11-19-2015, 10:00 PM
Filliam H. Muffman wrote:
I know some people are proud about nursing along old computers but an A1176 (Macmini1,1), even upgraded to the max, is like driving a moped on the shoulder of a highway. An iPhone 5S is 64 bit and has higher Geekbench results than a Core Duo mini (not 64 bit).
The low end Late-2014 mini is barely better than a road apple, not quite double the Geekbench scores of the iPhone 5S. At least it can be configured with 8 GB of SOLDERED- RAM (an extra $100 for RAM that costs $20) and should be able to install any new version of OS X through 2019.
All of the Late-2012 Mac mini models are typically more than 22% faster than the low end Late-2014, and have user upgradeable RAM.
We're not talking about a Mac Mini 1,1.
"he just uses it for web sites and email"
A 1.83 C2D Mini with $70 of upgrades is more than capable of performing this job without needing a newer machine. The biggest concern is the longevity of older parts, which is legitimate.