less than 4 gb is unacceptable now, so the new Mac Mini with 4 gb limit just because the first Mac Mini that "can" be used as a general purpose computer. Why anyone would consider an older Mac Mini is beyond me.

The new machines will rock with Mac OS X 10.6 (Snow Leopard) which uses the 16 nVidia GPU cores as CPU!!! That will make a shocking difference on a machine with 2+16 = 18 cores!!!

PriX, no, it won't use GPU cores as CPU cores. It will allow for some few applications to use the GPU to do calculations. This means it might make encoding video or something like that faster, if your program supports it.

So who's offering the best deal on the Just-Discontinued mini's? The Apple store's "Special-Deals" have been anything but. There's no refurb mini's listed at all today, and yesterday they were trying to push a model that didn't even have a SuperDrive for $549.

@James: Anything less than 4 GB is unacceptable now? Exactly what happened in the recent past that has made that a requirement for "general computing"? What a ridiculous, unjustifiable statement.

Some specific computing settings will benefit from having 4 GB of RAM. A very small handful may even require it. The vast majority won't even see a difference between 3GB vs 4GB, or even 2GB vs 4 GB.

@James: The Core 2 Duo (2007) Mac minis can take 2x2GB, with 3GB usable.

I have one of the original power-pc Mac Minis. I wish you had benchmarks for that in the comparison chart.

MINOR upgrade? What are you smoking?

This is the first version of the Mac mini since the G4 that I would feel comfortable recommending. The appalling GPU on the previous Intel mini has finally been tossed in the sink trap.

Three cheers and a Tiger... Leopard, I mean.

I don't know how you got your results, the new softwares of Apple are making these new iterations rock. A lot of blogs said the Mac Mini is not up to par in terms of performance, I believe they have not use it before.

@prix Andreas is correct.. Only some tasks can use the GPU cores. But then CUDA has existed for AGES to do this already, so don't think that OpenCL will magically change everything.

Even once OpenCL is added, not all tasks will instantly be OpenCL supported. Development libraries or/and programs in some cases will need redevelopment first.

However, the great thing about OpenCL for developers is that it will be available on all OS's (ATI and Nvidia have already said it will be supported in Windows). So everyone will benefit.

Either way, this benchmark isn't broad enough. By the sounds of things, its CPU-bound which is useless. And like many other benchmarks, makes the incorrect assumption that an application will easily support 16 threads of execution in parallel (in the real world it wont).

I'd rather see test with real applications too..

I own the old Mac Mini - and it's great... except you CAN'T replay 1080i HD AVIs on it. Yes, if you have a HD Tuner, you can replay using that custom hardware - but anything NOT encoded using the custom codec fails.

Considering that many people, like myself, use the Mini as a Home Theatre device, playback of HD would be a real bonus. I assume from the new specs - ie. DDR3 RAM, far more recent GPU etc. that the new version would be capable?

@Anon, yeah, easy.. Every dedicated videochip in a recent Mac kan play 1080p and 1080i just fine.. So can this baby..

Too bad the price is a bit steep, cause now the mini is really ready to rock as a media center with software like EyeTV, Plex or Boxee (whatever you want)..

7% higher score and $200 less(2.0 Ghz mini). This is disappointing?

I went out yesterday and bought a 2.8Ghz iMac as it seemed much better value for money than the 2.93Ghz iMac model. Apple should really rethink its pricing structures.

Hi,

I would love to see another mac mini mark:
the one for the latest G4!
because I'm about to upgrade from the G4 (1,42 single core PPC!) to the new 2009 version.
Would love to see the boost I will make...

@Pat: Look this older Post for comparison to G4 Minis:
http://www.primatelabs.ca/blog/2007/08/mac-mini...>

1: Not mentioning the VGA upgrade or even the platform update, this review is really terrible. Someone that talks about hardware changes should KNOW what the hardware is before making useless decisions!

2: The reason CUDA isnt that popular is because it only works on certain hardware. OpenCL is written so that it works everywhere. This will make it a lot easier to adopt.

3: Snow Leopard will have OpenCL built into its core. Even applications NOT written with openCL in mind will be able to use OpenCL since the OS (Snow Leopard) will interface the OpenCL for the application.

Seriously, releasing a review like this and posting stuff like an older mac may be a better choice is incredible $%*&^%$!

The one thing i haven't heard anyone about:
The new 24" iMacs have a resolution of 1680x1050. This is the first screen i have seen with such a low resolution on this screen size.
Most screens use 1920x1200 at 24"

This is the only reason why I won't advise people to buy a 24" iMac, and it's the the only downside that you don't mention!

About my previous comment:
Turns out the resolution thing was a type on the Apple website. It has now been corrected and i can tell people to buy iMacs again :-)

Wow. First, thank you for posting these tests.

Everyone, calm down. They were clear that these tests are of the memory and chip only. They specifically note that the video card isn't taken in to account.

In terms of raw processing power (say I was using it as a headless server, which I would be) the new devices aren't much of an improvement. It's good to know.

Seriously Mac fans, most of your comments are indistinguishable from astro-turf.

You've got a company here trying to improve the entire mac ecosystem and you jump up and down because they aren't saying effusively positive things.

I really would love to see a benchmark of the new 3.06Ghz version. I am still very much doubting between getting the new iMac and a Sony Vaio LV. I have been holding off buying the iMac because of the rumours about this new model, but it has been a bit of a disappointment for me.

The old mac mini with a Merom Hack is still faster than the latest one...

http://www.ambor.com/public/meromswap/meromswap.html

I have the cash ready to spend and was hanging out hoping the iMac would come with a quadcore this time... but instead a disappointing upgrade with a little speedbump. There's really very little performance increase between the 2008 and 2009 model.
I'm going to hang on to my 3 yr old iMac until I see 4 cores or at least 3 ghz as the low end.

The new Mac mini shows a 7.2% CPU performance improvement at the same clock rate. Combined with other system improvements (video, FireWire 800, DDR3, etc.), this is a sweet upgrade.

I'm curious about the P8400 CPU in the 2.26 GHz version: Will it have better-than-linear improvements? One thing to note is that, unlike to 2.0 GHz version's P7350 CPU, the P8400 supports both Intel VT and Intel Dynamic Acceleration.

Jasper think you need to check your facts the 24 inch iMacs have a resolution 1920 by 1200 pixels

One annoying thing with the new Mac Mini (apart from the base model being MORE expensive in Australia) is that the Core 2 Duo P7350 doesn't support VT virtualization extensions, while the older T7200 in the previous generation Mac Mini did have VT support. It also has less L2 cache than the T7200; frankly, it is positioned lower in Intel's current range of processor offerings than the T7200 was in Intel's range at the time the last Mac Mini revision came out.

Thanks Apple, I was actually going to buy one of these things once Snow Leopard came out (at least the higher cost would be offset by not paying for the OS upgrade that way), but you seem to have decided I need to buy an iMac instead if I want fast virtualization for running a Windows instance. Guess I'll try out Mac OS on a cheaper second hand Mini and run my Windows VM on a Linux box (with an unhobbled processor).

The MAC OS X makes any diference in the benchmark test? I mean is the "New Snow Leopard" probably improving those new iMac and Mac mini any longer???

The prev generation Mac Minis are on sale at the online Apple store - under the clearance section. The 1.83 C2D (link below) is listed at $499 for 1G RAM and 120G HD. The 2GHz model is $50 more.

http://store.apple.com/us/product/MB138LL/A?mco=Mjk1NDIxOQ

Just to let everyone know. I got the new MacMini monday and the first thing I did was throw on Windows (using bootcamp). It scores a 5.2 in Windows experience. In comparison, I got a Dell Studio Slim Desktop a week ago that is fully upgraded which scores a 4.1 in Experience. Haven't ran any other benchmarks. I plan on putting an Intel X25M SSD in it soon.

The Mini is seriously a little beast, especially if you're looking for a secondary box. The upgraded ram to 4gb and 256mb nVidia gfx chipset makes all the diff in the world.

Did anyone already test the dual screen capabilities of the new minis? I am considering to use two 24" monitors over DVI and would even like to use the latest 23" 16:9 panels (2048*1152) which goes beyond the specification...

Any reports on dual screen capabilities and stability are very welcome!

Regards
Stefan

I just got my own Mac mini 2.26, 4gb, 320 HD

It scored 3058 on geekbench

Jason: The 2.2ghz one supports VT, and is still cheaper than an iMac.

(That said, the choice of the P7350 is still disappointing. Would a P7450 have killed them?)

I agree with anon about how there really isn't very much difference between the '08 and '09 iMacs, except for the fact that they can take more RAM now!

I own a 2008 2.66GHz 20inch iMac and am perfectly content with its RAM maxed out at 4GB, also the fact that it has dedicated graphics memory to boot, unlike the 2009 20inch model.

However, I do question Apple's decision to equip the 2.66GHz 24inch model with the same nVIDIa Graphics chip, when I think they would have been wiser putting that card in the 20inch model only.

20inch models with Shared graphics/24inch models with Dedicated graphics is what I had in mind!