MAC Mini or Dedicated Streamer?

[AudioDoctor]

46 minutes ago, andremineirosp said:

Hi!  
I would also like to know about the Mac Mini font update. Could you share with us?  
I have a mid-2012 Mac Mini that I would like to keep on my system.  

Thanks.

Andre

 

you can install linux on that mini and even Ubuntu server and a headless HQPlayer embedded. As long as you don't try upsampling to DSD or some crazy high PCM rates, it will work fine. This is Ubuntu server, with the low latency kernel, and running HQP embedded, running on a 2011 mac mini.

 

 

 

[AudioDoctor]

9 minutes ago, botrytis said:

The new M1's are decent but with the SSD and memory directly soldered to the board, not expandable at all, and is cheaper to manufacture.

 

And, in my experience, a dedicated linux OS will always sound better than an all purpose desktop OS.

 

I took advantage of the holiday sales and bought a new 1TB Samsung SSD and some thermal paste. I spent a few hours tearing my mini apart, reapplying new thermal paste and installing the new Samsung SSD. It sounds amazing running HQP Embedded on Ubuntu server.

 

edit: And as you can see, temps are great and it barely uses any resources. Specs are a dual core i5 and 16GB of RAM. Upsampling to 24/192 because that's the limit of the Schiit Yggy and Modi Multibit.

[AudioDoctor]

6 minutes ago, botrytis said:

 

Not always. I have tried several dedicated Linux systems and NONE sounded any better on this mini-PC.

 

One issue with the Mac OS is there is always a layer of OS software between the hardware and software. My wife is finding that out now, in her new job where they use Apple computers. She is also finding out there is no rhyme or reason to what Unix command line editors, etc will work. She started in in DAC VAX, Unix, and a few others.

 

While I'll admit the M1 mini is an amazing device and sounds really good with HQP Desktop, I think the 2011 mini, running bare Ubuntu server with HQPe sounds even better than the M1 and the same 2011 mini running Ubuntu desktop (minimal) with HQP Desktop.