I want to buy a mac mini for developing on iOS. I’ve been using my Macbook Pro 2010 for awhile now and I am looking to get a mac mini. Have any of you used these for game dev? They seem fine with a quad core, but I’ll like to know from experienced users.
I want to upgrade so I can have a bigger 22" HD monitor, and not use the dinky screen on my laptop.
Also, what are your thoughts on the upcoming cylindrical Mac Pros?
Thanks.
Why not just connect your Macbook to an external monitor?
–Eric
I’ll try it, but this computer is so slow that I’m worried about the speed this computer will work at a much higher resolution. I will try it, however.
Which model of 2010 Macbook is it? I still have one of those which I use as a more-or-less everyday workstation. It’s not as nice as my newer desktop PC, but it’s still plenty for most dev (bearing in mind that I don’t work on high-end PC or next-gen console games).
It’s specs are:
2.4 ghz intel core 2 duo
2 gb 1067 mhz ddr3
nvidia geforce 320m 256 mb
os x lion 10.7.5
You probably want to eBay your MacBook and get a faster MacBook. The latest MacBooks are 4x faster.
Unity on MacBook 2010 compile time: 6 minutes
Unity on MacBook 2012 compile time: less than 1 minute.
if you want faster compile time, you could as well upgrade the hard drive to an SSD. This gives a big performance boost on everyday usage !
I bought an i5 Mac Mini about 6 months ago. I’ve been very happy with it so far. I run Unity, Maya, and Photoshop on it. I think I could use more RAM… it has 4Gb but I think 8Gb would help with Maya rendering and huge layered Photoshop files, and keeping multiple applications open at the same time.
Mini’s are a solid choice for a budget workstation. The HD 4000 GPU will give you about a 40% boost in speed over your GeForce 320m and should be quite sufficient for a larger monitor. If you can afford the i7 and the SSD, I’d definitely get them, both will help Unity in terms of import and build time.
You also ask about the upcoming Mac Pro. Well, given their history (and without actually playing with one obviously), if you can afford one, why would you even consider a Mini? I’m not trying to be snide, they are a completely different class of machine, and price range!
Slightly off topic, I have a similar spec’d mbp as the OP (My ram is maxed) - would a new gen mac mini’s Intel HD gpu be much better for gaming purposes than the GeForce 320m? Had poor gaming experiences in my younger days with horrible built-in intel graphics 
I thought I’d let everyone know that I just hooked a monitor to my macbook and everything works fine. It worked perfectly, and now I have dual monitors, the new monitor, and the macbook screen. Apparantly apple thought of this setup.
I’m running Unity on a Mac Mini:
2.3 GHz i7
4 GB 1600 MHz DDR3
Graphics: Intel HD 4000 500 MB
I using a 24" HDMI monitor.
So far I have not really run into any major performance issues to the point where I can’t do something, but if I’m running Unity, downloading from the asset store, and either recording my screen or editing the video I just recorded all at the same time, it can get a little slow. Yesterday I was doing all that plus had a couple other programs open and was uploading video to YouTube all at the same time. It did slow down, but didn’t crash.
Its hard to believe that little box does so much. I have a much more powerful i7 PC laptop (that I’m actually typing on right now) but I prefer to do all my dev work on the Mac Mini. My PC is i7 with 8 GB memory and a GTX 460M / 1 GB graphics card, but I like working with the Mac Mini better. I, as you bought the Mini to do IOS development, and it works great for that. I find myself using it for everything else though too.
I still think you should upgrade, even to a 2011 Macbook Pro.
I’m waiting for the MacMini 2014 to come out…