Anyone grab a mac mini 4 yet?

[Kapo_Polenton]

I finally took the plunge into the apple world after ditching my i-phone years ago and swearing I'd never go back. I hate I-tunes with a passion and apple controlling everything but end of the day, the value and features of the new mac mini are ridiculous and perfect for us music / home studio guys. I have an old gaming lap top which more than does the job given that i have a hybrid setup but it's heavy, has a huge power supply, and the battery drops out the back all the time. I figured it was time as I start to move gear back into my new basement space. Pricing was too good to ignore this time around. Glad I waited as well given that the chip is better and it comes stock with 16 GB ram. So, looks like i am an apple cuck too now!

 

[BesaMoogie]

No mac mini but I use a 2024 macbook air and, if recording, Logic.

Somewhere on FB Logic group I saw a chart where performance of various apple chips was tested. The conclusion was, that logic really uses the advantage of having multiple cores in the CPU.
So new chips expectedly performed better but old chips with many cores (up to 24) were within the top of the new ones with less cores.

Kind of makes sense as Logic is designed to work on Apple hardware only and using its full potential

 

[Kapo_Polenton]

No mac mini but I use a 2024 macbook air and, if recording, Logic.

Somewhere on FB Logic group I saw a chart where performance of various apple chips was tested. The conclusion was, that logic really uses the advantage of having multiple cores in the CPU.
So new chips expectedly performed better but old chips with many cores (up to 24) were within the top of the new ones with less cores.

Kind of makes sense as Logic is designed to work on Apple hardware only and using its full potential

Interesting, so would I benefit from being even more of an apple cuck and getting into Logic? I know they essentially have their own native plugins which are really good so you skip the pull to purchase others and manage them all/ keep em up to date. I use Reaper but I am not tied to it or in love with it really. Sometimes i feel the display and work flow is too feature rich. As I mentioned, I am hybrid so I want basic routing and groups and pump stuff through my console and outboard.

 

[BesaMoogie]

Interesting, so would I benefit from being even more of an apple cuck and getting into Logic? I know they essentially have their own native plugins which are really good so you skip the pull to purchase others and manage them all/ keep em up to date. I use Reaper but I am not tied to it or in love with it really. Sometimes i feel the display and work flow is too feature rich. As I mentioned, I am hybrid so I want basic routing and groups and pump stuff through my console and outboard.

You can always start with garage band which is free. Its a scaled down version of Logic but probably will be enough for simple recordings.

I really can`t compare the workflow of other pro DAWs as I only have experience with Logic. The good thing with Logic is, for like 200.- (in my country), you get a pro DAW that allready includes all you need for recorings like a whole bunch of effects and tools like compressors, multiband compressor, delays, reverbs, EQs, pitching vocals, correcting timing, drum loops etc etc etc...
Yes, third party VSTs have more options and a nicer layout, but Moldyne (for vocal pitch) can cost serveral hundreds if buying the extended version and their basic version doesn`t do more than the Logic version. So your really can`t go wrong with Logic for the price.

Just keep in mind, when you once got used to the workflow of Logic, you are sort of tied to Apple. I guess that`s part of the philosophy of Apple. They are giving you a DAW with everything around for an exceptional price knowing you will probably keep buying Apple stuff in the future, once you get used the the software.

 

[BesaMoogie]

For your purpose, maybe there is a try out pay later thing Apple offers???
There are of course all sorts of YT videos and tutorials so you get an idea of the workflow etc.

 

[edubfromktown]

Congrats. I ditched iPhones a while back.

Still have two 2011 Mini's running internal stuff (one streams my iTunes/Music collection over Sonos).

Sold my Apple refurb M1 Mini for more than I paid for it when M1 Studio Base Max was released. M4 mini looks intriguing but I'm sticking with the Studio (it has better internal storage I/O performance for sure). I also have a Raspberry Pi 5 8 GB (among my small herd older models). The performance on that puppy is amazing!

 

[JackBootedThug]

Man I need another desktop bad. All I do is surf on it. Mini mac is overkill for me but probably perfect.

 

[Monkey Man]

Mini mac is overkill for me but probably perfect.

At $599 the M4 Mini base model is 100%-puurfect for you bro'.

Zippy / snappy as all heck and more than enough grunt for all everyday tasks.

Prolly way-more grunt than you'd even need for fairly-complex audio projects in sophistimacated DAWs too. I know you wouldn't be interested in that deep dive so you could just use the built-in Garage Band which I'm bettin' would be easy-enough for you to learn / figure out quickly and powerful-enough for your hillbilly / hick projects.

Seriously 'though, you can't go wrong unless you need mega-powerful (more graphics cores) rendering capabilities (faster) for heavy-duty video editing. The base model handles video editing with aplomb but pros demand shorter rendering times (exporting a project in final format) 'cause time is money.