This means you could hide it behind a monitor or TV and pretty much forget that it was there. It also remained completely silent as we worked. We were seriously impressed with the performance we were seeing with such a small – and affordable – device.

So, we fired up Final Cut Pro and editing some 8K video footage, and the Mac mini handled it incredibly well. Combining both a CPU and GPU, it handles complex tasks, including graphical ones such as 3D rendering and video editing, with ease. Mac mini (M1, 2020) review: Power and performanceĪs we’ve mentioned in our reviews of the new MacBook Air (M1, 2020) and MacBook Pro 13-inch (M1, 2020), we’ve been incredibly impressed with the performance of Apple’s M1 chip.

While this won’t be a concern for a lot of people, if you like the idea of upgrading your PC yourself after a while to keep it performing well, the new Mac mini isn’t for you. However, we should note that because of the new M1 chip, RAM is limited to 16GB, and there’s no way to open up the device to add a larger hard drive (or more RAM). With the Mac mini, you can just plug it in and use it straight away. This is an additional cost, and is added complexity. Meanwhile, compact PCs like the Intel NUC series are slightly cheaper, but they are barebones systems, which means you need to buy and install hard drives and RAM (plus an operating system) as well. You can also get a pre-configured model with 8GB of RAM and 512GB storage (and the same M1 chip) for £899, and you can configure the Mac mini to offer up to 16GB of RAM and 2TB of storage.

External drive for mac mini m1