Hey /g/,
old mac minis seem fairly cheap on ebay, are they worth it?
>he wants to buy a cheap slot
>>51916383
lol
>>51916366
Sure. Why not?
But one little caveat. If you have/plan to use an iOS 9 device, it requires iTunes 12, which doesn't run on Snow Leopard ... or you can maintain it via iCloud, you just won't be able to sync it with a (Snow Leopard) Mac.
And a weird twist, if you do the iOS8 to 9 update over the air (via the device,) it'll still sync to iTunes11. Or at least my old iPad3 did. If you do the update via iTunes, it'll no longer sync.
>>51916366
sandybridge and up only, yes. don't get newer than 2013/14 or whichever model comes with regular ram
>>51917819
You could bootcamp it, right?
That's gay as fuck they limit what their OS installs on, though
>>51918178
If it's intel, you should be able to bootcamp.
If they feel the machine isn't up to running an OS, then they'll cut it off. Else you end up with shit like "Vista capable."
>>51918261
Yeah, I understand from a UX perspective. If just feels like there should be an override for those who do want to run it.
>>51918314
Like an Apple approved "use at your own risk" option? They'll never do that, even if they disclaim any responsibility, people will still whine when their old as fuck machine blows up.
If you want to modify installers to put it on non-approved machines, you can. People have put (PPC) OSX on mid-90s macs before. Shit took like an hour or more to boot up, but it's possible.
>>51916366
Only the ones that can support 16GB's, imho.
I had a 2012 Mac Mini, no optical drive. Modified to have 2 SSD's. The only downside was the shitty intel video....Wish it had the AMD discrete video. An amazing machine otherwise.
Specs said it supported up to 8GB, but 16GB's worked just fine per iFixit.
>>51917819
The new(er) ones (2010+) can upgrade to the latest OSX though, right?
i use one as a htpc
>>51916366
>eating shit from my hands seems fairly cheap, is it worth it?
macfags, when will they learn?
>>51916366
As long it's not a mac mini server.
>>51918977
http://www.apple.com/osx/how-to-upgrade/#hardware-requirements
2009 minis and later.
>>51916366
It was worth it for me. Got one for a few hundred bucks a few years ago from a German ebay store.
It's a late 2012 model, so no soldered RAM. Came with 16GB of RAM preinstalled. You can do pretty much anything on it, I play LoL on it sometimes. Photoshop runs perfectly.
I'm using it as a dev machine with Windows 8.1, botnet disabled. Personally I don't like OS X anymore, so I use mostly Windows right now. But if you're into OS X, you can have the latest version on it.
Just gotta watch that hybrid partition. These 2012 models only had EFI version 1, so basically officially they don't support more than 4 partitions. So if you need Windows on it and you want each OS on the machine to be upgradeable, your partition must look like this: EFI, Bootcamp, OS X, Recovery volume. If you mess with that hybrid shit, you're on your own, and every OS update might break it.
It's possible the newer models with the latest EFI version have done away with this retarded shit and you can have as many GPT partitions as you want, basically.
>>51916366
I use a 2010 Mac mini almost daily, it's a nice little thing and it changed my mind about Macs. I'd buy my own if they were cheap.
no
just build a hackintosh
How's Linux/BSD supporting that hardware? Been eyeing couple older models myself, maybe upgrade to 16 gigs of RAM and using it for developing and running virtual machines for testing and general fucking around.
>>51920366
I'm mainly a Windows desktop user, so I wouldn't need Windows on it.
What would be the easiest way to use both side by side? Not necessarily at the same time, but you get the idea
>>51916366
If you want to make and host another imageboard no one will ever find out go ahead
>>51916366
They're way overpriced for the specs you get. 200-300 dollars for a C2D-based computer is way overpriced. You can get an old enterprise-class i5-based tower for 100 dollars all day long.
The small form factor would really be the only redeeming factor, but that isn't worth a 2-3x premium.
>>51916366
>old mac minis seem fairly cheap on ebay
Interesting, because I just looked at Mac Minis on Craigslist the other day and it's laughable what people want. I'm talking $200 for a 1st gen. $400 for a 2010 model.
I figure if I want to do Mac development, I'll just do that RentAMac site (or whatever it's called) that lets you develop on a Mac over RDP.
>>51916366
No. Get a more capable Intel NUC and hackintosh it for less money
>>51916366
>wanting shit hardware with an Apple logo
I've got a PowerPC one under my bed running bsd. It's pretty nice.
>>51918261
>If they feel the machine isn't up to running an OS, then they'll cut it off.
Well, they've already fucked up. Mid-2012 Macbook Pros (which are still sold) can update to El Capitan, and my experience has been that it runs like shit on those unless you install an SSD. They only really run well on Mavericks.
My fucking Core 2 Duo plastic Macbook with an SSD runs El Capitan better than a third-gen Core i5 Macbook Pro with a standard hard drive does.
>>51916366
You could host an anonymous image board on one of these beasts.
