Teardown of New Mac Mini Posted

[admin]

Teardown of New Mac Mini Posted
Thursday, July 21, 2011
Posted by: Staff

iFixit just posted up a teardown of the new Mid 2011 Mac mini. The teardown basically goes step-by-step in taking apart the machine, while listing parts. iFixit isn't offering a repair manual at this time, but gave the Mac mini an overall score of 8 out of 10 in repairability. They also state that the Mac mini contains no proprietary screws or glued parts within. iFixit goes on to say that you can eaisily upgrade the RAM and hard drive, as well as add a secondary hard drive. You can also get to the power supply, but it takes removing everything. So if you're looking to upgrade or take apart your Mac mini, go and check it out. iFixit has done an excellent job here.



http://www.123macmini.com/news/story/1673.html

[mdgm]

Regarding adding a second hard drive they say: “The only deterrent is the availability of a second SATA hard drive-to-logic board cable.”

I wonder if a company will come up with a solution involving a second cable that could be used to e.g. add an SSD to use as a boot disk?

Though I'd prefer to add an optical drive (as the slot in the front of the Mini's removed this isn't an option), since that's not an option this would be a good use of the space.
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Laptop - 2007 Macbook 2.16Ghz, 2GB RAM 500GB 7200RPM HDD
HTPC - 2.0Ghz Mac Mini (Early 09), 120GB 5400 RPM HDD and 4GB RAM
Another Mini - 2.53Ghz Mac Mini (Late 09), 320GB 5400 RPM HDD and 4GB RAM
NAS - 2 x ReadyNas NV+ and 1 x ReadyNAS Ultra 6.

[Ray Finkle]

This is looking more and more enticing.

[Texark]

Wish they had torn down the server as well.

@mdgm OWC has something called the data doubler for the 2009 Mac mini. A product like that might be our only hope. I don't see someone just coming out with the cable. Plus, there might be a special heat sensor involved. This is kind of a downer.

[T'hain Esh kelch]

This is neat. I'm definitely going to add a second drive at some point. I'll just wait for a good guide, since I've no idea where to get the cable, and which one to buy.

[curt]

So how does the second hard drive in the Mac mini server connect to the motherboard? Does it just ride up over that first cable and connector to the second connector that is empty? Or is is a double and/or single cable that is split with two ends? Inquiring minds want to know.
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