Mac mini graphics power

[Unch]

I'm looking to replace my aging Aluminium MacBook. The poor thing seems to struggle a lot these days with simple stuff like YouTube videos and even some of the built in screen savers causing the fans to kick up into high gear. Phones and tablets mean that I no longer really need a notebook anymore. In fact the MacBook is now permanently hooked up to keyboard and monitor. So I've been looking at the Mac mini, in particular the i7 version.

My main use will be Photoshop Elements, a bit of Java and web development, the occasional bit of video editing in iMovie or Premier Elements, and then the general iWork/iLife type stuff. I also use boot camp for Office when I need the compatibility and Visual Studio for some playing about in .Net (it pays the bills). I'm looking to add another monitor to replace the one I'll lose on the MacBook, probably another 24" 1080p job.

My concern is the integrated graphics. I know that they've come on quite a bit in recent years, but I'm still worried a dual monitor setup will tax it too much. Also, with this rumour of a Haswell version in the pipeline I'm worried that I'll regret not waiting for the update to come out.

So I guess that my questions are - Will the mini be able to cope with the tasks I want to use it for? And would a Haswell refresh like the iMac got be a big enough upgrade that I'd be kicking myself for not waiting?

Thanks :)

[Brad]

I use the current-gen i7 Mac mini at work. It's hooked up to two 24" 1080p monitors, one via the HDMI port and one via the Thunderbolt port. I do web/server app development on it all day long (Python, Java, and PHP), and it seems to work perfectly fine. I don't do any video work on it, nor do I watch YouTube, but for IDEs and rich editors (I <3 Sublime Text) with multiple projects open, I have never once had a problem with the graphics performance of the dual-display setup.

Building Maven/Java projects can get slow at times, but that's a drain on any system, and I would guess that the biggest bottleneck for that is actually disk speed/IO. It's not bad enough for me to ask for an SSD or something else, though.

[Unch]

Thanks Brad. If you don't mind me asking, is it the standard 2.3 GHz or the 2.6 GHz that you're using? Also how much RAM do you have in there? Would you recommend maxing it out?

[Brad]

I'm not sure about the exact specs, but I'll check tomorrow morning and post them then!

[Maciej]

I would wait for the Haswell refresh. As always, if you can hold out - do it.

[Unch]

I've been holding off since October. I was hoping that there would be a silent refresh during one of the other launches. While my MacBook isn't on its last legs or anything, there are a few projects I want to crack on with, and I'd like to have a fresh start. Not to mention, wanting to avoid the hassle of migrating to a new machine half way through.

I am struggling with how much longer I should wait for. If I'm not going to reap performance benefits in my typical usage when (if?) the update comes along then I might as well bite the bullet now. However, if an update would have an impact, then I can hold off a little while longer.

[Brad]

I'm not sure about the exact specs, but I'll check tomorrow morning and post them then!

I totally forgot! But then I realized I could VPN in and get the information from home. Thankfully you can run system_profiler from the command line to get all this information. Relevant bits from the output are below.

The 8 GB I have is plenty for my day-to-day tasks. Other than sometimes running Tomcat locally and/or a Java IDE, I'm generally not running memory-heavy processes. Other than a few Python services I was working on last year, most of the apps I work on get deployed to headless VMs hosted in a server closet on the other side of the building. If Java is part of your daily workflow, though, definitely grab as much memory as you can get your hands on.

Graphics/Displays:

Intel HD Graphics 4000:

VRAM (Total): 768 MB
Displays:
SyncMaster:
Resolution: 1920 x 1080 @ 60 Hz
Pixel Depth: 32-Bit Color (ARGB8888)
SyncMaster:
Resolution: 1920 x 1080 @ 60 Hz
Pixel Depth: 32-Bit Color (ARGB8888)

Hardware:

Hardware Overview:

Model Name: Mac mini
Model Identifier: Macmini6,2
Processor Name: Intel Core i7
Processor Speed: 2.6 GHz
Number of Processors: 1
Total Number of Cores: 4
L2 Cache (per Core): 256 KB
L3 Cache: 6 MB
Memory: 8 GB

Memory:

Memory Slots:

BANK 0/DIMM0:

Size: 4 GB
Type: DDR3
Speed: 1600 MHz

BANK 1/DIMM0:

Size: 4 GB
Type: DDR3
Speed: 1600 MHz

[Unch]

Thanks Brad, it is much appreciated.

[Brad]

More stats!

I ran a couple of benchmark tools on the Mac mini today. The Luxmark OpenCL test is actually only exercising the CPU here; the integrated GPU doesn't even register as an option.

http://i.imgur.com/dmEI7wq.png

http://i.imgur.com/OdIZIWC.png

Here are some other system numbers for comparison. (http://www.tonymacx86.com/graphics/95703-nvidia-performance-benchmarks-10-8-3-geforce-gt-640-gtx-680-a.html) Note, however, that the Luxmark results in that thread are for GPU-only.

[Unch]

Thanks again for all the info Brad. I picked one up from the Apple store at the weekend. Not really finished setting it up yet and I haven't put any apps on to put it through its paces. The next step is to Max out the RAM.