Should Apple combine the Mac Mini and Apple TV to avoid ceding the living room to competitors?
Cult of Mac today addresses a fact that few have really gotten their heads around in the last 24 hours: Dell just released a stunning little living room computer with Blu-Ray, HDTV and mass-storage options, and it not only nails shut the current-gen Mac Mini’s coffin, but makes you wonder if Apple’s even capable of responding. Dell. Dell.
Craig Crannel outlines what needs to come out of Cupertino in response:
Rumors always abound regarding future Apple kit, with pie-in-the-sky wishes dashed by the brutal hand of reality upon an Expo or WWDC keynote. My wishes are rather simpler, though: a Mac mini that genuniely makes a play for the living room. Take a leaf out of Dell’s book, Apple, and bundle in that card reader, so people can more easily bung photos on their TV screen. Add that Blu-ray option for people who want to own media rather than rent downloads. And add HDMI video out by default, so people can connect their mini to a new TV without faffing about with additional leads.
Can Apple and the Mac mini learn from Dell’s Studio Hybrid? [CoM]
Faffing!
Seriously. Dell.
For Reals!
It surely is pretty. But how well built it is? I mean… Dell?
Under that purty skin, you’re still on a Windows box. If that’s your thing, great. If not, this won’t change any minds.
I get your point, Nap — OSX is king — but the minds that “won’t be changed” are few. Changing minds is Apple’s burden.
Let’s hope it works better than their last version of this…called the WebPC…I owned one and it was the worst computer I’ve ever had…and that’s saying something.
I’ve been saying for some time that the Mini and AppleTV should have a baby…but I also think before this thing gets any traction Apple will have an answer to it that they’ve been working on for a few years.
BTW…it isn’t enough to put a computer in the living room…it has to be easy to manage and operate.
I like the size, but not so much the design. But I’ll probably get one anyways, if I can find a decent Dell coupon. I’m currently running a homebuilt HTPC. It’s kick ass, but not very energy efficient, and not very quiet either.
I’m not sure this merits quite so much fuss, Rob. It’s a nice little package, but the differences between the Studio and a Mac mini boil down to HDMI out, a card-reader and optional Blu-ray. Not exactly game-changing, is it?
While that $499 base price looks pretty inviting, it’s a little misleading: it only ships with Vista, so another $50 to bring it up to 2GB is virtually mandatory, and if you like your networking wireless, that’ll be another $70. Throw in the Blu-ray drive for $250 and you’re up to $869. I can’t see Apple having much trouble maintaining their usual massive margin on a base Mac mini with Blu-ray drive at a price not much higher than that.
Craig Grannell always writes decent stuff, even when I don’t agree with him – I like his blog thingy here:
http://reverttosaved.com/
Though in this case the only reason I would be interested in a beefed up mac mini, is to get an updated version of Xbox Media Centre (now it’s been ported to the mac). My modded Xbox has made the best TV box I’ve ever owned. The fact a £20 second hand machine and an hours work can out perform a £200 AppleTV is ridiculous, so It seems in the future I’ll be going with the most open platform I can. And I doubt that will be a mac.
Disclaimer: He posts on the same forum I do. So I vaguely know him, in that weird 21st century way.
That Dell thinger doesn’t have an HDTV tuner. You have to buy a USB add-on for TV tuning awesomeness. Those things suck.
I’d couple it with an HD Home Run.
I know it’s all trendy to hate on Windows, but Windows Media Center is one of the nicer bits of software around for HTPC use. XBMC was nice as well, but doesn’t do TV.
I don’t have Microsoft software on any of my Dell machines, and they work fine; why are people insisting this is a windows machine?
Mythbuntu will probably run just fine on it.
–Charlie
Oh my God! How can Apple possibly compete? This is the perfect companion to Dell’s music and video download service! Apple and their little iTunes store are going to get steamrolled by the Dell media juggernaut!
What? Dell don’t have a download service? Uhm…
Apple will be washed away by the tidal wave of Dell switchers, eager to connect with devices that will at long last give them HDTV on their TVs via a computer! Why must Apple deprive us so? Give us our media and let us display it on our TVs using an intuitive interface, dammit!
@#11: Dell are insisting it’s a Windows machine in that your only OS choices are various flavors of Vista.
In any case, I wouldn’t say Linux was ideal for Blu-ray playback just yet, although things may have changed while I wasn’t looking.
@Tubman: Sadly, that’s where Dell gets you. Bait and switch. They can and will sell a lot of these because they’re green-friendly, but I don’t think Apple is gonna have a much of a problem competing.
quiet and small are really at odds with each other, if you want quiet, get a case that’s big enough to use low rpm 120mm fans and can be filled with enough metal to dissipate the heat properly.
it not only nails shut the current-gen Mac Mini’s coffin, but makes you wonder if Apple’s even capable of responding.
Rob, Rob, Rob… look, I know that every tech blogger must now and again be sorely tempted to FUD, but come on. The frakkin’ thing doesn’t come with wifi. What millenium is this, again?
It doesn’t come with anything unless you pay extra for it. I couldn’t configure a decent setup for less than about $900.
But it does come with 802.11n, even if you do have to pay $75 for it.
Unanswered questions: fan noise & heat, how the integrated graphics handle HD on the fly, hackability (larger 2.5″ hard drives, as they come), and whether or not it’s actually built right.
The bamboo one minus the ugly aluminium base would be alright, it looks like it might just be a stand it sites on top of, so that might be ok.
I haven’t seen any screens of the interface, which is where this could be completely screwed up, IMHO.
Can someone correct me about this, but I was under the impression that you couldn’t actually play Blu-Ray movies in OSX, so the lack of a BD drive on the Mini really isn’t the problem there. Perhaps this has been changed with a recent update?
I think the point here is that Dell is out innovating Apple. Apple has historically been a leader in innovation among the bigger companies(Ipod, Iphone, OSX, etc) and Dell well… Dell is best known for rebaging other peoples stuff.
Sure maybe it does cost $900 to get a decent setup but if you want Blueray, etc you are going to have to pay for it, the drives just aren’t that cheap.
Either way it does appear to have almost all the bits to be a killer machine (the only thing missing was the HD TV tuner as pointed out by a previous poster) and it’s basically better than the Mac mini, the AppleTV or both the products combined. Considering Apple is the one talking about becoming the centre of peoples digitals homes then the fact that they don’t have a competitor to this seems like a huge gaff, infact they should have had one with the Apply TV.
Unless you can crack these open and upgrade them yourself, these won’t go far with serious computer users… they’re only offered with crappy integrated Intel graphics.
What – no eSata? Every other port you don’t need is there.
When Dell builds an mini-size expandable hard drive enclosure that accepts hot swap 2.5″ notebook drives for $100 (sans drives), then they might be innovating.
Bamboo is cool, though. Can I get a slide rule graphic on the side?
Seriously, does no one see that Apple sells high-definition movies and television in the iTunes Store? Why would they want to let you get your media elsewhere? Yes, I understand they are not as high-quality as Blu-Ray or OTA (or as free as OTA—after the hardware investment) but could it be that this is not designed for you? Just as it is not for designed for people who want to play Crysis on it or for people who think Ubuntu is a superior desktop operating system.
I’m also not sure how anyone can make a statement like “Apple is not the center of people’s digital homes”. Can you download and watch music, high-definition movies and TV shows? Yes, yes, yes. Can you stream all three from your Mac? Again, yes. What is missing?
You are effectively whining that Apple does not cater specifically to the hardcore users, but when have they ever done that?
The Studio Hybrid is a very cool looking machine; I’d pick up the bamboo right this moment ONLY if they came with something better than the X3100.
Seriously, if Apple can cram the 8800GS into their iMac form factors; it should be possible to cram something better into these machines.
You could get a 40gig playstation 3 for less. Plenty of playback capability for various data, blu-ray, web browsing, downloadable content, and increasing flexibility with every system update.
Funny… My computer (a desktop PC) is already in my living room. It already serves as my TV, stereo, etc. Does them all quite well, in addition to still being a good computer.
I think people are overselling the apple comparison a bit too much here. To Dell, this Studio Hybrid is just a laptop PC in a mini power saving desktop form. It’s limited to the exact specs of their new line of Studio laptops.
Just as people are willing to pay more for a hybrid car that saves on gas, Dell is hoping you willing to pay more for a hybrid PC that save on electricity by using lower powered mobile technology.
You can save money and/or get a better Dell, by going for the traditional desktop form and still have all the save features offered by this new mini design.
The top CPU processor on a Studio Hybrid is the mobile Intel Core 2 Duo at 2.6 GHz and 800 MHz front side bus. For the same money, you can get a traditional Dell desktop Intel Core 2 Quad at 2.6 GHz and 1600 MHz front side bus.
With that HDMI out, and the low wattage on standby, this is a perfect living room iTunes server to plunk down next to your HDMI capable receiver. Of course you’d also need an external MyBook next to it — so hopefully Dell will come out with matching external hard drives to complete the look.