49 replies to this topic

[Cougar]

macdude22, on 17 October 2014 - 03:20 PM, said:

I think apple is happy to have us grognards build a hackintosh and buy our air's and iPhones to go along side it.

This is basically me. I just spent the better part of yesterday afternoon troubleshooting my Yosemite hackintosh install. It works fine now (granted I make it harder on myself with my custom Fusion drive), though sleep is still temperamental. And of course, I have no Continuity or Handoff. I have no patience buying the iMac bluetooth and other parts from eBay and then hoping they're right and they'll work together. Some guy is selling them prebuilt online, but he's charging an outrageous price for them.

Sigh. I want that xMac more than ever now.

[Tetsuya]

Wait... The RAM isnt user-upgradeable?

Its like Apple doesn't want my money anymore.  The only product im likely to have left is maybe an iPad.

[Thain Esh Kelch]

Tetsuya, on 17 October 2014 - 05:15 PM, said:

Wait... The RAM isnt user-upgradeable?

Its like Apple doesn't want my money anymore.  The only product im likely to have left is maybe an iPad.

RAM is not user upgradeable on that one either.

[Tetsuya]

at this point, even the iPad is a "maybe".  I dont have an iPhone, as i feel Android is easily as good as iOS as a phone OS, and i prefer to be able to customize how my OS looks and works, and Apple is still years behind on simple usability features that i really like.  I only have an iPad (Retina Mini) instead of an Android tablet because Android still didn't feel as good to me as a iOS on tablets, and there were no Android tablets out there with the build quality i was looking for and the 4:3 aspect ratio.  

When it comes time to replace my iPad in another year or two, there will very likely be an Android tablet that suits my needs - if Apple hasn't done something amazing with iOS by then, its likely i wont be getting another iPad.  

Couple that with them essentially not having a Mac i can buy that suits my needs without saddling me with hundreds of dollars of things i *dont* need (dont need an iMac, have a monitor, thanks), it rather seems like Apple is determined for me to just not use their products anymore.

[Jan]

The best product in my opinion is the iPad Air 2. Super thin, light weight and great hardware. This will be a mobile gaming powerhouse and iOS still has the best mobile games (excluding 3DS). I don't really care about Android, I've used iOS since day 1 and I'm satisfied with its features, especially the tight Mac/iOS-integration. Stuff like cross-device-syncing of docs and configurations is very important for me as I use Keynote and iA Writer on a daily basis.

[Janichsan]

A guy from the Geekbench developers came up with a possible explanation why the new mini no longer offers a quad-core variant:

Quote

Poole notes that Apple may have switched to dual-core processors in some Late 2014 Mac minis because Haswell dual-core processors use one socket to connect the logic board and processor while Haswell quad-core processors use different sockets. This would mean Apple would have to design and build two separate logic boards specifically for the Mac mini, while other Macs use the same logic boards across its individual line.

This trade-off didn't exist with Sandy Bridge and Ivy Bridge processors because both of its dual-core and quad-core processors used the same socket. Another option, according to Poole, is that Apple could have went quad-core across its new Mac mini line, but it would have made it difficult for Apple to hit the $499 price point.

Sounds plausible, but the situation is still disappointing, especially since the benchmarks indicate a severe performance drop between the old and the new models.

[Tetsuya]

that has to be the laptop parts.... as both dual-core and quad-core desktop parts use the same socket (1150), until you get into the Xeon-based chips, which use Socket 2011.

[Frost]

iFixit did their 2014 Mac mini teardown

Cliff's Notes: This thing is a steaming pile of fail compared to the one it replaces.

[Tetsuya]

Yeah im not surprised, really.  Bummed, because this basically leaves my future upgrade path as "build a Hackintosh".

[Frost]

This is really, really dumb. Honestly, I can understand the MacBook Pros. They're trying to make them stupidly thin and light, so cramming everything into an ever tighter space to the point you're putting everything on the motherboard makes a sort of sense. Sort of. To get a fraction of a fraction of an inch more thinness.

But the Mac mini??? Even the iMacs you can change out the RAM and if you're super-intrepid and willing to remove the display, the hard drive. This is just super-dumb.

[Sneaky Snake]

Frost, on 20 October 2014 - 09:35 PM, said:

But the Mac mini??? Even the iMacs you can change out the RAM and if you're super-intrepid and willing to remove the display, the hard drive. This is just super-dumb.

CPU is upgradable as well if you really feel like taking the screen off.

[Janichsan]

Tetsuya, on 20 October 2014 - 02:36 PM, said:

that has to be the laptop parts.... as both dual-core and quad-core desktop parts use the same socket (1150), until you get into the Xeon-based chips, which use Socket 2011.

Definitely. They always traditionally used laptop parts in the minis.

Frost, on 20 October 2014 - 09:35 PM, said:

Even the iMacs you can change out the RAM and if you're super-intrepid and willing to remove the display, the hard drive. This is just super-dumb.

To my knowledge, the RAM in the lowest-end iMacs is also soldered on.

[Frost]

Janichsan, on 21 October 2014 - 03:30 AM, said:

To my knowledge, the RAM in the lowest-end iMacs is also soldered on.

The 21" uses the same SO-DIMMs as the 27". It just doesn't have an access panel, so you have to tear it down to get to them and swap them out. But, it can be done.

[DaveyJJ]

Tetsuya, on 20 October 2014 - 09:16 PM, said:

... my future upgrade path as "build a Hackintosh".

I'm actually contemplating this route myself, when it's time to replace the iMac in my signature. Actually was reviewing the nice mid-higher end video cards yesterday on the main Hackintosh forums. Their $300-400 performance embarrasses my old 5670 something silly. What the hell is this 100+ frames per second thing people keep talking about? And look at Frost's Kestrel thingy ... man I'd like to see what Combat Mission or X-Plane looks like on that thing. (I take that back, I'd probably just end up weeping.)



Probably get Sneaky Snake (who lives 15 minutes away from me) to help.

Never thought I'd hear myself say that.

I think the Apple tattoo on my right butt cheek is burning. Ow.

[Janichsan]

Frost, on 21 October 2014 - 01:01 PM, said:

The 21" uses the same SO-DIMMs as the 27". It just doesn't have an access panel, so you have to tear it down to get to them and swap them out. But, it can be done.

I don't mean the quad core 21" iMacs, but the actual lowest-end, cheapest model for $1099. The only dual core iMac.

[Frost]

Janichsan, on 21 October 2014 - 01:49 PM, said:

I don't mean the quad core 21" iMacs, but the actual lowest-end, cheapest model for $1099. The only dual core iMac.

Ohhhh right, that thing. Yeah, that's soldered LPDDR3.

[Smoke_Tetsu]

I hate to say it but I'm leaning towards the Hackintosh route here as well because of Apple's recent choices even with the iMac which I do not agree with. Even if they end up refreshing it to have a GPU that can more than handle the load of 4k\5k gaming VRAM and all. (And no... 4GB is not enough for 5K gaming especially not for Next Gen stuff... Anyway...)

I personally don't want 5k resolution in a 27 inch form factor. If and when I buy into 4k or 5k it better be in a larger panel than I have now. A more near term upgrade for me would be to a 34" 21:9 3440x1440 monitor which is only available as a stand alone monitor at this point and it's probably unlikely that Apple is going to make an iMac with that type of monitor.

[Frost]

DaveyJJ, on 21 October 2014 - 01:42 PM, said:

I'm actually contemplating this route myself, when it's time to replace the iMac in my signature. Actually was reviewing the nice mid-higher end video cards yesterday on the main Hackintosh forums. Their $300-400 performance embarrasses my old 5670 something silly. What the hell is this 100+ frames per second thing people keep talking about? And look at Frost's Kestrel thingy ... man I'd like to see what Combat Mission or X-Plane looks like on that thing. (I take that back, I'd probably just end up weeping.)

X-Plane with all settings on "Melt my GPU" in the options looks so good you find yourself disappointed that it doesn't look even better.

[Sneaky Snake]

DaveyJJ, on 21 October 2014 - 01:42 PM, said:

I'm actually contemplating this route myself, when it's time to replace the iMac in my signature. Actually was reviewing the nice mid-higher end video cards yesterday on the main Hackintosh forums. Their $300-400 performance embarrasses my old 5670 something silly. What the hell is this 100+ frames per second thing people keep talking about? And look at Frost's Kestrel thingy ... man I'd like to see what Combat Mission or X-Plane looks like on that thing. (I take that back, I'd probably just end up weeping.)



Probably get Sneaky Snake (who lives 15 minutes away from me) to help.

Never thought I'd hear myself say that.

I think the Apple tattoo on my right butt cheek is burning. Ow.

I'd be very open to help. I've built dozens of computers over the years now. Never built a hackintosh though, so I wouldn't be able to help much in the software area.

[Cougar]

I posted something like this in another thread, but since it seems several are interested...

Don't build a hackintosh if you're not willing to tinker. It took me an afternoon to upgrade to Yosemite (although my situation is a bit more complex because I have a custom Fusion drive.)

To get things 100% is hard. "It just works" it doesn't. Small Point updates usually require an audio patch (but this is fast and easy to do.) The easiest way to get up and running is using the tools on the tonymac Hackintosh site, but the patch required for iMessage/Facetime doesn't work in Yosemite and it doesn't look like it's going to get updated. There's a different boot loader that you have to use, but it's more complicated and I'm waiting for someone to make an easy walkthrough of it with a Fusion drive.

You have to learn to live with little quirks sometimes. ATM my computer will "wake" from sleep occasionally, then go to sleep 20 seconds later. I live with it. It'll probably disappear at some point, for reasons unknown. If you care about AirDrop or iOS features like Handoff, you have to buy an iMac Wifi card and a few other things to make it work. I'm currently contemplating whether it's worth it.

That said, the performance for the price is so amazing. I built a Core i5 with a 5850 way back in early 2011 for around $700, and it's handled everything I've thrown at it around high (1080p) beautifully so far. The only upgrades I've done are SSDs. It can't do that now with most AAA games, but I never buy games on launch anymore, either, AAA games are becoming increasingly boring, and I have so many indies/old steam games to play, so it works out. I'll probably upgrade everything once Skylake arrives.

The new gtx 970/980 works with nVidia's web drivers, so now's a good time to do build one, too. And the community at the tonymac site is terrific at helping you out.