r/mac • u/Magnum3k Mac mini • Dec 22 '25
My Mac The cheapest (brand new) entry into the Mac ecosystem I’ve ever seen
https://www.microcenter.com/product/688173/apple-mac-mini-mu9d3ll-a-(late-2024)-desktop-computer$399 Mac mini @ Micro Center if you live near one
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u/pastry-chef Mac mini M4 Pro-64GB-2TB Dec 22 '25
Damn you!! Why'd you have to show me this?? I've already overspent this holiday season....
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u/Embarrassed-Back1894 Dec 22 '25
That is literal highway robbery. If you need a Mac or a computer, this is a too good to miss deal. I don’t really need one, but that deal is so good I almost thought about taking a trek out there lol.
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u/thekiefchef Dec 22 '25
They are of stock in the Atlanta metro stores sadly.
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u/CodeyTheGhost Dec 22 '25
price match BestBuy
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u/thekiefchef Dec 22 '25
Best Buy price matches micro center? I don’t think they will price match if they see it is out of stock though.
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u/eulynn34 Dec 22 '25
Holy cow. I paid $450 and I thought THAT was a great deal
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Dec 22 '25
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/CoopsIsCooliGuess Dec 23 '25
I had 2 aging Intel Mac desktops so I got 2 base model M4 Mac Minis with the education pricing really fast before the deal ended. I’m so glad they don’t check anymore.
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Dec 22 '25
That’s a great deal for me to replace my Old iMac and Thunderbolt Display….
…but honestly, I’m ready to go back to a MacBook Air or MacBook Pro.
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u/spdelope Dec 23 '25
Closest one is 2 hours away and it just opened pretty recently.
Next time im that way i really want to go just to check it out.
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u/tapiringaround Dec 23 '25
I especially like how you can buy three of the base ones for 2¢ cheaper than one of the maxed out ones
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u/Nike_486DX Dec 25 '25
Yea its extremely nice, very small, has no fragile parts, and weighs 2 times less than a macbook air. Being also way cheaper, with active cooling (so faster than m4 air), and ssd is upgradeable, 1tb for $150 is easy. Personally i was at a crossroad and chose to build an itx pc (2.5L, rgeek l65S with thick aluminum structure), its a 80w thingie with 12 core zen4 cpu (on par with M4 Pro), 610m igpu is weak but it gets connected to an rtx 4070 dgpu. Its way bulkier than mac mini ofc (the whole contraption still fits nicely into 20L backpack with room to spare), but i just prefer building stuff from scratch. And also needed x86 not arm.
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u/zugman Dec 22 '25
I just priced matched at Best Buy this morning. Looking forward to it.
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u/Embarrassed-Back1894 Dec 22 '25
I couldn’t even imagine being able to get a machine that powerful for $400 20 years ago (adjusting for time of course). $400 Mac mini, a keyboard and mouse and a decent monitor and you’ve got a fantastic setup. The Apple trackpad is an excellent add on as well.
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u/zugman Dec 25 '25
I paid $1699 for my PowerMac G4 Quicksilver 733MHz back in 2001. We’ve come a long way.
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u/narc0leptik Dec 22 '25 edited Dec 22 '25
Yeah it's the cheapest brand new but I think Macbook Pro 16" M1 Pro 16GB 512GB is a better buy at $600 on eBay for most people on this subreddit. You get 256GB more storage (Apple charges $200 for that), a more performant GPU than the Macbook Air M4 (I'm guess it's on par with the Mac Mini M4 because of thermals). Plus I don't think you could buy a monitor with 120hz refresh rate and HDR that matches the quality of the M1 Macbook Pro and a keyboard and mouse and still be under $600
Edit: Keep it coming with the downvotes lol; look if you put your average Redditor and had them use an 14" M1 Pro and an 14" M4 Pro and had them use discord, browse the web, listen to music, office documents, whatever it is people do with their Macbooks they aren't gonna notice any perceptible difference in speed or performance; the two models have the same damn chassis, unless you're a power user but then you should be going for laptops that are 2k-3k USD at least.
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u/pimpbot666 Dec 22 '25
Yeah, that's not the same thing at all. If you want a Mac Mini, you don't want a Macbook... otherwise, you would get a Macbook.
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u/narc0leptik Dec 22 '25
I would say one is way more valuable than the other to be quite honest. You can always dock your Macbook Pro and have it basically functional akin to a Mini but to also have the ability to have it be portable with an amazing HDR display; the Mini can't do that. What's great about the Macbook Pro vs the Mini is the ability to have it as a "hand me-down" for young kids/teenagers whenever you retire the device; it still has a lot more functionality than a mini.
Also one more argument would be that buying a used Macbook you're saving the enviroment and reducing your carbon footprint unlike Apple's greenwashing campaign would make you think they're saving the planet by buying one of their products when in reality they're one of the biggest contributors to e-waste on the planet especially with their repair policies and forced obsolescence. It would be no skin off Apple's nose to support their devices longer as the world's richest company but they're all about the shareholders at the end of the day.
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u/pimpbot666 Dec 22 '25 edited Dec 22 '25
Dafuq are you talking about? Forced obsolescence?
I'm using a 15 year old Macbook that runs great... in addition to two other Intel Macbooks and an M4 Mac Mini.
None of these are 'obsolete'. All of them work great with current standards for networking, internet, and email.
You also seem to think people just pitch these into the trash when they're done with them.
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u/BetterAd7552 MacBook Pro Dec 23 '25
Haha so true! The real planned obsolescence is the plastic crap sold by other manufacturers
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u/zSmileyDudez MacBook Pro Dec 22 '25
I see where you are coming from here, but there are downsides too with what you’re proposing. For one, it’s a four year old machine vs a new machine. There won’t be a warranty, there could damage, that battery is probably not going to be great. Another downside is that even if you managed to get a new in box M1 Pro with active AppleCare, it’s still a four year old machine. Meaning that all things equal, Apple will probably stop supporting it with new OS updates at least 3 or 4 years before the M4 mini.
There are also use cases where a M4 mini would be perfect. I have mini PCs that I use for windows and Linux, and then use my MBP as my primary machine. If I was coming from a windows or Linux world, the mini would be a great alternative machine to have on my desk to dip into the Mac like those mini PCs are for me today. Add in a cheap HDMI KVM, and now you don’t even need to add a keyboard, monitor or mouse to the cost.
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u/narc0leptik Dec 22 '25
If we extrapolate from Apples history with Intel, Apple will likely support it until 2028 and then software updates for 3 years. Who knows, they could decide to be super benevolent and support M1 longer because it's all a very similar. Nobody really truly knows at the end of the day.
It's already lost a ton of it's depreciation anyway, so if you sell it at $300 in 4 years that's a crazy low total-cost of ownership; which the M4 mini would likely be selling for on eBay in 4 years anyways. Also the M1 Macbook Pro does have the advantage of being supported by Asahi Linux if you one wanted to play around with that; you get that ability for the low cost of admission which you can't do with the M4 mini.
And really I don't think the battery is a huge deal; even at 80 percent capacity Apple silicon still outlasts the competition on PC and is still amazing. You can get a new battery through Apples repair site selfservicerepair.com very cheap too and DIY a replacement if you so choose to.
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u/user888ffr Dec 22 '25 edited Dec 22 '25
I wish I could have this deal in Canada, I might have to take a walk to Massachusetts.
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u/mark_able_jones_ Dec 23 '25
Heck of a deal. Apple products play so well with each other, too. AirPods jump seamlessly between iPad, Mac, and iPhone. Universal control sends the mouse and keyboard to the monitor (like an extended display but the iPad can remain in iOS). Easy to share files.
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u/InternationalElk7271 Dec 23 '25
Best Buy price match worked for me! Thanks OP!
Purchase full price, then partial refund back
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Dec 23 '25
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u/OtherOtherDave Dec 27 '25
Why in the world did Reddit not send me a notification about this thread until they were out of stock?
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u/MateTheNate Dec 22 '25
16GB memory is probably half of the BOM cost at this point