Being curious, I went to store.apple.com, and configured a Mac Mini with an i7, 32GB RAM and a 1TB SSD. $2499. Then I went to silentpc.com, and configured their smallest “quiet” PC, the so-called SFF PC, with the same specs. $1551. $1451 if you will take Ubuntu instead of Windows.
1 Like
IMHO, only people who are already in the Apple eco-system should consider buying a Mini for part of their audio chain, or really for anything.
I is is easy to make the smallest Mac Mini look cheap when you compare its price to the most expensive i7 in a fan less case NUC you can find. Instead of the comparable it to a i7 Mac Mini.
Who is you trying to cheat into believing that it is actually cheaper 
I did answer the is the i3 powerful enough question.
Playing with the Mac mini confiscator you real quick get into Nucleus territory.
If they keep getting confiscated, that may be the only option. 
4 Likes
It’s a good looking machine with a premium, but also with thunderbolt 3 that most competitors lack (and that is a big plus for many professionals).
I wouldn’t get it for audio purposes unless you want it to look pretty somewhere — and then you probably should get the Nucleus anyway.
If it had been released in 2016 I would probably have bought it as some kind of media point. Now the world has moved on and this is a nice machine for people using it for work.
(And yeah, definitely powerful enough for DSD512)
1 Like
I like how everyone assumes I have not thoroughly researched this. 
I currently have both a Haswell dual core i5 NUC and an old Mac Mini which was handed down to me from my father when he bought an iMac, the Mac Mini was simply way quieter. I know the Mac Mini is not fanless but in my experience the fans in the Mac Mini is better than the ones in the NUC. That is why if I was going with the NUC I would only do so to make it fanless using a custom enclosure and not use the standard prebuilt NUC. The new Mac Mini seems to have an improved cooling system with better CPU choices (more physical cores even in the base model rather than hyper threading, which also in my experience with Roon is preferred, as i have tried to run Roon on a dual core i5 Surface Book and performance leaves a lot to be desired even compared to my older desktop which has a slower core clock speed but more physical cores) which makes it an interesting candidate.
The Mini is certainly better looking than the NUC, and cheaper, according to PCWorld.
Playing with the Mac mini confiscator you real quick get into Nucleus territory.
No the i3 Nucleus starts at 1300 with no storage, the i7 version is well over 2000. I don’t know what world you live in where the baseline $799 i3 Mac Mini already with more cores, more RAM and more storage is in Nucleus territory. As I already have a life time Roon license so unless the Nucleus can rebate me on the license the baseline Mac Mini is objectively the cheaper buy, by a LONG shot.
The amount of unfounded Apple hate in this thread is actually kind of astonishing, and I’m a Windows/PC guy.
Everyone loves to bash the one on the top. Apple makes well though through products with great quality and high user satisfaction. Apperantly that leaves some a bit frustrated.
And after seeing the link posted by @Bill_Janssen I’m starting to think the Mac mini could be an attractive option for Roon Server. A bit depending on if you think the fan has any impact on sound reproduction. And if MacOS has a similar performance as ROCK.
All I know now is that my Mac Mini “sounds” good, but I have yet to challange it. And I will do so sometime in the coming 6 months.
new mini is nice, but with i7 is stupid expensive, at least here in europe
Most people, myself included, that are comparing Mini to a PC aren’t referring to a Roon Nucleus, but rather to an Intel NUC. There’s a difference and the bang for buck is always with the NUC.
1 Like
They are pretty much all the same under the skin! Since Macs became Intel based they have been identical in all but packaging and branding. And as Roon is platform agnostic there are no benefits of running Roon on one platform over another. So you pay your money and make your choice.
I see no one bashing Apple, only pointing out that it is not the best option cost wise (performance per $) if you are only using it as a Roon Core.
I agree that the new Mac mini will look nice next to the hifi, but it is neither the cheapest or most silent choice for a Roon Core.
Personally I prefer to treat the RoonCore as just a server that is put out of sight and in another room. So I do not care how it looks only the performance and price.
1 Like
2012 i7 Mac Minis are currently less than $500 on EBay. Mine serves 2X DSD without a hitch and if there’s a fan in it you couldn’t prove it by me as I’ve never heard it.
2 Likes
I see no one bashing Apple, only pointing out that it is not the best option cost wise (performance per $) if you are only using it as a Roon Core.
Saying that a Mac Mini will quickly go to Nucleus territory qualifies as unfounded Apple bashing (and yes, that was you, awfully cheeky now that you try to backtrack on it). As I’ve countered with facts - the new Mac Mini is nowhere close to Nucleus territory while offering better spec, while the Nucleus’s main advantage is that it comes in a nice customised fanless enclosure and a life time Roon license. And as I’ve said time and again, my personal experience is that the Mac Mini has a better fan than a standard Intel NUC. I value silence/near silence operation and I’m willing to pay a little more for that, and I don’t need people to keep yelling at the top of their lungs that Mac’s are not “best bang for buck” - as I’ve already made it plenty clear that is NOT what I’m looking for, if I need bang for buck I’ll just bash together another server from left over parts and it will cost me zero dollars. So maybe people can actually read the post and requirements before jumping the shark.
No one is yelling. All CAPS would be yelling.
That;s not the meaning of ‘jumping the shark’.
This was your OP -
The posts about NUCs are just answering that original musing.
Really, why the unnecessary outrage?
1 Like
That’s my experience, too. And, you should know fans! However, this new Mini seems to be designed for a different crowd. The old one we’re familiar with was a low-cost entry to OS X, and for applications like media servers. The new one is aimed at Mac Pro territory. So I’m wondering if different choices were made about fan noise, that’s all. We’ll find out in a few weeks, I’m sure.
I don’t think that the 2018 Mac Mini is encroaching that much on “Mac Pro” territory but there are some applications where I think the machine can replace what a Mac Pro used to do, especially an older one. I’ve been waiting for this machine to replace my ancient 2008 Mac Pro which current works as a file, Plex, Roon Core and HQ Player server. The 8 core Xeon machine is pretty stout but I’m pretty sure that a modern 6 core machine with consumer desktop parts can easily crush it. And with Thunderbolt 3, I can finally run my Drobo 5D3 external storage array at full speed instead of relying on USB 3.0 (using an expansion card on the old Mac Pro).
Thanks to @jacobacci, for this review of the new i3 NUC. According to this, the 8th gen is quieter (new larger fan design), power somewhere between last year’s i5 and i7, and has a total cost of less than $500. Actual decibel measurements on sound, too.
I am not backtracking from my earlier comments about the price and performance per $.
I did answer your question about i3 Mac Mini performance. So maybe we should just leave it there.
You do not have to thank me.