The new Mac mini is almost certainly coming

[Micky Do]

Been in three countries over the past few months, several cities in each, and have not seen the 2018 Mac Mini on display in stores anywhere.

Saw the 2014 model on display for several months in several stores, presumably until stock ran out about Q2 2019. The 2018 was on display in one for a few weeks early in the year, but presumably roused little or no consumer interest.

Despite being reasonably well reviewed by pundits, the current Mac Mini is more pro in its specs and price, thus seems to have roused little interest among the average Joe or Jill wanting a reasonably priced Mac to put on their desk.

To rekindle consumer level interest, a new Mac Mini almost certainly needs to come.

 

[sublunar]

Been in three countries over the past few months, several cities in each, and have not seen the 2018 Mac Mini on display in stores anywhere.

Saw the 2014 model on display for several months in several stores, presumably until stock ran out about Q2 2019. The 2018 was on display in one for a few weeks early in the year, but presumably roused little or no consumer interest.

Despite being reasonably well reviewed by pundits, the current Mac Mini is more pro in its specs and price, thus seems to have roused little interest among the average Joe or Jill wanting a reasonably priced Mac to put on their desk.

To rekindle consumer level interest, a new Mac Mini almost certainly needs to come.

Thing is, I doubt a spec bump would see a Mac mini get more store space. Apple would rather Macs have a built in screen I imagine - a lot easier for most users.

 

[PickUrPoison]

Thing is, I doubt a spec bump would see a Mac mini get more store space. Apple would rather Macs have a built in screen I imagine - a lot easier for most users.

True. Apple’s customers want Macs to have a built-in screen. 80%+ buy laptops, and another 10-15 points of the remaining 20 buy iMac. Apple gives the people what they want; what point is there really to devoting store space to products that few want?

btw @Micky Do doesn’t want a spec-bumped mini, he wants a cheaper mini, and even a down-spec’ed mini would be fine with him if it were cheaper. Personally, I’m not against a cheaper mini, I just don’t think it can get much cheaper, unless Apple wants to sell it at a loss. Just as it’s difficult for Apple to make an iPhone that sell for less than $399 or so, it’s also difficult to make a Mac that sells for less than $799.

 

[Apple fanboy]

Been in three countries over the past few months, several cities in each, and have not seen the 2018 Mac Mini on display in stores anywhere.

Saw the 2014 model on display for several months in several stores, presumably until stock ran out about Q2 2019. The 2018 was on display in one for a few weeks early in the year, but presumably roused little or no consumer interest.

Despite being reasonably well reviewed by pundits, the current Mac Mini is more pro in its specs and price, thus seems to have roused little interest among the average Joe or Jill wanting a reasonably priced Mac to put on their desk.

To rekindle consumer level interest, a new Mac Mini almost certainly needs to come.

But average Joe just wants a laptop these days no? Desktop computers are less common than ever. Especially for average Joe’s.

 

[MarkC426]

Only if your an average Joe.... 😜
I havn’t had a laptop since my g4 PowerBook.

I would welcome an update to the mini, it would make a nice ‘render node’

 

[Apple fanboy]

Only if your an average Joe.... 😜
I havn’t had a laptop since my g4 PowerBook.

I would welcome an update to the mini, it would make a nice ‘render node’

I’m not. I have a Mac Mini and duel 27” monitor set up for photography. Not a fan of laptops and their glossy screens.

 

[sublunar]

True. Apple’s customers want Macs to have a built-in screen. 80%+ buy laptops, and another 10-15 points of the remaining 20 buy iMac. Apple gives the people what they want; what point is there really to devoting store space to products that few want?

btw @Micky Do doesn’t want a spec-bumped mini, he wants a cheaper mini, and even a down-spec’ed mini would be fine with him if it were cheaper. Personally, I’m not against a cheaper mini, I just don’t think it can get much cheaper, unless Apple wants to sell it at a loss. Just as it’s difficult for Apple to make an iPhone that sell for less than $399 or so, it’s also difficult to make a Mac that sells for less than $799.

The price increase in this case appears to have been down to the change in storage from hard drives to SSD (and covering the introduction of of the T2 CPU). Apple always claimed that they took less profit on the Mini so this was a little bit surprising but the all SSD and new more powerful CPU has mostly glossed over the arrival of the T2.

 

[PickUrPoison]

The price increase in this case appears to have been down to the change in storage from hard drives to SSD (and covering the introduction of of the T2 CPU). Apple always claimed that they took less profit on the Mini so this was a little bit surprising but the all SSD and new more powerful CPU has mostly glossed over the arrival of the T2.

Yup. They also increased RAM from 4 to 8GB, and beefed up the power supply to accommodate the 65W desktop-class CPU they replaced the 15/28W parts they had previously used with.

But considering Apple previously sold the current config, i.e. 8GB RAM/128GB SSD, with a dual-core CPU for $749, the only ones who were shocked by the small increase in price to $799 were those who were, for some reason, expecting a price cut.

With the “switcher” market long-since gone, and with most Apple customers very much preferring laptops/iMac, Apple re-targeted the mini at a more business/pro user. The product page for the mini on Apple’s website (and the $100 optional 10GbE) makes that abundantly clear.

But like the new Mac Pro, the higher price point—however well-justified it may be for the increased power and capabilities—does price-out a certain number of users, for which the new machine is undeniably overkill.

However, in both cases Apple was listening to the users, and giving them exactly what the vast majority were asking for. It’s unfortunate that 5 to 10%, or even 20% (who knows?) are left without a lower cost alternative in the Mac mini or Mac Pro product line.
[automerge]1577464562[/automerge]

Only if your an average Joe.... 😜
I havn’t had a laptop since my g4 PowerBook.

I would welcome an update to the mini, it would make a nice ‘render node’

Intel doesn’t currently offer a “mobile version”, the -B suffix parts in the BGA package, with more than 6-cores. But I’m guessing there will be an 8-core part if not a 10-core for Apple to use in the mini refresh I expect next year. I’m sure some don’t think there will be an update until 2022 or even later, but I think we’ll see it at some point next year, maybe Oct?

 

[sublunar]

Yup. They also increased RAM from 4 to 8GB, and beefed up the power supply to accommodate the 65W desktop-class CPU they replaced the 15/28W parts they had previously used with.

But considering Apple previously sold the current config, i.e. 8GB RAM/128GB SSD, with a dual-core CPU for $749, the only ones who were shocked by the small increase in price to $799 were those who were, for some reason, expecting a price cut.

With the “switcher” market long-since gone, and with most Apple customers very much preferring laptops/iMac, Apple re-targeted the mini at a more business/pro user. The product page for the mini on Apple’s website (and the $100 optional 10GbE) makes that abundantly clear.

But like the new Mac Pro, the higher price point—however well-justified it may be for the increased power and capabilities—does price-out a certain number of users, for which the new machine is undeniably overkill.

However, in both cases Apple was listening to the users, and giving them exactly what the vast majority were asking for. It’s unfortunate that 5 to 10%, or even 20% (who knows?) are left without a lower cost alternative in the Mac mini or Mac Pro product line.
[automerge]1577464562[/automerge]

Intel doesn’t currently offer a “mobile version”, the -B suffix parts in the BGA package, with more than 6-cores. But I’m guessing there will be an 8-core part if not a 10-core for Apple to use in the mini refresh I expect next year. I’m sure some don’t think there will be an update until 2022 or even later, but I think we’ll see it at some point next year, maybe Oct?

Forgot about the RAM but it totally makes sense especially with the retargeting from casual/hobbyists (who have gone to iOS devices - like iPhone or iPad - or laptops) to budget pro or prosumer users.

Those users looking at the 2014 Mini and deciding it was overpriced were going to level the same argument at a warmed up 2018 mini that kept largely the same specs. The problem is that 4Gb was becoming too compromised for future macOS iterations and spinning discs were always going to be problematic for performance, especially if the plan for the mini was to add the T2 which - in effect - needed SSD.

If the current case does in fact require a redesign then could they consider something that might have better graphics capabilities?

The BGA criteria would be much easier to achieve if Apple went back to mobile CPUs for the Mini. Why would Apple go back to a mobile CPU though? It would only be of interest if there was some sort of integrated GPU improvement and that only shows up with the lower power CPUs which don't have the number of cores/threads that the 45w ones have.

 

[Krevnik]

The BGA criteria would be much easier to achieve if Apple went back to mobile CPUs for the Mini. Why would Apple go back to a mobile CPU though? It would only be of interest if there was some sort of integrated GPU improvement and that only shows up with the lower power CPUs which don't have the number of cores/threads that the 45w ones have.

The question I have is if Intel was going to offer up more 65W desktop BGA chips, why haven’t they for Coffee Lake Refresh yet?

Is Apple really the only buyers of these parts?

If so, I wonder if it’s related to AMD CPU drivers showing up in 10.15.2 betas...

 

[sublunar]

The question I have is if Intel was going to offer up more 65W desktop BGA chips, why haven’t they for Coffee Lake Refresh yet?

Is Apple really the only buyers of these parts?

If so, I wonder if it’s related to AMD CPU drivers showing up in 10.15.2 betas...

I would have thought that Coffee Lake Refresh CPUs don't offer anything much over the regular Coffee Lake. Far easier and cheaper for Apple to just double the storage on the mini SKUs if they intend to call it a refresh as I'd expect they get decent volume for the existing CPUs as used on the iMac range.

Obviously a 2 year refresh cycle means you could expect a new Mini in October next year which puts the Comet Lake S CPUs with multi threading on all SKUs onto the table.

I've not seen anything about AMD CPU mentions. It would be entirely unusual for Apple to be going to AMD just for the Mini and we'd have heard about it if they were intending to replace Intel Core CPUs across the board.

Having said that, AMD are about to supply the innards for PS5 and Xbox Series X next year, and their Ryzen 3 3200G and Ryzen 5 3400g would have been interesting for the Mini but only if the iMacs were going that way too. The Ryzen 5 probably runs too hot for the 2018 Mini PSU though.

This assumes the iMac Pro and Mac Pro go (stay with Xeon CPUs) but it's a complete flight of fancy as Apple are also heavily reliant on Quicksync from the Intel CPUs.

Putting a dGPU into a mobile redesign package would eliminate 2 of the 4 Thunderbolt 3 ports which is a big compromise considering an eGPU would simply plug into one of the 4 ports albeit at a price.
[automerge]1577485381[/automerge]

 

[Micky Do]

Thing is, I doubt a spec bump would see a Mac mini get more store space. Apple would rather Macs have a built in screen I imagine - a lot easier for most users.

True. Apple’s customers want Macs to have a built-in screen. 80%+ buy laptops, and another 10-15 points of the remaining 20 buy iMac. Apple gives the people what they want; what point is there really to devoting store space to products that few want?

btw @Micky Do doesn’t want a spec-bumped mini, he wants a cheaper mini, and even a down-spec’ed mini would be fine with him if it were cheaper. Personally, I’m not against a cheaper mini, I just don’t think it can get much cheaper, unless Apple wants to sell it at a loss. Just as it’s difficult for Apple to make an iPhone that sell for less than $399 or so, it’s also difficult to make a Mac that sells for less than $799.

Not everyone wants a built in screen. Modular suits many folks, for one reason and another. I know people with systems based on a Mac Mini, and also a similarly sized Dell.

The big reason for a small computer to me is ease of transport..... just take the computer with me, in a backpack, on the odd occasion the need arises, and plug in peripherals available where I am going to. In the past that was usually an LCD projector in a classroom.

Also being able to choose peripherals suited to ones situation, desires and budget is an advantage. These are the reasons the Mac Mini got a following and the likes of the Dell OptiPlex 7040 have a place in the market.

The 2018 Mac Mini is over priced, over powered and lacks the storage desired by the average Joe or Jill. For a niche of pros seeking transportable power it may be a fit, but the wider market of folks who found earlier iterations of the Mac Mini specced to suit their more humble needs and budgets, are now left out in the cold..... and retailers know it, hence they don't stock the current model.

But average Joe just wants a laptop these days no? Desktop computers are less common than ever. Especially for average Joe’s.

My needs changed, and I got a 2017 spec MacBook Air about 18 months ago. I had it upgraded to 500 GB SSD because for now it is my mainstay during an itinerant phase in my life. However, I am looking forward to settling down somewhere again, preferably sooner than later, and setting up my 2009 Mac Mini on a desk again (or almost certainly a new one, if something suitably specced and priced does arrive on the scene)

Many, if not most, folks I know have a desktop as their mainstay at home, especially if they are running small business from home. Laptops, tablets or mobile phones are a supplement, not a replacement for desktops.

Laptops tend to be replaced more frequently than desktops, which will affect the ratio of desktop to laptop sales.

 

[PickUrPoison]

Not everyone wants a built in screen. Modular suits many folks, for one reason and another. I know people with systems based on a Mac Mini, and also a similarly sized Dell.

The big reason for a small computer to me is ease of transport..... just take the computer with me, in a backpack, on the odd occasion the need arises, and plug in peripherals available where I am going to. In the past that was usually an LCD projector in a classroom.

Also being able to choose peripherals suited to ones situation, desires and budget is an advantage. These are the reasons the Mac Mini got a following and the likes of the Dell OptiPlex 7040 have a place in the market.

The 2018 Mac Mini is over priced, over powered and lacks the storage desired by the average Joe or Jill. For a niche of pros seeking transportable power it may be a fit, but the wider market of folks who found earlier iterations of the Mac Mini specced to suit their more humble needs and budgets, are now left out in the cold..... and retailers know it, hence they don't stock the current model.


My needs changed, and I got a 2017 spec MacBook Air about 18 months ago. I had it upgraded to 500 GB SSD because for now it is my mainstay during an itinerant phase in my life. However, I am looking forward to settling down somewhere again, preferably sooner than later, and setting up my 2009 Mac Mini on a desk again (or almost certainly a new one, if something suitably specced and priced does arrive on the scene)

Many, if not most, folks I know have a desktop as their mainstay at home, especially if they are running small business from home. Laptops, tablets or mobile phones are a supplement, not a replacement for desktops.

Laptops tend to be replaced more frequently than desktops, which will affect the ratio of desktop to laptop sales.

I think it just depends on your personal preference (and who you know). I don’t know anyone who carries a mini in their backpack for use from place to place; everyone I know uses a laptop for that scenario. I also know quite a few people who use a laptop as their only computer—no desktop at all. I also know some who use only an iPad, and even just their iPhone; their needs are met without a traditional laptop or desktop. I couldn’t do it, but 🤷‍♂️

I doubt you’ll see a mini much under $800, just as you probably won’t see an iPhone much under $400. $80/year seems to be pretty close to the floor, whether for an iPhone that lasts five years, or a mini that lasts ten. In the next year or two maybe you can pick up a used 2018 mini around $500 🤞

 

[satchmo]

It seems like Apple strategically had the eGPU option to address the needs of a niche prosumer. It provides an upgrade path but only to those who really need it.

That said, could Apple satisfy a greater audience by providing both a stripped down model for $100 less, and one with a dedicated GPU?

 

[Krevnik]

I would have thought that Coffee Lake Refresh CPUs don't offer anything much over the regular Coffee Lake. Far easier and cheaper for Apple to just double the storage on the mini SKUs if they intend to call it a refresh as I'd expect they get decent volume for the existing CPUs as used on the iMac range.

That assumes the BGA chips exist only to serve Apple. If they exist to serve Intel by adding niches to the product line, there should be 9th gen versions as well.

I've not seen anything about AMD CPU mentions. It would be entirely unusual for Apple to be going to AMD just for the Mini and we'd have heard about it if they were intending to replace Intel Core CPUs across the board.

There’s no reason to do an AMD switch in the whole product line at once.

But 10.15.2 betas did contain AMD CPU drivers that didn’t exist before. Apple is at least looking at them, if they haven’t decided to switch yet.

But something like the Mini is a good choice to switch over *if* Intel decides to not provide more desktop CPUs Apple can use in the Mini.

The Ryzen 5 probably runs too hot for the 2018 Mini PSU though.

First, they don’t. They don’t exactly sip power at idle, like the i5 does, but under full load, the package power is fine for the Mini.

The 3600 in particular is a good drop in for the 8500 and has similar power needs under load: https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/amd-ryzen-5-3600-review,6287-3.html

I’ve seen the 8500 sit at 80W under load just fine.

Second, you got some terminology mixed up. “Too hot for [a] PSU” makes no sense. Either it’s too hot for the thermals, or draws too much power for the PSU. Neither of which is true.

But Turbo Boost will eat up the thermal headroom available in the Mini, which is true today.

This assumes the iMac Pro and Mac Pro go (stay with Xeon CPUs) but it's a complete flight of fancy as Apple are also heavily reliant on Quicksync from the Intel CPUs.

Since Apple are reliant on iGPUs as well, they’d have to look at a custom APU for the Mini. Such an APU would mean Apple could use the embedded AMD GPU in place of QuickSync internally. Developers wouldn’t even notice a difference since the work would be internal to AVFoundation. “Van Gogh” was a code name that showed up in the 10.15.2 betas, which while little is known, is suspected to be a semi-custom APU via other sources prior to the Apple leak.

None of the current APUs are reasonable to jump to for Apple IMO.

Putting a dGPU into a mobile redesign package would eliminate 2 of the 4 Thunderbolt 3 ports which is a big compromise considering an eGPU would simply plug into one of the 4 ports albeit at a price.

This doesn’t compute. Apple already sells this config in the MBP on Intel. If we are talking AMD still, then lanes should be easier to manage, not harder. Zen 2 has more on-package lanes, and they are PCIe 4.0. You could put a Navi dGPU on an x8 4.0 connection and it’d be *fine*. Still leaving 16 CPU lanes for whatever you want.

The bigger issue is that to make room for a true dGPU in the Mini (Intel or AMD), they have to give up the changes they just made in the 2018. Which I would find surprising.

But my general opinion is that if Apple jumps to AMD in the mini, it will be using something like the rumored Van Gogh or some other semi-custom design, not an off the shelf component. And it will be because Intel basically abandoned the BGA desktop CPUs after just one offering, and refused to keep making them just for Apple.

Simply: Apple will switch to AMD from Intel on a product if Intel stops producing what Apple wants. And I kinda agree with the thinking that the Mini has moved into a territory of Colo and Production focus. eGPUs for those that need grunt. But to keep it a good choice in that space, Intel must keep making BGA chips (something I’d consider an unknown at the moment), or Apple must source competitive chips elsewhere.

 

[Spectrum]

The best upgrade they could give the Mac mini would be to remove the PSU and have it powered externally. Could USBC provide enough juice?

The extra space from removing PSU could improve cooling a lot, and give space for an M2 slot and a mobile GPU similar to 16 inch MBPro.

Including 4 RAM slots would also open up some interesting possibilities for those wanting 64GB+ RAM.

 

[sublunar]

The best upgrade they could give the Mac mini would be to remove the PSU and have it powered externally. Could USBC provide enough juice?

The extra space from removing PSU could improve cooling a lot, and give space for an M2 slot and a mobile GPU similar to 16 inch MBPro.

Including 4 RAM slots would also open up some interesting possibilities for those wanting 64GB+ RAM.

I've always thought that Apple kept the old form factor to please the Colocation guys. They didn't have to put desktop class CPUs into that chassis though as most of us expected next gen mobile CPUs anyway so perhaps pricing has come into it at some point - the mobile chips have a higher price according to Intel's Ark site.

The convenience of being able to plug into a single box is a big selling point for Apple. No point having a power brick that's almost as big as the compute box altogether.

I suggested the idea of a USB-C power delivery for the Mini much earlier in this thread - if the entire box could be powered from a 95w MBP 16" PSU, or 85w 15" PSU (or a dock, or a suitable monitor) that would have been very interesting if perhaps leaving the device more at risk from power loss.

What's also interesting is the prospect of Intel providing competition for AMD in low end dGPUs next year with their DG1 card. Notebookcheck suggests DG1 will have GDDR6 memory and performance similar to a GTX 1050GPU which pretty much covers everything in iMacs at the moment.

It's effectively integrated graphics on steroids (double the speed of Iris Pro graphics judging by the number of Execution Units (96 vs 48)) with discrete VRAM that doesn't steal from system RAM and sips no more than 25w.

Obviously it would be more for an iMac but if Apple wanted to do the Mac mini properly - increase internal volume to include a better cooling solution - they could also consider adding the Intel GPU.

Unless, of course, they intend to get cheap GPUs from AMD by using Intel as a bargaining chip.
[automerge]1577568817[/automerge]

First, they don’t. They don’t exactly sip power at idle, like the i5 does, but under full load, the package power is fine for the Mini.

The 3600 in particular is a good drop in for the 8500 and has similar power needs under load: https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/amd-ryzen-5-3600-review,6287-3.html

I’ve seen the 8500 sit at 80W under load just fine.

Second, you got some terminology mixed up. “Too hot for [a] PSU” makes no sense. Either it’s too hot for the thermals, or draws too much power for the PSU. Neither of which is true.

But Turbo Boost will eat up the thermal headroom available in the Mini, which is true today.

I think was was describing the Ryzen 5 3400g with integrated Vega 11 graphics - which I believe would run too hot (and draw too much power) for the Mini under turbo conditions (as you suggested). The Ryzen 5 3600 would need a dGPU which would then render the total package too much for the Mini.

 

[Krevnik]

The best upgrade they could give the Mac mini would be to remove the PSU and have it powered externally. Could USBC provide enough juice?

The extra space from removing PSU could improve cooling a lot, and give space for an M2 slot and a mobile GPU similar to 16 inch MBPro.

Including 4 RAM slots would also open up some interesting possibilities for those wanting 64GB+ RAM.

PD isn’t an option. The 2018 is on a 150W PSU, beyond the 100W max supported for USB PD.

They’d need to add more vents as well to get better cooling. The thermals are also airflow constrained. They can add vents in the side where the PSU currently is to help, but I’m not sure how much that would help vs just making the thing thicker so a bigger duct and sink can be used.

The idea isn’t bad, but Apple tends to prefer internal PSUs vs external bricks.

 

[sublunar]

Since Apple are reliant on iGPUs as well, they’d have to look at a custom APU for the Mini. Such an APU would mean Apple could use the embedded AMD GPU in place of QuickSync internally. Developers wouldn’t even notice a difference since the work would be internal to AVFoundation. “Van Gogh” was a code name that showed up in the 10.15.2 betas, which while little is known, is suspected to be a semi-custom APU via other sources prior to the Apple leak.

None of the current APUs are reasonable to jump to for Apple IMO.

The only AMD Ryzen parts currently on sale with iGPU appear to be Ryzen 3 3200g and Ryzen 5 3400g which, contrary to their naming, are only Zen 2 (aka Zen +) parts - not the latest generation. Even though their graphics outstrip the Iris graphics on Intel laptop parts, as you imply, these are fairly low end parts with fewer cores/threads rather than the kind of higher end hardware that Apple would require.

With the world possibly heading into a period of tariffs I'd imagine Apple are looking to be able to insulate themselves against surprise price increases for their products at dock by reducing costs.

Part of this could have been aided by the lower price of NAND due to bargaining power over time but Apple may be looking to reduce costs elsewhere too by reducing unit prices and SKUs.

Don't forget Intel have DG1 graphics coming by mid 2020 which might be a challenge to AMD on Apple machines - as long as Apple can be assured of getting driver support for a number of years.

The sheer number of cores available to AMD parts may help but let's see if Apple can uncouple their reliance on Quicksync - it might actually be in their interests to do so if they intend to migrate macOS to ARM in the future.

Thing is, though, AMD parts have a certain sensitivity to specific RAM specs that the Intel lines are not as concerned about. That's possibly another strike against using AMD and allowing customer upgrades in Apple gear.
[automerge]1577570664[/automerge]

PD isn’t an option. The 2018 is on a 150W PSU, beyond the 100W max supported for USB PD.

They’d need to add more vents as well to get better cooling. The thermals are also airflow constrained. They can add vents in the side where the PSU currently is to help, but I’m not sure how much that would help vs just making the thing thicker so a bigger duct and sink can be used.

The idea isn’t bad, but Apple tends to prefer internal PSUs vs external bricks.

It would have to go back to a mobile CPU design then where the PSU was max 100w - which isn't going to happen. They may then be able to continue using the existing chassis but the compromise would be too obvious even if they somehow managed to use a part with Intel Graphics and keep the price down.

 

[Spectrum]

The only AMD Ryzen parts currently on sale with iGPU appear to be Ryzen 3 3200g and Ryzen 5 3400g which, contrary to their naming, are only Zen 2 (aka Zen +) parts - not the latest generation. Even though their graphics outstrip the Iris graphics on Intel laptop parts, as you imply, these are fairly low end parts with fewer cores/threads rather than the kind of higher end hardware that Apple would require.

With the world possibly heading into a period of tariffs I'd imagine Apple are looking to be able to insulate themselves against surprise price increases for their products at dock by reducing costs.

Part of this could have been aided by the lower price of NAND due to bargaining power over time but Apple may be looking to reduce costs elsewhere too by reducing unit prices and SKUs.

Don't forget Intel have DG1 graphics coming by mid 2020 which might be a challenge to AMD on Apple machines - as long as Apple can be assured of getting driver support for a number of years.

The sheer number of cores available to AMD parts may help but let's see if Apple can uncouple their reliance on Quicksync - it might actually be in their interests to do so if they intend to migrate macOS to ARM in the future.

Thing is, though, AMD parts have a certain sensitivity to specific RAM specs that the Intel lines are not as concerned about. That's possibly another strike against using AMD and allowing customer upgrades in Apple gear.
[automerge]1577570664[/automerge]


It would have to go back to a mobile CPU design then where the PSU was max 100w - which isn't going to happen. They may then be able to continue using the existing chassis but the compromise would be too obvious even if they somehow managed to use a part with Intel Graphics and keep the price down.

I feel like an 8core i9 MBPro under full, transient load of both CPU and GPU might easily pull more than 100Watts...

In past iterations of the MBPro (2008 era) I recall that such power spikes were covered by a combination of the PSU+battery. I suspect that may be true now as well.

So this does put the mini at a further disadvantage.

 

[Krevnik]

The only AMD Ryzen parts currently on sale with iGPU appear to be Ryzen 3 3200g and Ryzen 5 3400g which, contrary to their naming, are only Zen 2 (aka Zen +) parts - not the latest generation. Even though their graphics outstrip the Iris graphics on Intel laptop parts, as you imply, these are fairly low end parts with fewer cores/threads rather than the kind of higher end hardware that Apple would require.

Zen 2 isn’t Zen+, so be careful with the naming. 3600 is Zen 2 while the 3400G or 2600 is Zen+.

But *again*, I’m not suggesting Apple would make the switch to existing APUs. Makes zero sense when none of the existing APUs can even keep up with the i5/i7 the Mini currently use. You aren’t exactly attacking my argument here.

With the world possibly heading into a period of tariffs I'd imagine Apple are looking to be able to insulate themselves against surprise price increases for their products at dock by reducing costs.

Don't forget Intel have DG1 graphics coming by mid 2020 which might be a challenge to AMD on Apple machines - as long as Apple can be assured of getting driver support for a number of years.

Taiwan isn’t covered by Chinese tariffs. TSMC and AMD are both outside the scope of the current trade war.

And it doesn’t matter if Intel has flying pigs if Apple can’t convince them to package them for use in the Mini. And that’s the real clincher one way or another. If the missing Coffee Lake Refresh parts are a fluke or a sign of something more troubling for Apple sourcing updated chips from Intel suitable for what the Mini has evolved into.

Right now, I believe Apple has 3 possibilities for a Mini refresh without redesigning the chassis for a dGPU:
1. Get a BGA 10th gen desktop part (not guaranteed)
2. Go back to mobile chips starting with 10th gen (needed to beat the 8700 on raw performance)
3. Convince AMD to build a semi-custom APU suitable for them.

Apple likely wouldn’t have AMD CPU drivers accidentally show up in beta builds if they weren’t seriously considering their CPUs, and have internal engineering hardware using them. It’s more a question of what product(s) are they looking at.

The reason I think the Mini is a good possibility is that AMD’s desktop cores are more competitive than the laptop cores, and the Mini is a product that depends on a semi-custom package, making it vulnerable to Intel’s whims.

13” MBP is another possibility if the goal is to sneak a better GPU in, but as you point out, Intel is about to get serious with their own dGPU, and the 10th gen iGPUs should be a noticeable jump that could make AMD less enticing there.

The sheer number of cores available to AMD parts may help but let's see if Apple can uncouple their reliance on Quicksync - it might actually be in their interests to do so if they intend to migrate macOS to ARM in the future.

Apple has already been using the T2 for HEVC encode in the 2018, and it is capable of decode as well (although it’s not 100% clear if it is used for decode at the moment). Which pretty much means they are already uncoupling it leveraging the same hardware encode/decode they use for iOS.

Apple even advertises the transcode features of the T2 on their announcement for the 2018: https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2018/10/new-mac-mini-packs-huge-punch/

I feel like an 8core i9 MBPro under full, transient load of both CPU and GPU might easily pull more than 100Watts...

Briefly I think it can, but the thermals can’t handle it for more than *very* brief spikes. The CPU alone can’t break 80W or so.

 

[sublunar]

Zen 2 isn’t Zen+, so be careful with the naming. 3600 is Zen 2 while the 3400G or 2600 is Zen+.

But *again*, I’m not suggesting Apple would make the switch to existing APUs. Makes zero sense when none of the existing APUs can even keep up with the i5/i7 the Mini currently use. You aren’t exactly attacking my argument here.

Fair enough, clarification on the fact that the iGPU enabled Ryzen 5 3400g is actually a generation behind the latest non iGPU Ryzen CPUs - for instance, Ryzen 5 3600 is 3rd generation (aka Zen 2), whereas 3400G is (Zen +, which I take to mean Zen 1.5 or second generation) or analogous to the Ryzen 5 2600 for example.

Either way, they don't sound very much like the kind of CPU that Apple would look at.

Perhaps the additional PCIe lanes (4.0 to boot) on the regular Ryzen CPUs and the reduced reliance on Intel for Thunderbolt could allow Apple a realistic competitive option to compare with Intel.

And it doesn’t matter if Intel has flying pigs if Apple can’t convince them to package them for use in the Mini. And that’s the real clincher one way or another. If the missing Coffee Lake Refresh parts are a fluke or a sign of something more troubling for Apple sourcing updated chips from Intel suitable for what the Mini has evolved into.

Apple would have had a view of the Intel roadmap, they probably didn't like the continually slipping release dates though. Even the 2015 21.5" iMac which came with a Broadwell Iris Pro cpu (with Iris Pro Graphics 550) didn't get replaced with the Skylake equivalent which I took to mean that Apple got a look into Intel plans which suggested that Skylake's Iris Pro 580 was to be the last iteration of that. They then replaced the 2015 which a 2017 model which came with a dGPU (in this case an AMD Pro 555).

The MacBook Pro 15" 2015 model came with Haswell i7-4770HQ which had Iris Pro 5200. That was replaced by a late 2016 model which saw the low end 15" model also get an AMD dGPU - let's quietly ignore the keyboard issue though.

Again, my takeaway from this is that Apple were forewarned by Intel that Iris Pro was going away and decided to go with dGPU for products that needed more graphics grunt rather than rely on iGPU.

Right now, I believe Apple has 3 possibilities for a Mini refresh without redesigning the chassis for a dGPU:
1. Get a BGA 10th gen desktop part (not guaranteed)
2. Go back to mobile chips starting with 10th gen (needed to beat the 8700 on raw performance)
3. Convince AMD to build a semi-custom APU suitable for them.

Apple likely wouldn’t have AMD CPU drivers accidentally show up in beta builds if they weren’t seriously considering their CPUs, and have internal engineering hardware using them. It’s more a question of what product(s) are they looking at.

The reason I think the Mini is a good possibility is that AMD’s desktop cores are more competitive than the laptop cores, and the Mini is a product that depends on a semi-custom package, making it vulnerable to Intel’s whims.

13” MBP is another possibility if the goal is to sneak a better GPU in, but as you point out, Intel is about to get serious with their own dGPU, and the 10th gen iGPUs should be a noticeable jump that could make AMD less enticing there.

The fourth possibility is a case redesign along with a combination of change of CPU and possibly a dGPU.

The main reasoning here is that I can see Apple preferring BGA to prevent people from buying low end Minis and swapping out the CPU. If Intel are not showing Apple any future BGA desktop CPUs they like the look of (yes, they could go Xeon BGA but that sounds far fetched).

I always thought that a mobile solution would be be both an incremental progression on the 2014 Mini as well as utilising economies of scale with 15" MacBook Pros.

If they gave the Co-Location guys notice that a 2020 Mini would have a new case - maybe Cube sized with the same footprint for example - they would have enough space for a suitable cooling solution that would include a lot more cores - able to turbo for longer - and maybe even a Intel Xe DG1 GPU for help with transcoding without hammering the heat or power consumption profile.

For me, adding a dGPU would be the only reason for a Mini user accepting a reversion back to lower power mobile CPUs and the possible loss of 2 Thunderbolt ports and one controller if the new GPU requires 8 PCIe lanes.

If Intel are taking this seriously they need to have a convincing argument to get Apple to adopt it over the AMD offerings like the 5300M.

Apple has already been using the T2 for HEVC encode in the 2018, and it is capable of decode as well (although it’s not 100% clear if it is used for decode at the moment). Which pretty much means they are already uncoupling it leveraging the same hardware encode/decode they use for iOS.

Apple even advertises the transcode features of the T2 on their announcement for the 2018: https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2018/10/new-mac-mini-packs-huge-punch/

Good point there. Maybe a bigger case would allow Apple to properly cool the T2.

 

[sublunar]

I've just seen a Patently Apple news story about Apple plans to address the eSports market with a gaming orientated Mac. This is connected to the Apple Arcade and could get launched at WWDC next year which would immediately be compared with the launches of the PS5 and Xbox Series X.

The story mentions a large screen AIO (iMac) or laptop for gamers but I think the Sony and Microsoft consoles will easily wrap up the market if Apple are thinking that offering a gamer orientated macOS box would attract people to it over a Windows PC.

In this case, a retina screen would be counter productive for most gamers and pricing it up to $5k (iMac Pro prices!) sounds ridiculous when macOS gaming lags so far behind what the Windows guys can get from a properly tuned up rig which - crucially - they will happily upgrade every 6 months as newer hardware comes out to stay on the bleeding edge.

The first thing that hard core gamers will be after is variable high refresh rate over a retina quality screen and while gamers with deep pockets can afford the hardware to drive a 4k gaming rig - Apple would need to tap AMD up for the latest and greatest graphics hardware knowing that Nvidia do it better and cooler with their latest gear.

More sensible would be to tackle the AMD APU SoC that is being rolled out for the PS5 and Xbox Series X by creating an AppleTV Pro using - for example - an A14X CPU SoC.

In effect, this would be Apple keeping gaming in house by going down the tvOS route for gaming - no need to pay Intel or AMD when you can develop a 6th generation AppleTV that people might buy to stream AppleTV+ on as well.

They can announce it at WWDC and launch it after the iPhone with the A14 CPU in September. A byproduct of this could mean iPad Pros get A13X refreshes in 1H 2020 to ensure supply of A14X CPUs later this year.

With a $499 price and, for example, plenty of flash storage for games (it doesn't have to be NVMe, go SATA for volume perhaps) the console philosophy of keeping a standardised set of hardware for 3-5 years is more in keeping with what Apple do.

If Apple wanted to optimise macOS hardware for 'AAA' gaming (within an Apple set of rules, I'm ruling out an xMac with graphics card slots for a start!) they'd have to effectively sell a headless MacBook Pro 16" (with AMD Pro 5500M) within a cooling solution that would enable silent gaming (or heavy duty work) which I would say should be their USP.

And a headless MacBook Pro would cost between $2k-$3k; or perhaps be used as at the basis of a 24" iMac with high refresh rate screen which could also be 4k retina from $3k.

 

[Krevnik]

Fair enough, clarification on the fact that the iGPU enabled Ryzen 5 3400g is actually a generation behind the latest non iGPU Ryzen CPUs - for instance, Ryzen 5 3600 is 3rd generation (aka Zen 2), whereas 3400G is (Zen +, which I take to mean Zen 1.5 or second generation) or analogous to the Ryzen 5 2600 for example.

i literally point that out in the text you quoted.

Perhaps the additional PCIe lanes (4.0 to boot) on the regular Ryzen CPUs and the reduced reliance on Intel for Thunderbolt could allow Apple a realistic competitive option to compare with Intel.

Since Apple already uses a PCH controller from Intel in the Mini which has its own PCIe lanes, mostly it‘s that the T2, GPU and TB3 controllers can’t all be on the CPU lanes. Could with Zen 2 though.

The fourth possibility is a case redesign along with a combination of change of CPU and possibly a dGPU.


The main reasoning here is that I can see Apple preferring BGA to prevent people from buying low end Minis and swapping out the CPU. If Intel are not showing Apple any future BGA desktop CPUs they like the look of (yes, they could go Xeon BGA but that sounds far fetched).

I always thought that a mobile solution would be be both an incremental progression on the 2014 Mini as well as utilising economies of scale with 15" MacBook Pros.

If they gave the Co-Location guys notice that a 2020 Mini would have a new case - maybe Cube sized with the same footprint for example - they would have enough space for a suitable cooling solution that would include a lot more cores - able to turbo for longer - and maybe even a Intel Xe DG1 GPU for help with transcoding without hammering the heat or power consumption profile.

For me, adding a dGPU would be the only reason for a Mini user accepting a reversion back to lower power mobile CPUs and the possible loss of 2 Thunderbolt ports and one controller if the new GPU requires 8 PCIe lanes.

If Intel are taking this seriously they need to have a convincing argument to get Apple to adopt it over the AMD offerings like the 5300M.

First, the Mini has free PCIe lanes off the PCH controller already. Likely what would happen is something currently on the CPU’s lanes would move to the PCH. This assumes the T2 and two TB3 chips are all on the CPU lanes already. Don’t worry about the lanes, IMO.

Second, I call out those are the three options if they don’t want to resize the case. Resizing the case comes at a cost, even if the Colo folks are notified. Colo gets more expensive for everyone, because of the extra volume.

They could redesign the case, but I’m honestly of the opinion that if the “gaming Mac” rumors are true, they may just leave the Mini as-is, and slot the gaming Mac above it with a design that can cool a desktop GPU. And their efforts on eGPU seem to suggest they are fine as long as the iGPU is adequate for their needs, which means they are probably fine with what’s there now.

4K gaming is rough right now if you want to court more than the indie devs, even on something like the 5700XT. Something Mini-esque with HDMI out for hooking up to a TV, but with KB/M and external monitor support would fit better IMO. A gaming laptop seems like a bag of compromises and doesn’t offer much over the 16” MBP.

Meanwhile, done right, it could double as a gaming system you can hook up to a monitor or TV, but also a “Mini with more graphics Oopmh” if they want. They could play with refining the formula behind some of the smaller (sub 10L) ITX cases on the market. They could make something that takes a 2-slot desktop card but is also smaller than the Dan A4 if they really want.

Good point there. Maybe a bigger case would allow Apple to properly cool the T2.

T2 doesn’t even have a heat sink and hardware decode/encode is very low power consumption compared to the rest of the SoC... I’m not sure what point you are even trying to make here.

 

[sublunar]

First, the Mini has free PCIe lanes off the PCH controller already. Likely what would happen is something currently on the CPU’s lanes would move to the PCH. This assumes the T2 and two TB3 chips are all on the CPU lanes already. Don’t worry about the lanes, IMO.

I've been of the opinion that the CPU lanes are reserved for Thunderbolt ports for best performance. This is why the Mac mini can have 4 Thunderbolt ports - all 16 lanes coming from the CPU.

Discrete graphics would hang off the CPU lanes too - usually 8 lanes - explaining why iMacs only have 2 Thunderbolt ports taking up the other 8 lanes.

Everything else is patched through the PCH chipset (USB ports, SSD, wifi, bluetooth, HDMI).

eGPU is a useful if limited solution for mobile users but also a pricey solution for Mac mini users. It's the only way to get some GPU upgrades even if, in some ways, it's better than putting it all into the same box given Apple's cooling solutions.

4K gaming is rough right now if you want to court more than the indie devs, even on something like the 5700XT. Something Mini-esque with HDMI out for hooking up to a TV, but with KB/M and external monitor support would fit better IMO. A gaming laptop seems like a bag of compromises and doesn’t offer much over the 16” MBP.

Meanwhile, done right, it could double as a gaming system you can hook up to a monitor or TV, but also a “Mini with more graphics Oopmh” if they want. They could play with refining the formula behind some of the smaller (sub 10L) ITX cases on the market. They could make something that takes a 2-slot desktop card but is also smaller than the Dan A4 if they really want.

Something about 'Mac gaming' doesn't hold up about that recent shaky story the more you think about it. Apple just aren't ready to be the best option for gamers going forward.

When they say eSports in the report I'm thinking multiplayer action titles that don't need the highest end hardware. Usually it's just powerful enough to run simpler titles like DOTA, Starcraft 2, Overwatch and Fortnite. It's eSports rigs that get talked about when people put their ITX sized gaming rig in a bag and go round a mate's house to play.

Most of the discourse around 'gaming Mac' has been around what I call a misinterpretation of what PC gamers call AAA titles - the games that need the very best Nvidia GPU and top of the range Intel gear - Call of Duty, Crysis, etc.

We all know that macOS as it stands doesn't get enough developer support and Metal isn't being utilised to the max. It doesn't help when Apple lose interest in developing technologies like OpenGL and consistently don't put top of the line graphics hardware into Macs (or even current hardware for that matter).

Its therefore no surprise when we read about PC titles getting more FPS when run in Windows on Bootcamp using the same hardware.

A Mac mini with internal GPU, better cooling system if Apple overlay chase the gaming angle, would be costly for sure. How many gamers with that much money would buy one? Over the hobbyists who wanted a Mini with more graphical grunt but balked at the price of a mini plus eGPU combo?

The more I think about it, the more it makes far more sense for Apple to produce a games console which is capable of playing the eSports titles being mentioned. The ARM CPUs should be capable of at least Xbox One X/PS4 Pro performance next year - maybe even give the Xbox Series X/PS5 a run for their money too.

Apple would certainly be able to push a portable gaming angle with the iPad/iPhone too.

The other thing I would be doing is acquiring a games studio to make exclusive titles for my games platform. With Catalyst it should not be too hard to code something that could run on both iOS and macOS.

In the meantime I would also be tapping up Mac friendly studios (eg Blizzard) to release certain titles for Mac and iOS - Overwatch for a start.

T2 doesn’t even have a heat sink and hardware decode/encode is very low power consumption compared to the rest of the SoC... I’m not sure what point you are even trying to make here.

Probably not worth fully forming the argument yet but I'm reading a number of threads about T2/BridgeOS issues suggesting that improperly cooling that chip can lead to issues and perhaps ultimately the death of the system since it's so pivotal for security reasons and if it were to die prematurely it would be very bad for a Mac.

Those threads aren't hard to find but it's certainly worth monitoring in case it's not a temporary software issue.

In these cases I'm guessing the total system heat is the issue and not anything the T2 is doing by itself. Interestingly, Appleinsider have an article about the assistance it gives to video encoding and it's worth pointing out that the iMac Pro doesn't have Quicksync because the Xeon CPU they use doesn't have an iGPU. It's also fair to say that the new Mac Pro has the same issue but both of these Pro machines have the T2 CPU to take over from Quicksync.

Quicksync also helps with AirPlay mirroring although macOS Catalina's Sidecar feature does actually seem to work with iMac Pro and the new Mac Pro so I'm wondering if the T2 CPU is handling the grunt work that Quicksync would have handled if the Mac doesn't have that feature.

The point to be made here appears to be that the T2 CPU is taking over where the Mac doesn't have native quick sync - iMac Pro and new Mac Pro are the main examples here.

That could be taken as evidence of Apple reducing reliance on specific features of Intel CPUs. It does appear to remove reliance on iGPUs but AMD don't offer anything with an iGPU that Apple would be interested in. While this might not be an issue in the iMac (which does come with a dGPU) it will be an issue for the Mac mini specifically as that relies on the iGPU.

If, then, Apple have decided to introduce more GPU capability in future Macs because of a strategy shift to start catering more for gamers it makes sense for the Mini to have a dGPU on more affordable SKUs. These machines probably won't be of interest to the Colo guys because of the GPU.

On that basis, Apple could be free to design a larger case for the Mac mini Pro to include desktop CPU and add in discrete graphics if they continue to sell the existing Mac mini with perhaps a storage bump to keep it ticking over.