M2 vs M2 Pro Mac Mini: Which Should You Buy?

At $599, the M2 Mac Mini is definitely a really hard deal to pass up but depending on what you're planning to do with your shiny new mac, it might not be the best option for you. Perhaps, the M2 Pro Mac Mini is the best choice for your needs. In this video, we aim to assist you with your potential new Mac Mini purchase.

#m2 #m2pro #macmini

[macrumors]

Note: there is no M2 Max Mac Mini. Meant to say "stick with M2 Mac" but you COULD spring up towards an M2 Max MacBook Pro if you really want 👀

[orl]

Funny, but all the Apple centric youtube channels think that everybody is a creator, needs the highest end everything, etc. The PC youtubers suffer the same thing, the gamming disease. Apple sells more of the base models of mac mini's, macbook airs. 99.9 percent of their business is towards the rest of us. I'm old now retired, worked in the car business all of my life, even at GM as trainer. The most common thing was people tented to overbuy, like a 15 way power seat, when they only drove it, set it once and never moved it. Apple of course is like any other company, it tries to market to youtube creators, influencers etc, so that you can maybe someday, be like that guy on mac rumors! Those of us that are based in the real world just want something that works, were no going to video edit in 8K in final cut pro etc.

[goranmajic]

I dont get it. I can edit 4K on my 2016 Macbook Pro and everything else with 8 GB RAM. Why is a machine coming out in 2023 not capable of it? Thats an info you are not offering to your viewers. How can such a machine only be ready for eMail reading? 99 Dollar Smartphone can read eMails. Please be more serious about your reviews! This review only disturbed and cofused me.

[bbot]

The main reason I would go with the Pro Mac Mini, is the 4 ports. Want to see the benchmarks as well.

[calmcruiser]

Hi Dan, I am still running the 2012 Intel i7 16GB Mac Mini for basic Office Tasks. This thing is now 11 years old. So if longevity is something you’re looking for buy the best what you can get and enjoy it for many years to come!

[chrismv]

Straight, clear and to the point. Excellent preview and recommendation.

[CharlesBronsun]

In a few years I will buy a used M chipped Mini with 64gb ram, 2TB SSD. All will be well in the world. My music production plugins will run wild

[cvdavis]

I’m finally replacing my 2008 and 2009 Mac Pros. I’ve decided on the M2 Pro Mac Mini with: 16GB ram, 12 cores, 19 core gpu, 1T of storage and 10G Ethernet. It’s all overkill for me but then my Mac Pro 4 core was overkill and lasted 14 years. The only reason I’m changing it out is the IOS is vulnerable to attacks because it’s not supported and some websites won’t even work with it. I will miss the 26T of storage on my Mac Pro but I don’t need access to all my videos all of the time. I have NAS drives as I bought them figuring my next Mac wouldn’t have that much internal storage. I was right.

[miahorg]

RE: 8GB of RAM on models. This can cause filesystem performance hits. While SSD storage is blazing fast it is still not as fast as RAM. Many applications are written, especially ones that write data out to disk, with the assumption that they can write out as fast as possible and the OS will maintain enough filesystem cache for this to work out pleasantly for everybody. Desktops aren't my thing, but in the database/server world you can reasonably plan on half of your system ram being used for the filesystem cache. 8 GB is pretty paltry considering that Chrome can easily consume 4 GB on its own. No matter what CPU you have, the amount of filesystem cache will ultimately be the bottleneck. I suspect this is why your podcast recording sessions had drop outs - the app delivered the data effectively, but the OS was not able to scribble it down to the disk in time.

[shankard]

Thank you so much brother. Your suggestion is really helpful for me. I just bought M2 pro Mac mini. Its outstanding like you . Thanks again...

[erikwestre]

16 GB RAM is needed even for basic users. 256 GB storage is fine for most users, and iCloud storage is super cheap. A fast usb-c flash drive/stick in addition, and most people will be fine. So be it if transfers are a bit slower. How often do people transfer hundreds of GB? Do not overspec your Apple devices. It costs way to much, and you get less value for money. None of the spec-steps are worth more than 1/3 of what Apple charges for them.

[eoschill]

I can relate! I started coding a year ago on my m1 8gb 256 and it was fine. I got my 1st remote role as a software engineer, and now I have to monitor the ram since I'm working on small personal projects and company products on the same mini, I'm now considering the m2 pro 32 gb 512. Also just had my 1st kid so I may wanna hop back into photography and some short videos so I should 100% "future-proof" myself with this next purchase.

[toadlguy]

Hmm, you are wrong. The M1 Mac Mini has 2 128GB SSDs - That was a problem on the MacBook Pro 13", not the Mini. We don't know yet if it is a problem on the M2 256GB Mini yet. I have a base model M1 Mini and tested it myself, I'm sure you could have as well.

[astrostl]

"Most importantly, if you run out of space on your Mac because you have only 256GB of storage it's gonna start eat into your virtual memory."

This is very false. If you run out of space, you're out of space and you will not be able to store anything unless you delete things or add external storage. Virtual memory is when you run out of RAM and your storage is used as much slower RAM.

[timetowatch_francois]

Thanks! Made my life easier to choose 😊👍🏻
… even after 1 year since this came out.

[Jeff]

8 GB RAM and 256 GB storage are laughably low for a desktop. I'd never go for that. Storage I suppose you can use external storage for, but at least get 16 GB RAM.

[TechnoBoomer]

Thanks for the video. I bought a M2 Mac mini with 16 Go of ram and 256 Go SSD because this machine will be a secondary computer (the primary being a Fedora-based PC). I'll plug a 500 Go external SSD as well. François

[jayducharme]

I have a maxed-out M1 mini and it still works fine, so I think I’ll stick with it until the M3 comes out.

[JoshPostVlogs]

I can confirm the base M2 Mac Mini is crap for video editing. I bought the base model and even upgraded to 16GB Ram. It’s CONSTANTLY stalling when editing video in Final Cut Pro (and I’m even using Proxy media). Constantly I’m getting the little spin wheel and I have to wait for it to catch up. Super frustrating. Just bought this a month ago and it is now past the return date. 😢

[HeavyNaturals]

surprised you didn't touch on the fact the base model is being shipped with a HDMI 2.0 port and the pro model has a 2.1 port. 4k at 60 vs 4k at 120 is a huge deal for usability of a desktop.