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Home / News / IMHO – Apple’s new Mac Mini is too pricey

IMHO – Apple’s new Mac Mini is too pricey

I've been waiting months for the new Mac Mini. Before jetting off to Las Vegas for CES, all the talk was of a new model getting the keynote treatment

I’ve been waiting months for the new Mac Mini. Before jetting off to Las Vegas for CES, all the talk was of a new model getting the keynote treatment up the road in San Francisco at Macworld. But alas, it’s taken Apple until today to unveil it. And unsurprisingly, the price is a major sticking point.

Before I get started, let me be clear. I can appreciate why some Apple kit is pricey. It has always been aimed at the high–end consumer and their brand is uber–desirable. You don’t expect Nike trainers or Diesel jeans to be cheap and Apple falls into that same designer category. The quality of iMacs and MacBooks is undeniable, its price reflecting the apparent status it confers on gadget fans and trendsetters alike.

But the Mac Mini is a whole different beast. The new prices, £499 for the 1GB RAM model, £649 for the 2GB RAM model, are hefty to say the least. When they last got a bump in August 2007, they cost £399 and £499 respectively. The specs are nowhere near that much greater to justify such a price hike.

The whole concept of the Mac Mini is to introduce more people to the world of Apple’s excellent OS. The spec sheet though, cannot justify the price. While there may be NVIDIA graphics on board, the relatively low memory and 160GB HDD on the cheaper model should mean we’re looking at a price around the £400 mark, if not lower.

As for £649 for the specced up version, you may as well save up the extra and buy an iMac instead. Or grab a MacBook.

With the Asus Eee Box 206 and MSI’s WindBox, Apple now has some serious and stiff competition in the shallow end of the desktop pool. While I can understand their need to keep things desirable, why not slash the cost and get even more people on the OSX bandwagon?

Profile image of Dan Grabham Dan Grabham Editor-in-Chief

About

Dan is Editor-in-chief of Stuff, working across the magazine and the Stuff.tv website.  Our Editor-in-Chief is a regular at tech shows such as CES in Las Vegas, IFA in Berlin and Mobile World Congress in Barcelona as well as at other launches and events. He has been a CES Innovation Awards judge. Dan is completely platform agnostic and very at home using and writing about Windows, macOS, Android and iOS/iPadOS plus lots and lots of gadgets including audio and smart home gear, laptops and smartphones. He's also been interviewed and quoted in a wide variety of places including The Sun, BBC World Service, BBC News Online, BBC Radio 5Live, BBC Radio 4, Sky News Radio and BBC Local Radio.

Areas of expertise

Computing, mobile, audio, smart home

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