Obviously, the 3819 CNY version is equipped with the most basic M2 chip (8-core CPU and 10-core GPU), 8GB unified memory, 256GB solid-state drive, and two Thunderbolt 4 ports; while the 8499 CNY version is equipped with the M2 Pro chip (10-core CPU and 16-core GPU), 16GB unified memory, 512GB SSD, four Thunderbolt 4 ports.

According to reports, Apple’s refurbished products will go through a strict refurbishment process before they are sold, and they can enjoy Apple’s one-year limited warranty and 14-day return policy. AppleCare can also be purchased separately, but engraving and gift packaging services are not applicable.

For reference, It is found the pricing of this model on other platforms. At present, the 8G version of Mac mini is 3,558 CNY in JD.com.

The M2 also brings ProRes acceleration to Mac mini, making tasks like Final Cut Pro video editing up to twice as fast.

The M2 model supports two simultaneous streams of 8K ProRes 422 at 30 fps, or twelve simultaneous streams of 4K ProRes 422 at 30 fps. With up to five times the overall performance of the best-selling Windows desktop, the Mac mini is an excellent value for first-time computer buyers, upgraders and customers switching from other PCs to a Mac, according to Apple.

Compared to a Mac mini with an Intel Core i7, a Mac mini with M2 has the following performance:

 Machine learning (ML) image optimization with Pixelmator Pro up to 22x faster upscaling performance.

 Render complex timelines with Final Cut Pro up to 9.8x faster.

Compared to the previous-generation Mac mini with the M1, the Mac mini with the M2 offers the following features:

 Up to 2.4x faster ProRes transcoding with Final Cut Pro.

 In Adobe Photoshop, render filters and functions up to 50 percent faster.

According to Apple, the Mac mini is designed to minimize its environmental impact, including the use of 100 percent recycled materials for: aluminium in the case, rare earth elements in all magnets, tin in the motherboard solder, and multiple printed circuit boards Gold in electroplating. 35% more recycled plastic is used in several components than the previous model. Mac Mini meets Apple’s high standards for energy efficiency and is free of many hazardous substances. 97% of packaging materials are fibre-based, bringing Apple closer to its goal of completely removing plastic from the packaging by the end of 2025.

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In a report shared with investors on Tuesday, Morgan Stanley lowered its forecast for the PC market, lowering its 2023 shipment estimate from 261 million to 249 million. This is due to a number of factors, including weaker-than-expected market demand, increased channel inventory, etc., resulting in weakness in both the consumer and commercial markets.

It is learned from a Morgan Stanley analysis: “Weak consumer demand, significantly weaker enterprise demand, a weaker U.S. and European economy and increased inventory in the global channel will lead to a decline in PC shipments to 249 million units in FY23, a 12.5% year-over-year decline.

The average selling price of PCs is now expected to decline 3% year-over-year due to “lingering inflationary pressures and an aggressive mix shift. Morgan Stanley sees total transaction volume falling to $206 billion in fiscal 2023, 26 percent below the $279 billion peak in 2021, driven by weaker shipment expectations and lower average selling prices.

In its report, Morgan Stanley focuses on Apple, which it considers “the top choice among global PC original equipment manufacturers. Apple had the most significant price target increase of 15 percent, followed by Dell with an 11 percent increase. Morgan Stanley sees Asus and Acer dropping 40 percent and 43 percent, respectively.

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Here is a description of game performance from Apple’s Mac Mini official website: “The amazing graphics processing performance of M2 or M2 Pro allows you to play graphics-intensive 3A game masterpieces such as “Pascal’s Contract” and enjoy smoothness. High frame rate and high fidelity picture.”

In the review, foreign technology media MacWorld bought a new Mac Mini with an M2 Pro chip, 16GB of memory, and a 1TB SSD for $1,800, which can indeed handle most AAA games.

M2 Pro

Windows PC

With Prioritize Graphics mode preset to 1080P resolution, the frame rate of the tested games ranged from 70-120fps. With MetalFX Upscaling on in Quality mode, performance can be increased by about 30%. You can even crank it up to 4K and output at 40-60fps in Prioritize Graphics mode.

That said, Apple Mac gaming performance is fine, but there’s no advantage for Windows PCs at the same price point, and the number of games available for the platform is still very small.

Tim Millet, Apple’s chip designer, also admitted that there are gaps in the Apple Silicon chip for gaming. He said Apple will not use the tagline “Mac is a great gaming platform” in its communications, but Apple will continue to improve Apple Silicon’s gaming performance in the future.

Valve recently released its Steam hardware and software survey for January 2023. In terms of operating systems, the percentage of Linux players has not changed, while the number of macOS players has increased by 0.13 percentage points compared to the previous month, with a current share of 2.61%.

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If the situation is true, then nearly 20,000 of the 2023 MacBook Pro models are hard to escape the problem of being slowed down by SSDs, and similar situations have occurred before.

Previously, a number of external media tests found that the 256GB storage space version of the 2022 MacBook Pro was significantly lower than the equivalent model of the previous generation in terms of SSD read/write speeds.

The latest exposure and the previous appearance of the situation is speculated to be the same reason, Apple is only equipped with a NAND flash chip, while the previous model has two NAND chips, which may be the reason for the speed difference.

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Both devices are available for order in the Apple Store app in 27 countries, including the United States, on January 17 and will begin arriving to customers on January 24 and will be available at Apple Retail Stores and Apple Authorized Resellers.

In addition, the new Mac mini and MacBook Pro will be available to customers in China, Hong Kong, Macau, Australia, Japan, and New Zealand starting February 3.

The M2-powered Mac mini will start at RMB 4,499 and the education discount will start at RMB 3,699, while the M2 Pro-powered Mac mini will start at RMB 9,999 and the education discount will start at RMB 9,199.

The new 14-inch MacBook Pro with M2 Pro starts at $15,999 with an Education Discount starting at RMB 14,799, and the new 16-inch MacBook Pro with M2 Pro starts at RMB 19,999 with an Education Discount starting at RMB 18,399.

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A teardown of the new Mac mini shared by YouTube channel Brandon Geekabit shows that the M2 chip version of the 256GB model comes with just one 256GB storage chip, while on the M1 chip version, there are two 128GB storage chips. This difference explains why the newer models have slower SSDs, as multiple NAND chips allow for faster speeds.

“We have confirmed through the Blackmagic Disk Speed Test benchmarking application that the SSD read and write speeds for the new 256GB Mac mini are each approximately 1500 MB/s, which is 30 to 50 percent slower than the read and write speeds of its equivalent predecessor, although benchmarking results and actual performance may vary. “

Users seeking the fastest SSD speeds should be sure to configure the M2 Mac mini with at least 512GB of storage to avoid this issue, the slower SSDs can affect file transfer speeds and overall performance slightly, as Macs temporarily use SSD space as virtual memory when physical memory is fully used.

As for the high-end Mac mini with the M2 Pro chip, the base model with 512GB of storage appears to have two fewer NAND chips than the previous Intel-based model, according to a teardown shared by Brian Stucki of MacStadium.

The 13-inch MacBook Pro and MacBook Air models with the M2 chip and 256GB of storage also have slower SSDs due to their single NAND chip, so apparently, Apple hasn’t decided to change the course of the new Mac mini.

In a statement shared with The Verge last year, Apple claimed that M2-based Macs have “faster” performance in real-world activities, but it’s not clear whether the statement was referring to SSD performance or overall system performance: “Thanks to the improved performance of M2, the MacBook Pro and MacBook Air models have been able to deliver the same performance.

“Thanks to the M2 performance boost, the new MacBook Air and MacBook Pro 13-inch are incredibly fast, even when compared to Mac laptops with the powerful M1 chip. These new systems use new, higher-density NAND to deliver 256GB of storage using a single chip. While the 256GB SSD benchmark may be different compared to the previous generation, these M2-based systems perform even faster in real-world activities.”

Also according to 9to5Mac, the new 2023 MacBook Pro also has slower SSD speeds when configured with 512GB of storage due to fewer NAND chips.

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Geekbench running scores show that the Mac mini with M2 Pro and 16GB of unified memory has a single-core score of 1952 and a multi-core score of 15013. This is also the first Geekbench score for Apple’s M2 Pro chip.

For comparison, the previous M1 Mac mini has a single-core score of 1651 and a multi-core score of 5181 (the Apple M1 single-core score is about 1700 points, and the multi-core score is about 7000 points). The M1 Pro in the previous-generation 14- and 16-inch MacBook Pros scored 1734 single-core and 10076 multi-core.

Additionally, the M1 Max scored 1727 in single-core and 12643 in multi-core. This also means that the M2 Pro surpassed the M1 Max in terms of Geekbench running scores.

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According to the latest news from analyst Ming-Chi Kuo, the specifications for Apple’s 2024 MacBook Pro have also been revealed, and it will come with the 3nm M3 Pro and M3 Max chips.

According to Ming-Chi Kuo, the next new MacBook Pro is expected to enter mass production in the first half of 2024 with M3 Pro and M3 Max chips, manufactured using a 3nm process (TSMC N3P or N3S).

TSMC is expected to start mass production of its next-generation 3nm chips in late December, so the M3 Pro and M3 Max will indeed have to wait until 2024 according to the timing.

In addition, Ming-Chi Kuo said that the new Mac mini in 2024 will maintain a similar exterior design to the current version, so it seems that the previously announced glass-topped Mac mini may not be available in the short term.

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Powered by the M2 and M2 Pro chips, the new Mac mini is more powerful and more useful than ever, and it’s priced from $4499. For the first time, the new M2 Pro brings professional-grade performance to Mac mini. With M2 and M2 Pro, Mac mini delivers faster performance, more unified memory and advanced connectivity, with support for up to two simultaneous displays on M2 models and up to three simultaneous displays on M2 Pro models.

The M2 and M2 Pro chips bring a new generation of faster CPUs and graphics, more memory bandwidth and a more powerful media engine to Mac mini than the chips in the previous generation of Mac mini, enabling superior performance and industry-leading power efficiency. Both Mac mini models feature advanced cooling systems for consistently high-performance output.

Mac mini with M2

With up to 24GB of unified memory and 100GB/s of memory bandwidth, tasks such as editing images in Adobe Photoshop are up to 50 percent faster than the previous generation of Mac mini. The M2 also brings ProRes acceleration to Mac mini, making tasks like Final Cut Pro video editing up to twice as fast, and the M2 models support up to two simultaneous 8K ProRes 422 video streams at 30 fps or up to 12 simultaneous 4K ProRes 422 video streams at 30 fps. Apple says Mac mini delivers up to five times better overall performance than the best-selling Windows desktop computer, making it a great value for first-time buyers, upgrades and customers switching from another PC to a Mac.

Compared to the Mac mini with Intel Core i7, the Mac mini with M2 delivers the following performance.

• Up to 22x faster performance for machine learning (ML) image optimization enlargements with Pixelmator Pro.
• Up to 9.8x faster rendering of complex timelines with Final Cut Pro.

Compared to the previous generation of Mac mini with M1, Mac mini with M2 delivers the following performance.

• Up to 2.4x faster ProRes transcoding with Final Cut Pro.
• Up to 50 percent faster filter and feature performance in Adobe Photoshop.

Mac mini with M2 Pro.

The M2 Pro brings professional-grade performance to Mac mini for the first time, starting at $9,999. The M2 Pro features up to 10 core CPUs (including six high-performance cores and four power-efficient cores) and 19 core graphics and doubles the memory bandwidth of the M2 to 200GB/s with support for up to 32GB of memory. The new generation neural network engine is 40% faster than the M1, accelerating machine learning tasks such as video parsing and image processing. This is a significant increase in video playback and encoding speed while maintaining extremely low power consumption. The M2 Pro model is up to 14 times faster than the Mac mini with the most powerful Intel chip.

Compared to a 27-inch iMac with an Intel Core i7 chip and Radeon Pro 5500 XT graphics, Mac mini with M2 Pro delivers the following performance.

• Up to 50 percent faster filter and feature performance in Adobe Photoshop.
• Stitch panoramic photos up to 5.5 times faster with Adobe Lightroom Classic.
• Up to 4.4x faster object tracking with Final Cut Pro.

Compared to the previous generation of Mac mini with M1, Mac mini with M2 Pro delivers the following performance.

• Affinity Photo graphics performance is up to 2.5x faster.
• Up to 4.2x faster ProRes transcoding with Final Cut Pro.
• Apple says gaming performance is up to 15 times faster than Mac mini with the most powerful Intel chips.

The M2 Pro model comes with four Thunderbolt ports and supports up to three simultaneous displays. In addition, the M2 Pro model supports one 8K display, a first for Mac mini. Both models feature two USB-A ports, an HDMI port, a Gigabit Ethernet port (with an optional 10Gb Ethernet port), and an upgraded headphone jack that supports high-impedance headphones. For wireless connectivity, both models support the latest standard of high-speed Wi-Fi 6E (not yet supported in mainland China), with up to 2x faster speeds than its predecessor, and Bluetooth 5.3.

The M2 model is equipped with 2 Thunderbolt 4 ports and supports simultaneous connection of up to 2 monitors

M2 model with 2 Thunderbolt 4 ports and support for up to 2 simultaneous monitors

Apple says Mac mini is designed to minimize its environmental impact, including the use of 100 percent recycled materials: aluminum in the enclosure, rare earth elements in all magnets, tin in the motherboard solder, and gold in several printed circuit board plating layers. 35 percent more recycled plastic is used in several components than in previous models. mac mini meets Apple’s high standards for energy efficiency and is free of many harmful substances. 97 percent of packaging materials are fiber-based, bringing Apple closer to its goal of completely removing plastic from packaging by the end of 2025.

The post Apple’s 2023 Mac mini release: M2 and M2 Pro chips on board, starting at RMB 4,499 appeared first on TechGoing.

Apple’s latest 2023 Mac mini, with its M2 and M2 Pro chips, has the same design as the previous M1 and Intel models, with no major external design updates. The changes are all internal, with a faster M Series chip.

“The new M2 Pro brings professional-grade performance to Mac mini for the first time, allowing users to run performance-critical workflows in such a compact design that was previously unimaginable. Mac mini with M2 and M2 Pro delivers faster performance, more unified memory and advanced connectivity with up to two displays connected simultaneously on M2 models and up to three displays connected simultaneously on M2 Pro models. Combined with Studio Display and the Magic Control accessory, and the powerful and easy-to-use macOS Ventura, the Mac mini gives users an extraordinary desktop experience that is both more efficient and more creative. The new Mac mini is available for order beginning January 19 and will be available for purchase on Friday, February 3.

Rumors in 2021 and 2022 that Apple’s new Mac mini would have a plexiglass top and other refreshed looks did not materialize.

Apple is also introducing the Mac Studio in spring 2022, which is powered by Apple’s M1 Max and M1 Ultra chips, and will be updated to the M2 family of chips at some point.

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