No, not a new MacPro, unfortunately.
But admittedly, as I was playing with it in the shop, I realized just how much more powerful than my daily needs this machine is and what a terrible waste of money it would be.
So, I opted for a Mac Mini with 2.3 GHz Core i7 CPU (from ricardo.ch, but still shrink-wrapped). With a Crucial 480GB SSD and 16GB RAM, this is still a very powerful machine.
I still had the Apple Wireless Keyboad I bought a couple of years ago, I can still use my trusty Dell 24″ display (back from the time when there were no glare display…) etc.
iFixit gives the Mini a 8/10 score on repairability – it’s the only device Apple manufactures except for the aforementioned MacPro and the ancient and soon-to-be-discontinued non-retina MacBookPro that actually has user-servicable parts.
That and the fact that it’s still a fast machine, even compared to Apple’s 2013 lineup of 27″ iMacs, led me to go for it instead of an iMac (for which the latest models began showing up in the refurbished-store by the time I was ready to buy).
The SSD is more than 10 times faster than the hard disk in my iMac from 2008, it’s absolutely breath-taking – and with no mechanical parts except for the fan, the MacMini is absolutely, positively silent. There’s no telling if it’s on or not other than connecting the monitor (and the indicating lights on the unit).
It can drive a 30″ display, at 2560×1600, so once the prices of these babies come under pressure from the beginning 4K revolution, I’ll also get a larger display (and use the old one as a 2ndary display).
With a bit of tricking, it will apparently even drive a 4K display – at a meager 24Hz refresh rate, which would make it just fast enough to view a static image….
