# Share here your Macbook mini experience



## Nate (Dec 19, 2012)

Hi,

I dont want to say the exact story because its long and irrelevant why I want to buy a Mac Mini Server. And its not even important.

What I would like to know is how does the Mac Mini 2 ghz quad core i7 (I will upgrade it to 16gb ram) perform with photoshop, lightroom and premier pro.
In photoshop sometimes I put 10, 22 megapixel raw shots, and in premier pro full hd videos, but with a few effects. I would like to ask if anyone has experience.

Intel HD 3000 vs 4000?

And how is the 2ghz quad core i7 with 8gb or 16gb perform in editing?


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## paul13walnut5 (Dec 19, 2012)

I'm running a 2009 iMac i7 Quad HT ith 8GB RAM, using Premiere and Photoshop CS5.

It's very fast. Faster than the MacPro I use in the office (with 32 bit apps) the more RAM then in theory the more speed, but in actual fact you really need to consider the speed of the drives.

And you will need more than one.

Ideally you want a drive to run the OS and apps, a capture scratch (for your RAWs, and H264s) and a render or output scratch to write to.

This is going to get the most out of your machine.

THe second thing to consider is getting an SSD drive for the system drive (gets data in and out very quickly) and look at the connections the mac mini supports.

There isn't much scope for internal expansion with a mini, so you are looking at an external option. A fast RAID can be set up with great capacity for relatively modest cost. Something like 2x E-Sata II or III Seagate Barracudas in an external RAID caddy with the drive striped using software raid will give you SSD speed but with TB's of space.

If you could spec two RAIDs, one for capture and one for render then your Mac Mini would absolutely fly.

However do note that a Mac Pro tower has internal bays for expansion, so if you need speed this may be the best bet (put an SSD in the spare optical bay, use the 4x 3.5 bays for 2x software RAIDs)

Not to mention the extra grunt at the processing.

But RAM is good. 64bit is good. The thing that slows most folk down are their drives. Usually the last thing they upgrade. You want multiple. You want speed.


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## natureshots (Dec 19, 2012)

Nate said:


> Hi,
> 
> I dont want to say the exact story because its long and irrelevant why I want to buy a Mac Mini Server. And its not even important.
> 
> ...


The HD 4000 graphics are a big step up in graphics power. The extra RAM will not make a huge difference right now but it will in the future when applications get heavier unless you are doing heavy multitasking (which wont really work well on a mini anyways). The mac minis use mobile processors which are considerably less powerful than a desktop processor at a similar clock speed/architecture . Photoshop and Lightroom will run well, the main issue will actually be disk speed that you can fix by upgrading the HD to an SSD if you need more speed. Running Premiere will be a problem. The integrated graphics, mobile processors, slow hard drives and poor heat disipation of a mini won't work so hot for video. Will it work? YES! Will you wait a lot longer than if you got an equivalent PC desktop or iMac? DEFINITELY. You will probably get limited life out of the mini for video editing and it all really depends on how much time you have to wait around for rendering. What is your workflow like? Are you professional?


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## Halfrack (Dec 25, 2012)

The baseline hardware is fine, but I'm anti-embedded graphics. Bump up the RAM and put in an SSD or external array (thunderbolt or firewire) and you'll be fine. How much video or graphic intensive bits are you looking at doing? Your only way to improve the video horsepower is via external - http://sonnettech.com/product/echoexpresschassis.html Is it expensive, yes, but it's just an external box that can be moved around.

So that long irrelevant story goes like.....?

edit: looks to not be enough for video, but lots of other bits seem to work...


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