At the time of writing, you can buy one of these “barebones” kits with a Core i7-10710U inside for £460, and add 8GB of RAM, a 256GB SSD and Windows 10 OS license for an extra £160, bringing the total to £620. The benchmark among compact PCs is Intel’s NUC 10 (and the forthcoming NUC 11) range of mini PCs, which typically use much slower, lower-power U-series Intel chips. Prices rise as you add RAM and storage but essentially, this is the same hardware as you get in the M1 MacBook Pro, minus the screen, keyboard and touchpad, of course.
At £699 for the base model with 8GB of RAM and a 256GB SSD, you’re getting a lot of performance and hardware for your money. Part of the reason behind the appeal of the M1 Mac mini – and the appeal of its laptop siblings – is the price. M1 Apple Mac mini review: Price and competition If you don’t mind being a guinea pig for Apple, however, or you’ll never venture outside the safe boundaries of Apple’s own software stack or other native applications, then the M1 Mac mini is a great choice for a minimalist desktop setup. However, with not all software shifted to the new architecture just yet, you should know that you may need to run some of your favourite applications under emulation at first, and that some of your favourite Mac apps might not run perfectly – or at all. If you need a fast, compact PC for working from home, then there’s a lot here that’s good. Just like Apple’s M1 MacBooks, the M1 Mac mini is very impressive, delivering a huge amount of performance per pound. READ NEXT: M1 MacBook Air review Apple Mac mini review: What you need to know From the outside, the M1 Mac mini looks exactly like the previous model, but it’s on the inside where all the fireworks are happening. Aside from the radical architecture revamp, Apple has otherwise made few changes to its much-loved compact PC.
The Mac mini is the third of the first wave of M1-based Apple products we have reviewed since they were announced last year, joining the M1 MacBook Air and the M1 MacBook Pro at the vanguard of Apple’s move away from Intel.