Speaking from 30+ years of experience, I can tell you that the NUMBER ONE RULE IN MANUFACTURING IS THAT 'VARIATION KILLS QUALITY'. Hence, its a GOOD THING that the case for the Mini has not changed in 10+ years. Also, using the same materials for multiple platforms (aka: products) saves money due to economies of scale. Yeah, its kind of boring, but lets just roll with it :)
"If it ain't broke, why fix it?" as they say, apparently! Seriously, it's become a design classic, and what about it needs redesigning? It is easily adequate enough for the current chipset, so until the chips require more cooling that could be practicably done in the current case, i doubt it will change. Would be nice for a Space Grey, or Midnight version, though.
YOU Have no idea how much I love tech and you’re the person that I enjoy one of the most and I have to say thank you for posting videos like this and I love your background
Thank you, Luke! I'm looking forward to more coverage on the M2 Pro and M2 Max devices! I really appreciate you opening up the devices and revealing (and explaining) what we're paying for!
Luke, there is a benefit to anodising a heat sink Black even when it can’t be seen. It improves its efficiency. I found this out when specifying a heat sink for a work project.
This M2 Pro Mac Mini ticked all but one of the checkmarks on my wish list. HDMI 2.1, Check! 512Gb storage, Check! 16Gb Ram, Check! The higher powered headphone jack, Check! Space Grey color option to differentiate it from the regular Mac Mini, No Check! $1,300 dollar U.S. base price, Check! 5 out of 6 items I had on my wish list ain't bad! I look forward to getting mine soon!
Thank you, Luke. This looks like solid engineering - I'm less concerned about thermals after seeing the heat sink cover and channel. One question, has Apple made any changes to the Bluetooth antenna? There were some reports of Bluetooth dropouts in earlier Mini designs, perhaps this has been improved along with the BT 5.3 update.
I was thinking the same thing, but the Studio does outperform the Mini, especially when comparing (almost) apples to apples specs. The Studio can also be purchased at Costco for $1699, making it one hell of a bargain.
I guess it really depends on your priorities, slower read right speeds, slightly faster CPU depending on the use case. I would be tempted to look at a refurbished model from the last generation personally if I was in the market
After researching my options, I bought the M2 pro mac mini with 32gb ram as a work from home design machine and its handled everything I've thrown at it so far. I wonder now if I needed the performance for my use casse but at least it should be future proofed! Great little silver box, has flawlessly replaced my 2008(!) Mac(Hack)Pro I was running, even though I can't run 5 hard disks on it as cleanly haha
Thanks luke, interesting to see the evolution of the components here, Apples industrial design has become very static. A bit more light on these dark components for the disassembly would be helpful for the video.
Nice video I really wanted to see the arrangement of the NAND, my only outstanding question is how many NAND chips the 1TB config has (eg. 4No. 256GB or 2No. 512GB)
This week I needed a new Mac after 8 years using my 2015 Macbook pro. I saw this was in my budget and only few months old, I just bought it. Now that I'm seeing this video and other reviews, I'm very happy with it. AND this thing is flying compared to my 8 year old MBP. That was the top end 15" MBP at the time and it still works fine for internet and video usage. I can still sell it for around $500. M2 pro Mini can play games even. I was playing Civ 6 ultra maxed out settings, the fan didn't even speed up. CPU temp was in the 60s. When I was recording the game fan and temp was the same. When I was exporting the recording from ScreenFlow, CPU went up to 80C but fan still stayed at 1700. When I sped up the fan manually to 3000, it cooled the CPU down to 65, that's a drop of 15C! This is a beast and should work for anyone who think they might need Mac Studio but thinks it might be overkill. That was where I was, thought I needed a Studio.
actually curious about your thoughts about a max mac mini (full cores, 32GBRAM) vs a base Mac Studio (binned m1max with 32GBram) For video editing, which would you say is the better one. They are prices almost exactly the same, as you said.
I just love how beautiful Apple devices are even on the inside - something most people will never see. Knowing my devices are so well made makes them feel that much more special.
To replace my 2012 (!) quad core Mini, I ordered an M2 Mini with 16GB RAM and a 512GB SSD...the took another look at the base M2 Pro and decided that was really the sweet spot for value and performance. Purchased that one in-store on launch day and couldn't be happier. Outstanding machine and outstanding value.
You said that the speed of the 16gb is due to the two nand chip. Has this been confirmed or are you comparing the speed of the m2 8gb of another product?
If i order 2TB, will that mean 8 chips of 256GB, or will they just use 4 chips of 512GB. The read write speeds would be way faster for 2TB if that meant 8 256GB. What have you heard? Can you test or link to a test that compares SSD speed for 2TB vs 4TB vs 8TB? Most Detailed review of motherboard yet of Mac Mini M2 Pro. Thanks!
it looks like for the 512GB model, there is only one NAND chip as well (according to a you tube video by elevated systems. so for 2TB, they may only populate one side of the Motherboard with 4 512GB nand, and for 4TB they may either choose 4 1TB chips to only populate one side of mother board, unless price of nand cost more than price to place more chips. so i guess only the 8TB model has all 8 spots filled. i wonder what the performance is 8tb vs 4tb, that would answer if any difference, is there a test out there for that?
@@dackel4253 maybe to further clarify this a bit. You want a cooler/heatsink to absorb and radiate heat as that is its intended purpose :). Hence, white would not be as efficient, because as you say, it is less efficient in absorbing heat/energy.
The extra cables connect to power supply should be PS_ON, Power good signal and/or some remote. The big connection clearly is just ground and power so they need these signal have other route.
So, there is something curious. I just bought an m1 pro macbook pro 14, base model. I ran black magic disk and my read and write were consistent between 4,5 and 5GB/s (it ran for about 1 minute). So if your m2 pro mac mini get only 3 GB/s it means it is way slower than first generation. Could you make a comparisson between base 14 m1 and m2? I would be really interested to see if the results will show a slower, faster or equal speed for the SSD (and also some other real world tasks like reandering video speed, copy 40-50 GB folders, exporting big photos, opening big apps like davinci resolve...and so on)
L2 cache for M2 Pro is 36 MB & L2 Cache for M1 Max is 24 MB which gives an upper hand in GPU performances when It comes to 3D applications for M2 Pro. M1 Max has an advantage of expanding upto 64GB of RAM while M2 Pro is capped to 32 GB of RAM .If I have to, I probably might go with M2 Pro for my use case scenario.! Awesome video , Great tear down , Thanks 🙏🕊 I had a great time watching this video :)
I'm super happy to see that it has dual NAND chips, I saw on another channel that the regular M2 only had 1 and was HALF the speed that you got. I still want a desktop Mac and the M2Pro mini will probably be it unless the Mac Studio stays at the same price for the M2... which I doubt.
Heck there is so much space inside that little computing device that I can let my pet mouse Mr Jingles take naps in there,and yes I am 142 years old now by golly!
Great video!!!! Are you using an iMac as a monitor with this machine? What model of external monitor would you recommend purchasing wihtout beaking the bank? All the best
That was great. Loved the quick teardown. I completely agree on this being a game changer. Particularly the base model. The additional cost from a similarly configured M2 w/ 512 GB SSD and 16 GBs of Ram is only $300 for 50% more Performance CPUs and 60% more GPUs as well as 2 more Thunderbolt 4 ports and a better cooling system. What is really game changing though, is for almost anybody, this is all you need to run even high end professional software. You can add additional storage if you need it, but you really want 512GBs on your boot drive. 8 GBs works for memory, but heavy workloads will cause swapping - 16 GBs, however, given MacOS memory management, really is all you need for almost all tasks. This machine is right in the sweet spot (unless you need portability).
Speaking from 30+ years of experience, I can tell you that the NUMBER ONE RULE IN MANUFACTURING IS THAT 'VARIATION KILLS QUALITY'. Hence, its a GOOD THING that the case for the Mini has not changed in 10+ years. Also, using the same materials for multiple platforms (aka: products) saves money due to economies of scale. Yeah, its kind of boring, but lets just roll with it :)
"If it ain't broke, why fix it?" as they say, apparently!
Seriously, it's become a design classic, and what about it needs redesigning? It is easily adequate enough for the current chipset, so until the chips require more cooling that could be practicably done in the current case, i doubt it will change.
Would be nice for a Space Grey, or Midnight version, though.
Let’s not and say we did. 10+ years is a little ridiculous. Imagine iPhones still looking like iPhone 3G in 2023.
@@IAMLXGEND well yeah but now iPhones cost well over $1,000 up from $500.
And it keeps the server farm mini buyers happy, too.
@@cjc363636 true! I wonder how many of the world's Mac minis are currently rack mounted
YOU Have no idea how much I love tech and you’re the person that I enjoy one of the most and I have to say thank you for posting videos like this and I love your background
Thank you, Luke! I'm looking forward to more coverage on the M2 Pro and M2 Max devices! I really appreciate you opening up the devices and revealing (and explaining) what we're paying for!
7:20 black colour actually radiates a little more heat than pure aluminum
Luke, there is a benefit to anodising a heat sink Black even when it can’t be seen. It improves its efficiency. I found this out when specifying a heat sink for a work project.
This M2 Pro Mac Mini ticked all but one of the checkmarks on my wish list. HDMI 2.1, Check! 512Gb storage, Check! 16Gb Ram, Check! The higher powered headphone jack, Check! Space Grey color option to differentiate it from the regular Mac Mini, No Check! $1,300 dollar U.S. base price, Check!
5 out of 6 items I had on my wish list ain't bad!
I look forward to getting mine soon!
Wonder if case can be swapped with 2018 - been asking for over a year - no-one cares lol
@@colindoyle9876 oh lol that idea had been in my head since the m1 mini came out
I love that you’re still doing this. Thanks for showing us how it all works.
Thank you, Luke. This looks like solid engineering - I'm less concerned about thermals after seeing the heat sink cover and channel. One question, has Apple made any changes to the Bluetooth antenna? There were some reports of Bluetooth dropouts in earlier Mini designs, perhaps this has been improved along with the BT 5.3 update.
i can speak to having a mac mini pro, no issues with BT or otherwise
Best M2 Pro video out there! Thanks
FINALLY!!! Been waiting for all your vids on these!!!
M2 Pro Mac Mini looks like the machine to get. Pricing one out currently for a new studio setup. =) Thanks for the superb teardown/review, Luke!
I was thinking the same thing, but the Studio does outperform the Mini, especially when comparing (almost) apples to apples specs. The Studio can also be purchased at Costco for $1699, making it one hell of a bargain.
Costco really, got a link? 🤔
I hope you reapplied thermal paste.
Hey Luke! Is it true they gimped the SSD on the base-model MacBook Pro as well?!
I guess it really depends on your priorities, slower read right speeds, slightly faster CPU depending on the use case.
I would be tempted to look at a refurbished model from the last generation personally if I was in the market
2:30 2020 DTK = Developer Transition Kit.
This is great but I am curious does this mean a new M2 Pro Wii?
I like that Luke starts to talk a lot quicker compared to the older videos. The confidence is now naturally high!
7:25 black heatsinks will radiate heat better than shiny metal, even when no one is looking..physics!
anodizing in black may have some effects on heat dissipation
After researching my options, I bought the M2 pro mac mini with 32gb ram as a work from home design machine and its handled everything I've thrown at it so far. I wonder now if I needed the performance for my use casse but at least it should be future proofed! Great little silver box, has flawlessly replaced my 2008(!) Mac(Hack)Pro I was running, even though I can't run 5 hard disks on it as cleanly haha
No RAM slots, no storage slots... BOOOOO ! Great teardown!
I wonder if we can have access to those memory modules and soldier them on to extend storage on the cheap
Such a beautiful engineering work. I don't have apple products, but love watching videos about it
Thanks luke, interesting to see the evolution of the components here, Apples industrial design has become very static.
A bit more light on these dark components for the disassembly would be helpful for the video.
This was great. Love the tear down first test second approach 😂
That was kinda badass. 😂
I hope the Bluetooth on these is improved vastly. Great teardown as always man!
I just did a quick check vs my 2018 mac mini and it does appear improved.
@@Nick-kb6jd same with mine
I wonder if you can exchange the Space Gray 2018 Mac mini’s chassis with the M2 Pro Mac mini’s chassis? 🤔
+1 (same here!)
I dont think so. The 2 mobo screws in 2018 mini are in the middle of the machine, power supply is different.
It’s possible that making those heat sink fins black makes heat radiation more efficient as well as looking good.
Is there still a lithium battery in there somewhere? Great teardown!
Sure enough it will be, but i would not care about it unless you plan to use this Mini PC for over 15 years
Nice video I really wanted to see the arrangement of the NAND, my only outstanding question is how many NAND chips the 1TB config has (eg. 4No. 256GB or 2No. 512GB)
This week I needed a new Mac after 8 years using my 2015 Macbook pro. I saw this was in my budget and only few months old, I just bought it. Now that I'm seeing this video and other reviews, I'm very happy with it. AND this thing is flying compared to my 8 year old MBP. That was the top end 15" MBP at the time and it still works fine for internet and video usage. I can still sell it for around $500. M2 pro Mini can play games even. I was playing Civ 6 ultra maxed out settings, the fan didn't even speed up. CPU temp was in the 60s. When I was recording the game fan and temp was the same. When I was exporting the recording from ScreenFlow, CPU went up to 80C but fan still stayed at 1700. When I sped up the fan manually to 3000, it cooled the CPU down to 65, that's a drop of 15C! This is a beast and should work for anyone who think they might need Mac Studio but thinks it might be overkill. That was where I was, thought I needed a Studio.
When you go to a concert but can't get the stamp to wash off of your hand 😉
Luke, how did you use the iMac as a display for the M2 Mac Mini?
Targeted Display Mode
Hey, which thermal paste you used while putting it back?
This is base model M2 pro?
Try gaming on m2 pro and max
I agree. Got mine today. Thanks for showing the internals.
Thanks Luke.
Please make video putting this mac mini in a iMac
Waiting to hear if more ram or a bigger /additional sdd can be added
As much as with the MacBook Pros…. practically impossible, theoretically possible
How it compares to Studio Max?
Luke, how did you use the iMac as a monitor for the Mac Mini? Can I do this with Macbook Pro?
Good report ........ thanks
actually curious about your thoughts about a max mac mini (full cores, 32GBRAM) vs a base Mac Studio (binned m1max with 32GBram) For video editing, which would you say is the better one. They are prices almost exactly the same, as you said.
the upcoming M2 max :)
Does 1TB is splitted to two different SSD chips or not?
That’s the teardown I was looking for. Awesome! Thanks Luke
Really cool to see that it opens the exact same way as the old ones did.
Why no Space Gray option?
I just love how beautiful Apple devices are even on the inside - something most people will never see. Knowing my devices are so well made makes them feel that much more special.
You are great! Thank you forthilft review!
Thank you!
Luke is such a badass! The way he doesn’t care about the cable in the box. And how he tossed that lid to the side. I’m feeling all kinds of emotions.
wait wait wait! please tell us how did you use the iMac as a display for the M2 Mac Mini?
So I could take the board out and run it as is? I ask because I like to make custom case
To replace my 2012 (!) quad core Mini, I ordered an M2 Mini with 16GB RAM and a 512GB SSD...the took another look at the base M2 Pro and decided that was really the sweet spot for value and performance. Purchased that one in-store on launch day and couldn't be happier. Outstanding machine and outstanding value.
pls next video compare the two versions M2 Pro 10 cores vs 12 cores vs M2 Max 12 cores ;) in mini or laptop or studio
You said that the speed of the 16gb is due to the two nand chip. Has this been confirmed or are you comparing the speed of the m2 8gb of another product?
4:04 - DankPods, is that you?! 😂
If i order 2TB, will that mean 8 chips of 256GB, or will they just use 4 chips of 512GB. The read write speeds would be way faster for 2TB if that meant 8 256GB. What have you heard? Can you test or link to a test that compares SSD speed for 2TB vs 4TB vs 8TB? Most Detailed review of motherboard yet of Mac Mini M2 Pro. Thanks!
it looks like for the 512GB model, there is only one NAND chip as well (according to a you tube video by elevated systems. so for 2TB, they may only populate one side of the Motherboard with 4 512GB nand, and for 4TB they may either choose 4 1TB chips to only populate one side of mother board, unless price of nand cost more than price to place more chips. so i guess only the 8TB model has all 8 spots filled. i wonder what the performance is 8tb vs 4tb, that would answer if any difference, is there a test out there for that?
This is INCREDIBLE, thats empy slots of memory are compatible with iphone nand flash chip, so you can make a 8tb mac mini for 1/4 of the price
Thank you for the intelligent teardown review without theatrics. How refreshing! Liked & subscribed.
Always a good video from Luke, thanks!
Great review as always bro
I am surprised that the M2 Pro Mac mini doesn't come in Space Gray. Is a case swap with an Intel model possible?
Loved seeing you tear it apart
Pleaaase please do a mac mini m2 pro comparison vs the m1 max mac studio! Pretty pleeeasy please!
Heatsinks are often coloured black as it makes them slightly more efficient at dissipating heat. It also looks cool :-)
thats not true, quite the opposite
Im suprised thats the case, i would expect a white cooler to be more efficient since white reflects EM Waves and doesnt absorb the energy / heat
@@dackel4253 If I remember correctly, white is better at reflecting heat (not absorbing it), whereas black is better at absorbing and radiating heat.
@@dackel4253 maybe to further clarify this a bit. You want a cooler/heatsink to absorb and radiate heat as that is its intended purpose :). Hence, white would not be as efficient, because as you say, it is less efficient in absorbing heat/energy.
@@DiIusion That makes sense, thanks
I just bought the base model with 16GB of ram. Hoping it doesn't dissapoint. 🤞
A teardown deserves at least two 👍👍
The extra cables connect to power supply should be PS_ON, Power good signal and/or some remote. The big connection clearly is just ground and power so they need these signal have other route.
So, there is something curious. I just bought an m1 pro macbook pro 14, base model. I ran black magic disk and my read and write were consistent between 4,5 and 5GB/s (it ran for about 1 minute). So if your m2 pro mac mini get only 3 GB/s it means it is way slower than first generation. Could you make a comparisson between base 14 m1 and m2? I would be really interested to see if the results will show a slower, faster or equal speed for the SSD (and also some other real world tasks like reandering video speed, copy 40-50 GB folders, exporting big photos, opening big apps like davinci resolve...and so on)
It likely has to do w the number of ssd modules. If this had two 512 modules, I bet the read/write would almost double, since they’re in a 0 raid.
i wonder if you could upgrade a m1 mac mini to m2 or m2 pro, it kinda worked for the 13in macbook pro, why not with the mac mini?
For the same price point would you go with the studio?
ESD protection...maybe?
Black has less thermal resistance.
whats the stamp on your hand
Thanks for doing all that, that's why I love watching your videos
I always forget you have an iMac as a display when I come to your channel from anywhere else.
L2 cache for M2 Pro is 36 MB & L2 Cache for M1 Max is 24 MB which gives an upper hand in GPU performances when It comes to 3D applications for M2 Pro. M1 Max has an advantage of expanding upto 64GB of RAM while M2 Pro is capped to 32 GB of RAM .If I have to, I probably might go with M2 Pro for my use case scenario.! Awesome video , Great tear down , Thanks 🙏🕊 I had a great time watching this video :)
I'm super happy to see that it has dual NAND chips, I saw on another channel that the regular M2 only had 1 and was HALF the speed that you got. I still want a desktop Mac and the M2Pro mini will probably be it unless the Mac Studio stays at the same price for the M2... which I doubt.
Please which channel ?
The lesser the number of NAND chips, the more reliable. Apple uses RAID 0, so if any one of the NAND chips fail, your computer won't boot.
ahhh. i miss MKBHD's mac mini upgrade videos years ago. you can't do that on this one and that's sad.
Best of all!! Fun and relevant, as always!!!
Heck there is so much space inside that little computing device that I can let my pet mouse Mr Jingles take naps in there,and yes I am 142 years old now by golly!
Can you compare base m1 graphics to base m2 pro graphics?
Great teardown just a bit sad to see that though a user could open it it’s not user-upgradable, which is what I love about my two 2012 Mac Minis
Yeah I have an old 2010 MacBook Pro and that was fun to spec out
Great video, thanks.
Great teardown, appreciate the speed and straightforwardness!
Can we theoretically populate the empty pads with NAND ourself?
Mac Mini! Mac Mini!! Can’t wait to get one of my own!!
Great video!!!! Are you using an iMac as a monitor with this machine? What model of external monitor would you recommend purchasing wihtout beaking the bank? All the best
This is just a 5nm chip. Now, imagine a mac with 1nm chip in the future
I love to watch your videos, Luke. Also your english is perfect for someone who aren´t native english users.
That was great. Loved the quick teardown. I completely agree on this being a game changer. Particularly the base model. The additional cost from a similarly configured M2 w/ 512 GB SSD and 16 GBs of Ram is only $300 for 50% more Performance CPUs and 60% more GPUs as well as 2 more Thunderbolt 4 ports and a better cooling system. What is really game changing though, is for almost anybody, this is all you need to run even high end professional software. You can add additional storage if you need it, but you really want 512GBs on your boot drive. 8 GBs works for memory, but heavy workloads will cause swapping - 16 GBs, however, given MacOS memory management, really is all you need for almost all tasks. This machine is right in the sweet spot (unless you need portability).
Why doesn't the thermal paste cover the whole chip though?
how much is the power consumption written on the power supply
Do you think it would be possible to put a M2 max chip in a M2 pro mac mini?
4:05 lol, is this you low-key telling us you're a Dank pods fan?
Question, where you got that wallpaper
Finally! I get mine today!
I can't wait to see this same treatment for the 24 inch iMac. The Mac mini with m2 pro is exciting!
LOL! 3:53 - 3:58
I will have to cut it and make a meme out of it 😂
Is it possible to do a Hac Mini? Just gut out a thicc iMac from 2010, and put this Mac mini inside….?