Should I buy iMac or Mac mini?

I think it comes down to whether you prefer having an integrated display or having a separate monitor.

If you don't have a monitor that you want to use with your Mac, the iMac is clearly a better value than the Mini, since it comes with monitor and keyboard, and uses a faster, larger hard drive.

Nonetheless, I prefer to have a separate monitor because I attach it to several computers via a KVM switch. I also want the flexibility of choosing, servicing, and upgrading my monitor separately from my computer(s). So I chose the Mini.

In a way, the primary difference between the mini and iMac is flexibility. The iMac is exactly what it is - a fast, powerful, integrated system capable of running almost any software written for MacOS X. But it comes at a relatively high cost and you don't get to pick which keyboard, mouse and screen to use with it to meet your specific needs. Thus, if you want that choice, and perhaps wish to trade off a little performance in exchange for lower costs and wider choices of such things as widescreen displays, then a mini is often better value and a more reasonable choice.

You can see that the decision really comes down to what it is you want the system to be used for. A mini with a good digital display would cost somewhat less than a 20" iMac, but leave you with a system which is somewhat slower, not just because of the slower processor but also because it uses a slow laptop drive instead of fast desktop unit. If email, web browsing and iPhoto are really all you'll do, then that isn't going to matter much, but if on the other hand your new interest in Apple systems leads you to rather more extensive image processing and tasks of that sort, the iMac would be better.

Ultimately, the iMac is more expensive for a good reason - it's more powerful. If your budget stretches that far and you have no objection to an all-in-one solution, it would make a better platform for all sorts of possible needs into the future, not just the things you contemplate at the present. On the other hand, a mini is sufficiently cheaper that were your needs to change radically, you could sell it and replace it more readily if the need arose.

If I were making the choice, I'd opt for a mini with 2Gb RAM, to which I'd add a reasonably inexpensive DVI-euipped 17, 19 or 20" display and a large external, firewire, hard drive for extra storage and backups. I'd make that choice because I'd know if I decided after 2 or 3 years I needed the power of a MacPro, I could sell the mini to help pay for it, but still keep the drive, display etc to make the transition easy.

I bought a mini, with a 22" Viewsonic screen and swapped out the ram to 2GB, plugged in an external HDD.

It cost me about $300 less than a 20" imac. I call it my "jmac"--not quite an imac, and cheaer<G>. I don't reckon the difference in chip speed (1.83 vs 2.16) to be significant and drive speed...well, I hadn't thought about that. With the 2GB ram the system flies much better than my emac did.

I would have gone for the imac if I had not had to spend $800 to fix my car so it would pass smog.

I use the machine for outputting dtp files. Seldom am I creating them, just fixing and printing to PostScript. Photoshop works pretty well...roughly like my 4 year 3 Ghz old P4. If the May Surprise (expected hardware realignment at the Leopard Launch) puts the mini even lower on the totem pole, it is still a useful gadget at a reasonable price (though they should include the keyboard and a mouse in spite of the fact that win keyboards/mice work just fine).

What I would like that the imac has that the mini does not is the ability to have a second monitor. (Yes, Matrox has a magic box that will work but the Viewsonic uses the majority of the res that thing supports). Once you get used to that, you will not want to go back to one screen, no matter how big they are.

The best deal I found on an imac 20 was on Amazon, which offered free shipping, no Calif sales tax (not yet, anyway<G>) and a $75 (5%) rebate. I bought the mini at a CompUSA store that was closing, so it had a 5% discount and it was a sealed box.

$0.02!

The iMac has 2 technical advantages over the mini - first, the mini uses Intel's integrated video while the iMac does not giving the iMac better 3D graphics - better looking and faster. The second is that the Mac mini uses Core Duo while the iMac uses the Core 2 Duo for a modest but significant speed improvement.

I bought a mini last year because I needed to start figuring out how the Intel Macs differed from the PPC Macs - I'm responsible for keeping several labs up and running and all will be switched over to Intel Macs by this time next year. It is an incredible little machine and if you already have a keyboard, mouse, and display, it is a strong contender. Just be sure to upgrade it to at least 1 GB, 512MB does not cut it.

Although I have the mini, I intend to replace my aging G5 desktop. For as long as I can remember I've been buying Apple mini towers, but the G5 is probably going to be my last. I've pretty much concluded that the 24" iMac is the perfect home computer. You have to see the displays in person to appreciate them.