Apple Mac mini

When we first encountered the newly announced mini a year ago, it was equipped with the distinctly venerable PowerPC G3 processor. But following the announcement last year of the first Intel-based Mac, the tiny white marvel has received a shot in the arm in the form of a 1.66GHz Intel Core Duo T2300. This is a tad slower than the T2400s in the Shuttle X100 and Hi-Grade mDMS P60, but the 1.66GHz part can easily outperform a G3.

With its new processor inevitably comes a new chipset, the provenance of which hasn't been confirmed but is certainly also Intel - a fact that's given away by Apple's necessary admission that the new mini's graphics are Intel GMA950 based. The limited 3D acceleration of the 950 makes the mini suitable for 2D applications only - the one and only big compromise over its larger Intel-based brethren such as the iMac. The only other drawback is the total lack of internal upgrade potential. This isn't only because of the tiny size of the case and lack of PCI Express slots, but also the fact that to get into the chassis you need a palette knife, nerves of steel and a willingness to void your warranty.

The most obvious practical upshot of the move to Intel is the presence of a more generous complement of USB 2 ports. Peer round the back and you'll see four of them, providing a far more flexible setup than the two of the old G3 machine. If you opt for a complete Apple package, you can take advantage of the fact that the Apple keyboard has an integrated USB 2 hub with two ports, so once you've plugged the mouse into one of these and a USB flash drive into the other you'll still have three left round the back of the mini. The USB ports are joined by a DVI-I output, FireWire 400 socket, and combined analog and S/PDIF audio jacks for both audio input and output. Finally, a Gigabit Ethernet port provides the only physical connection to a network - the modem of the old model has gone. Bluetooth is standard, though, as is AirPort Extreme 802.11b/g WLAN.

From the front, the only way you'd be able to tell the new model from the old is the tiny black square at one side of the dual-layer DVD writer's slot. This is the new infrared receiver for the Apple Remote, which can be used to control OS X's Front Row Media Center-style interface. The chassis itself is still a mere 165mm on each side.

The end-user experience is identical to that of any other OS X-based machine: a slick and good-looking OS that nonetheless has its foibles and irritations - just like Windows XP. On the performance front, the speed of most heavyweight applications is still crippled by the fact that they need to run via the Rosetta translation layer to convert PowerPC code into x86 instructions the Core processor understands. Applications such as Photoshop consequently perform significantly slower than on a Windows platform under a Core processor. Using the CPU-intensive panorama-stitching test from our Windows application benchmarks, the mini takes more than twice as long to complete the operation in comparison to the Core Duo T2500 in the Sony VAIO VGN-SZ1VP. The Sony is ready and waiting for the next challenge after 20 seconds, while the mini takes 48 seconds.

Performance issues aside, the mini remains a superb little computer for the majority of everyday tasks. For more power and flexibility, though, the Windows-based Shuttle and Hi-Grade are more attractive propositions.

Author: David Fearon