I've sadly had to retire my 2011 Mac mini. It was a good run (cough). No really, given that Apple has been no help at all during this whole ordeal, it's still worked out that I was able to continue using my mini for another couple years. Over the totality of this adventure, I've reflowed the logic board 4 times in all. The longest I was able to use my 2011 Mac mini after this began, was 6 months between reflows. Sadly, on my 5th reflow, something else has been damaged and it will no longer power on at all. Nothing. I've replaced the power supply, but it's the logic board.
I have to say though, even on it's last day, that 2011 was a little rock star. I've never had a complaint about it's speed/performance. My kids played games on it, it's housed my iTunes library, I used to as a vpn client, and for a time it even acted as nat router. We love the Mac mini's, so we decided to try one more, a latest model refurb that has been working wonderfully so far, no complaints. And I have to say, that even now IF I could figure it out, I'd still try to resurrect my 2011 mini again (great little workhorse). I've even considered buying a replacement 2011 logic board, but sadly the cost is prohibitive, given that it's soon to be a 7 year old computer.
