bhdien

Q: Mid 2011 Mac mini vs New Mac mini

Hello everyone,

 

I wanted to get your opinon on the minis. There is a Mid 2011 for sale with SSD and 16gb 1333 mhz DDR3 2.3 intel core i5, Intel HD Graphics 3000 512MB running on El Capian 10.11.5. My question is, is it worth making the purchase for this one or would it be a better choice of buying a brand new mac mini then upgrading the harddrive to ssd? It would mainly be used for schooling and internet surfing. Nothing to major. no photo editing or anything like that.

 

Opinions will be greatly appreciated.

 

Thank you

Mac mini, OS X El Capitan (10.11.5)

Posted on Aug 15, 2016 11:15 AM

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Q: Mid 2011 Mac mini vs New Mac mini

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  • by JimmyCMPIT,

    JimmyCMPIT JimmyCMPIT Aug 15, 2016 11:22 AM in response to bhdien
    Level 5 (6,973 points)
    Mac OS X
    Aug 15, 2016 11:22 AM in response to bhdien

    if you are not gaming, modeling 3d, mixing recorded music or working in high-res photo retouching the i5 with 16GB RAM is sufficient for study and surfing.

  • by Rysz,

    Rysz Rysz Aug 15, 2016 11:36 AM in response to bhdien
    Level 7 (20,242 points)
    iTunes
    Aug 15, 2016 11:36 AM in response to bhdien

    Personally, I would not buy anything that's five years old. For schoolwork and browsing you don't need anything fancy. You don't even need SSD. I'd wait until new Mac minis come out, whenever that will be, then buy a modestly priced unit.

  • by Lanny,

    Lanny Lanny Aug 15, 2016 12:29 PM in response to bhdien
    Level 5 (7,900 points)
    Desktops
    Aug 15, 2016 12:29 PM in response to bhdien

    The best future proofing that you could do would be to buy a new MacMini with the options for the i7, the max RAM 16 GBs, and the max SSD 1 GB.

  • by keg55,

    keg55 keg55 Aug 16, 2016 6:49 AM in response to bhdien
    Level 6 (8,368 points)
    Mac OS X
    Aug 16, 2016 6:49 AM in response to bhdien

    It would be worth getting the current 2014 Mac Mini for the following reasons.

     

    • 2014 has faster PCIe SSD blades instead of SATA SSDs found in the 2011. You would probably want to get a 2014 with a 1TB Fusion Drive as this will have a 128GB PCIe SSD blade and a 1TB 5400 rpm hard drive. Otherwise, trying to upgrade a 2014 with an SSD might be difficult if you cannot find the PCIe connector that clamps onto the system board's PCIe port. I don't believe anyone sells the PCIe blade SSDs for a Mac Mini yet.
    • USB 3 ports (faster) versus USB 2 ports on the 2011
    • (2) Thunderbolt 2 ports (faster) versus (1) Thunderbolt 1 port on the 2011
    • 5000 Intel HD Graphics (faster) versus 3000 on the 2011
    • 802.11ac WiFi (faster) versus 802.11n on the 2011

     

    If you decide on the 2011, you want the seller of the 2011 to install the original shipped OS. And if it has OS Install DVDs to provide those to you too. El Capitan is tied to the seller's AppleID, not yours. So, reinstalling El Capitan might be problematic.

  • by lllaass,

    lllaass lllaass Aug 16, 2016 7:06 AM in response to keg55
    Level 10 (187,938 points)
    Desktops
    Aug 16, 2016 7:06 AM in response to keg55

    The 2011 does NOT have a DVD drive and came originally with Internet Recovery so no OSX install disk were provided.

    One only has to boot to Internet Recovery and format and reinstall OSX and then update as necessary

  • by Lanny,

    Lanny Lanny Aug 16, 2016 10:24 AM in response to keg55
    Level 5 (7,900 points)
    Desktops
    Aug 16, 2016 10:24 AM in response to keg55

    Otherwise, trying to upgrade a 2014 with an SSD might be difficult if you cannot find the PCIe connector that clamps onto the system board's PCIe port. I don't believe anyone sells the PCIe blade SSDs for a Mac Mini yet.

    All the more reason to just option for the 1 GB SSD at the time of purchase.

  • by keg55,

    keg55 keg55 Aug 16, 2016 10:29 AM in response to Lanny
    Level 6 (8,368 points)
    Mac OS X
    Aug 16, 2016 10:29 AM in response to Lanny

    If budget provides. Not everyone has the funds to upgrade to that for $800. Plus one can only upgrade to a 1GB SSD if they select the Mini for $999.