Malcolm Owen
Apple has introduced a New Mac mini with the M4 chip upgrade, more USB-C, and a new smaller, sleeker design.
As part of its fall updates, the new Mac mini brings quite a few things to the table. For a start, the compact and entry-level Mac is smarter, thanks to its new chip.
Gone are the M2 and M2 Pro chips from the previous generation, and in their place are the M4 and M4 Pro. Apple says the new M4 offers 1.8 times the CPU performance and 2.2 times the GPU performance over the M1 model.
The M4 Pro version, with up to 14 CPU cores and up to 20 GPU cores, also has a better Neural Engine that's three times faster than the M1 equivalent. The memory bandwidth is also higher, going from 120GB/s in the M4 to 273GB/s.
Along with the new internal powerhouse, the Mac mini has been updated externally. Following months of rumors, the new Mac mini is smaller than the well-known aluminum puck, with it being even thinner than before.
Down from 7.7 inches square, the new Mac mini is now just 5 inches by 5 inches, shrinking its desktop footprint considerably.
This shrinkage has also forced some design changes, including to the ports at the back. That starts with the inclusion of three Thunderbolt 4 ports on the rear, with the Pro model gaining Thunderbolt 5.
For reference, the Thunderbolt 4 connection can handle up to 40Gbps of throughput. Thunderbolt 5 can offer up to 120Gb/s data transfer speeds.
All models also have HDMI and Gigabit Ethernet on the back too, with the latter upgradable to 10Gig.
Around the front, Apple includes a pair of USB-C ports, as well as the audio jack, for easier access.
When it comes to external display support, the M4 Mac mini can deal with two 6K displays and one 5K display. Meanwhile the M4 Pro can do up to three 6K displays at 60Hz.
Apple is also calling the Mac mini the first carbon-neutral Mac. It is made from over 50% recycled content, including 100% recycled aluminum in the enclosure, gold plating for the circuit boards, and rare earth elements for the magnets.
The electricity used to make it is sourced from 100% renewable sources, while low-carbon modes of shipping have been prioritized to cut carbon further. After reducing the carbon footprint by over 80%, Apple uses high quality carbon credits to cover the remainder.
It's also the first Mac mini to get entirely fiber-based packaging.
Apple will open preorders for the Mac mini from today, with availability from November 8. The M4 Mac mini starts from $599, while the M4 Pro can be bought from $1,399.
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42 Comments
Hmm. Seems like the Studio Display should be updated to include an opening through which to route the wires from the Mac Mini that is perched upon its base.
Ten performance cores is way beyond what I was expecting. That’s huge. The m4 pro should be more than twice as fast as the m4 on multithreaded workloads. At least for CPU, this could be close to an M2 Ultra
It’s really tempting to replace my 2018 Mac mini that I use as a Plex server, but it works just fine, it’s just that it gets so hot in the closet where I have it.
My 2013 Mac Pro just got nervous. This looks like a great little general purpose machine.
Bravo! A real update and upgrade, a real “Portable Desktop”.