Should The Mac Mini Return After Yosemite?

Apple’s Mac Mini has not been revamped since 2012 and some rumors suggest that it may have been discontinued altogether, but the compact machine carved out a unique segment of the market that could easily be expanded with a few tweaks.

Loyal users are still holding out hope as earlier this year a Belgian computer store listed a 2014 model of the Mini along with the rest of Apple’s upcoming line of products. While this may just have been an error or wishful thinking, it does demonstrate that there’s a demand.

Retailers still sell the current generation on a regular basis, and with the top end quad core Intel i7 variant, there’s no doubt that it can still get the job done. However at the rate of processor innovation, it won’t be too long before the Mini fades in to obscurity.

Of course the pending release of the new OS X Yosemite will be highlighted by the big boys like the MacBook Pro, but it would also be an opportune time to upgrade that hardware and give the Mac Mini another shot.

Why The Mac Mini Mattered

Ok so it was never the leader of the pack in terms or hardware or popularity, but the Mini was portable, looked delicious and was versatile. Not only was it the perfect replacement for those bulky windows based PCs – and was successfully marketed as such – but it also functioned as a multi-purpose home theatre system, and looked the part while doing so.

Students and busy office folk loved them because you could easily take them anywhere and hook them up to everything.

That market has not simply disappeared and can easily be reached again with the right campaign.

Potential

Because there’s been no official announced for a 2014 Mac Mini, obviously there are no real specifications to discuss, but there’s a lot of room to talk about potential.

There’s no need for a complete redesign, the concept itself is solid. However if a new model was to be released it would presumably get even more compact. Take the CD/DVD drive for example, at this stage in the game is really needed?

The most obvious upgrade would be to the processor, and this is where things get interesting. Integrated graphics has always been the Mini’s thing, and the Intel Haswell has taken things to a level where gaming now becomes an option. With the home theatre segment checked off, who’s to say the Mac Mini couldn’t morph itself in to a portable entry level gaming system?

What do you think, should Apple upgrade the Mac Mini? Or is it dead in the water?