It took me all of 2 weeks to weigh up my options and bite the bullet. I’ve put the cash down for a new Mac mini M1 – with 16Gb memory and a 1TB HDD.
The biggest annoyance over it all is the cost associated with storage. I know I can add additional storage via USB and Thunderbolt (and I plan on doing so) but I wouldn’t mind having it all together for ease, but the pricing just wasn’t there. The base model, 8GB Memory and a 256GB HDD costs £699. Each upgrade is around £200, so £200 to bump the memory up to its max, 16GB – not brilliant by any stretch of the imagination, but not terrible when it comes to Apple pricing. To take the HDD up to 512Gb is another £200. Then to 1Tb adds an additional £200. To get the top of the line storage is another £400 on top of that, and I just can’t justify an extra £400 for 1Tb of storage when I’ve already paid an additional £400 for 3/4 of that.
Im clearly drinking the kool-aid if I’m moaning about this cost but still paying it. My late 2012 Mac mini no longer gets OS Updates. I now have an annoying red badge letting me know some apps need updating, but they won’t update because I don’t have the latest OS. I’ve manager 8 years with this one computer, and it still runs fairly well. But it’s time to upgrade. Because I like to average out the cost of things, my current mini has cost me a total of:
Unit: £679.00
Accessories: £57.00
RAM Upgrade: £58.13
HDD Upgrade: £150 (approx)
Total: £944.13
Lifetime cost per month: £9.83.
For the new mini to make those same costs I’ll need to keep it for around 10 years. If I manage to sell my existing mini I’ll update the charge above. Lets see how the new one holds up…