Modify Mac Mini case for access?

I know it sounds extreme, but has anyone modified the Mac Mini case for easy access to the hard drive? I am considering buying a Mac Mini Server, but don't want to do Mac-surgery anytime I may need or want to swap hard drives. I watched this tear down video and thought it would be so much easier it had an access door on the top or no case at all. What do you guys think?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wZy0wPniqqo

I can't imagine how you could modify the case enough to make it easy to access the drives and not just in essence destroy the case. I'd strongly suggest either using external Firewire drives or getting a Mac Pro.
Regards.

Similar Messages

Using Mac mini as an access point for home network

Hi
I'm looking for some help on using my mac mini as an access point on my home network.
I have a G5 tower which is wired in to my router and acts as a home server. It has all my itunes library, films, etc
I stream these to various machines in the house, one of which is a mac mini in our living room.
The mini is connected to the network via powerline adapters meaning the airport is left free.
So i set up internet sharing on the mini via airport so I can use the machine as an access point for the living room.
If I connect another machine to the mini via airport, Internet is working fine but for some reason I can't see the any other machines on the network.
All I see in the sidebar is the mini, not the server.
I've tried it on both mine and my friends macbook but had no luck.
Am I doing this the wrong way?
How would you go about doing this?
Cheers

Internet Sharing may not be providing an address via DHCP, It also may not be providing a subnet Mask that can get you to communicate with the other computers on your local Network.
Take a look at what IP addresses are being used by the various computers on the network. I would expect you have a Router that may be using 192.168.0.1 as its base "private" address, and issuing DHCP Addresses in that range and higher with a subnet mask of 255.255.255.0, meaning anything with the same three high octets can communicate freely without Router intervention.
But what addresses are bing used for the Wireless Shared computer(s)? and what subnet mask?

Is 2012 mac mini good for audio production?

is 2012 mac mini good for audio production. Take in mind that I am a novice, but that really does not matter, I want to get the right product if that is an imac instead than so be it.

It depends on the sort of audio production you'll be doing. If you're going to be working with only stereo content or just a few tracks, in GarageBand for instance, a 2012 Mac mini would probably suffice, though you'll probably want to max out the RAM in the system. If you're going to be working with many tracks simultaneously with effects, EQ, etc on many, for instance with Logic Pro X with a number of plugins going, then a Mac mini probably won't do the job. In that case you'd probably want a top-end iMac or perhaps even a Mac Pro (the new model of which should be released sometime this month).
I'd suggest that you decide on the software you'll want to run, and then ask in forums related to that software what sort of system configuration users are finding to be adequate.
Regards.

Hi, we are using mac mini's for our developement purpose. connecting the same through using Real VNC. Mac mini's are late 2009 and 2010. Now we have upgraded them to 10.8.5. after upgrading having display issues after launching the simulators

hi, we are using mac mini's for our developement purpose. connecting the same through using Real VNC. Mac mini's are late 2009 and 2010. Now we have upgraded them to 10.8.5. after upgrading having display issues after launching the simulators, we are unable to view the icons we need to move the simulator (into different places) to view the icons.
Also we are having Mac book pro's (Late 2009 & 2010) after upgrading them to 10.8.5. Unable to launch the mac, getting only white screen with apple icon.
Let me know is there any specific Hardware (Graphic Cards) we need to use for the same.
Please provide me the early solutions.
Regards,
Suresh.

Hi, try this first...
Bootup holding CMD+r, or the Option/alt key to boot from the Restore partition & use Disk Utility from there to Repair the Disk, then Repair Permissions.

Using mac mini nearly for 3yrs. From few weeks i feel electric stock over it surface and on keyboard too. I Tested with current tester it showed electric flow

Using mac mini nearly for 3yrs. From few weeks i feel electric stock over it surface and on keyboard too. I Tested with current tester it showed electric flow

H.Kiran wrote:
Thank First
I just plug it to any plug in my house or my friend house before powering mac mini there is electric stock near power button
I took it to apple care center strangely there i could't feel too much as in my house the service center guy recommend me to go with three pin power cable.
I checked my house ground with technician everything is fine
I have another system (Window pc) plugged to same ups no problem
When i plugged my Apple keyboard to mac mini i feel electric stock but when plugged to pc no electeic stock & i tested it with electric tester
I am asking what the result of testing it with the the tester was.

How can I turn mac mini into wifi access point for iPhone?

Hi,
I do not have a wifi router.
I want my iPhone to be able to use my broadband internet instead of the slow EDGE internet.
The simple solution would be to buy a wifi router whih would enable my iPhone to access the wifi home network.
*What if I could turn the mac mini into a wifi access point?* That would save me from the hassle of buying a wifi router.
Any idea how to do this??
Message was edited by: d00by666

I did this.
I think I am doing something wrong. I am doing something wrong in this setting *from ethernet to airport*.
see attached screenshot.
To start Internet sharing on a computer using Mac OS X:
1. Open System Preferences, click Sharing, and then click Internet.
2. Select how you would like to share your Internet connection, and then click Start. You
can choose to share your Internet connection with AirPort-enabled computers,
computers with built-in Ethernet, or both.
Note:
If your Internet connection and your local network use the same port (built-in
Ethernet, for example), contact your ISP before you turn on Internet sharing. In some
cases (if you use a cable modem, for example) you might unintentionally affect the
network settings of other ISP customers, and your ISP might terminate your service to
prevent you from disrupting its network.
3. If you want to share your Internet connection with computers using AirPort, click
AirPort Options to give your network a name and password.
----------------------------------------------------

How do i make it so my mac mini can always access my media for Itunes on my time capsule?

I just recently switched over to a mac mini from a pc. I also purcahsed a time capsule and set it up to hold all my media like music, movies ect. So what settings do i go to so that my itune always acesses the media on my time capsule. If the only way to do that is never let the mac sleep i can do that. But i was wondering if there is a better way to make sure i can watch a move on my apple tv without having to "wake up my computer" and then reslect the hard drive as the media source. Thanks for anyone help!!

The ipod is not a backup device. The music sync is one way - computer to ipod. The only exception is itunes purchases: Without syncing:File>transfer Purchases
Copy everything from your backup copy of your old computer to your new one.

Mac Mini Wake for Network Access Not working after upgrade

After upgrading to the latest OS (10.8) the WOL fuction is not work. This used to work before the release. i could see the Mac mini on my mac book pro even when it was asleep. Once I click on it under the shared resources area I could see the Mac wake up. Now as soon as it goes to sleep it drops from my mac book pro. I am connected via WIFI but also tried via LAN. Same result. Any ideas? Seems to be a bug as I google this issue it appears to be impacting many people.

Same issue here after updating my iMac to OS X 10.8. I can't use Logmein, wireless syncing to iTunes from my iOS devices, or my Logitech Server software for my Logitech Radio. Once the computer goes to sleep, it is invisible to the rest of the network. This all worked fine on 10.4-10.7. I have double-checked that Wake on Network Activity is turned on. I have disabled all networking interfaces except Ethernet. Nothing seems to help.

Mac Mini slow when accessing hd - NVidia MCP79 SATA Driver Problem?

I bought a Mac Mini (Early 2009) a while ago. Unfortunately i have a problem concerning speed and responseability which i couldnt solve even with a lot of googleing.
I noticed that problem first time when i tried to play a video file from hd. The video does not play as smooth as it should. It stutters from time to time. It is like a short interruption. The picture freezes for half a second and replays the lost frames very fast after that. These freezes do not occure periodically. It seems to appear randomly. The wierd thing is that the cpu usage is very low and there is enough free ram and disk space.
So i think its not a ressource problem. I noticed that these freezes do not only affect video playback. The whole system is kind of unresponsive. And thats the the case if there is some sort of hd or dvd access. When i try to copy a huge file these freezes are increasing rapidly. The more hd access the more the system is unresponsive and cannot be used anymore.
All these effects reminded me of a faulty dma/udma setting on windows machines. So i tried to check the transfer mode for my macs hd controler. But i didnt find any place where to check that. And i dont really think it is running in pio mode because that would result in a high cpu usage.
I played around a little bit to understand whats going on. So this is what i found out:
When i play a video from the hd its stuttering. It increases if i copy a file from or to the hd. Copying a file from the dvd-rom increases the effect as well. It is not influenced by a copy from AND to an external usb hd. And the whole effects do not appear under Windows Vista no matter how much i acces the hd.
So i come to the conclusion that there must be something wrong with the SATA controler driver which is a NVidia MCP79. Unfortunately i have no idea what i can do to solve this problem. And i didnt find any advice or something in the internet.
So i would appreciate any suggestions.

Ok, I think I was jumping to conclusion. Disabling journaling didnt remove the problem. It just seemed so because my problem is much less distinct with Leopard. Bad luck I guess.
kmac1036, to answer your questions. For sure I dont have warranty anymore. Maybee I should have posted that I upgraded my Mac to 3 GB RAM. Furthermore I replaced the original Hitachi HD with a Western Digital 500 GB model.
Somehow that may be connected to my problem. I've read that many people have problems with the WD HD and those beachballing issues with SN. (I do so too)
But my performance problem when accessing the HD did also exist with the Hitachi. In fact the Mini was extremly slow with the original 1 GB RAM. I think putting some additional memory into the machine helped because it reduced hd accesses.
Ok, I am not an expert. But if I had to guess I would say the following seems to happen. There may be an operation in the hd driver that takes longer than it should. Because of that it maintains cpu cycles and prevents the kernel to continue scheduling. That would explain why the freezes are not connected to a high cpu usage and why the systems seems to catch up things after the freeze very fast.

Help Setting up Mac Mini Server for Printer/File Sharing to Windows comp.

Hi, so in our office, we decided only to switch half of the office to macs for budgetary reasons. We purchased the mac mini server to replace the 5,000 year old one and have also gotten to macbooks and a mac mini. My other two co-workers unfortunately still are using two windows vista machines. We have important documents on the server hard drive and they also need our OLD ACT! database to access from it and I have not been able to get them to access the hard drive. Can someone please walk me through these steps? Also, ideally we want to be able to access this servers hard drive when we are out of the office and edit word documents and such, but I also have not been able to do that or make that work. Any help in these areas would be greatly appreciated!

If you use a different login name for the network account to your existing local account then the local account will not be affected. You might want to transfer the contents of your existing local account to the new network account. To do this you could try the following
Create new network account
Login using old local account
Now while logged in using old local account - connect to the File Server
Enter the new login details
It should hopefully list the Share that stores your new network account, complete the connection
You should now have the Share mounted, copy the contents of your local account to the corresponding location in your new network account
Note: The Library folder in your home directory contains all your settings
Once complete logout of the old local account
Try logging in to the new account
In terms of limitations, it is going to be slower than a local account because it has to go across the network, and some badly written applications may have some issues but most will be fine.
At this stage your local account has not yet been deleted so if you have problems you can revert to it.

Setup a Mac mini server for small business

Im trying to come up with a solution for a families small business.
theres two of them that operate it out of their home and need something central to access all the company data and documents.
one travels and one stays back, so the one traveling all they do is forward an email and thats the current documentation they have is in email, no database or file archiving.
we also want to get their old files and documents scanned in and accessible too, instead of digging through boxes of stuff.
they also would like remote access while on the road to access their data, i presume they may use macbooks and possibly iOS devices.
I was thinking a mac mini, and an airport/time capsule for backup purposes and remote accessibility.
any suggestions on file management and remote access?
thank you!

Thanks for those suggestions.
They need file sharing on the road, away from the home office. I think I understand the concept, but aside from my own personal set-up of OS X server and back to my mac type things, its not really business-y in my opinion to offer them.
Unless they believe it will good enough.
So how would i set-up dyDNS? i have a test system i can work with if there are steps you'd recommend?
I just want to offer them a way to access their documents while traveling to sites through the Apple ecosystem.
BackBlaze, i hear about this, my only concern is if this company disappears then what? yknow. Crash plan is a nice alternative, but I'm looking for inside the Apple box methods here if possible.
i really appreciate the ideas.

Using Mac mini LAN for Xbox 360

Hi,
The Xbox doesn't have a built-in WLAN. What a shame. So I had the idea to use my Mac mini as the WAN-provider for the Xbox via LAN, since my Mac mini is online via WLAN (and Airport Express). Is this possible?
I tried connecting the Mac mini with the Xbox, but it seems like the Mac mini thinks it's a WAN-IN rather than a WAN-OUT. I need the Mac mini to provide WAN access via LAN not look for WAN access. Anyone knows how?
Regards,
Eric.

Thanks mate!
Got it working. Had to do some manual ip/subnetmask/gateway/dns-setup on the Xbox, but then it worked. Seems like the Mac mini is setting up it's on little network when activating the option in Sharing, so for everyone else, make sure to check ip/subnetmask/gateway/dns in the terminal by typing "ifconfig en0" and "dig" (look for the line: SERVER).
Regards,
Eric.
Message was edited by: esreverse

Is the mac mini server the same hardware as the other mac minis (except for the quad core i7 and dual hard drives) with different software or is it configured differently?

I have a mac mini with an i7 dual core processor. It is perceptably slower than my macbook pro with a quad core i7. Does the mac mini server have the same hardware configuation as the regular mac mini with server software or is the hardware different (aside from the i7 quad core and dual hard drives)? I want a mini with a quad core i7...

Your assumption is correct. The server does however only
have the Intel HD3000 graphics like the base model with
no option, at this time, for the discrete graphics chip. So,
depending on what you are using it for, that could be a deal
breaker. Remember that your MBP does have a discrete
graphics chip.
I have a 2011 Mini Server connected to a Thunderbolt display
that gets used as an engineering workstation and general
personal use (some photo editing, LP restoraton, general
internet browsing). You simply just not enable any of the
server services. I find the combination to work quite well
for my purposes. I also have a 13" 2.7 GHz i7 Macbook Pro
which is pretty much strictly for work. As far as CPU
power it is pretty much equivelent to your Mini. For the most
part I find the Mini does outperfom my MBP. I heavily use
Parallels and Windows7 virtual machines, so the more cores
the better.
So, If you do a lot of CPU intensive stuff that is multithreaded,
the Server may help. If it is graphics intensive and your software
heavily leaverages the GPU, you may actually take a hit on
performance.

Mac mini support for Samsung Syncmaster 244T

I recently purchased a Mac mini 2.3GHz quad-core Intel Core i7 and wanted to connect it to a Samnsung Syncmaster 244T monitor. I connected it using the Mini DisplayPort to DVI Adapter but it would not display. I also attempted to use the HDMI to DVI adapter included with the Mac but to no avail. Any recommendations?

Try resetting the Mac Mini's > NVRAM and PRAM
1. Shut down the computer.
2. Locate the following keys on the keyboard: Command, Option, P, and R. You will need to hold these keys down simultaneously in step 4.
3. Turn on the computer.
4. Press and hold the Command-Option-P-R keys. You must press this key combination before the gray screen appears.
5. Hold the keys down until the computer restarts and you hear the startup sound for the second time.
6. Release the keys.

How can I install Mac Mini drivers for Windows 7 32-bit if I didn't install Windows 7 using bootcamp?

Hello. I have a mac-mini (mid 2010) and with bootcamp, was successfully running XP.
I then decided to upgraded to Windows 7 had lots of trouble installing it on my existing bootcamp partition.
I finally was able to install Windows 7, by just booting off the CD and letting it install that way.
But reading more on it, I think I was supposed to use Bootcamp to do it for me...
I had thought the Bootcamp Assistant was for only fresh installs of a Windows O.S. where no partitiion existed previously.
I had a partition so thought Bootcamp wasn't required for my needs.
But now, inside Windows 7, I have 0 drivers installed. I have an AirPort Express, so on the Mac side, I downloaded
and installed the Windows version of AirPort Utility and copied it to my USB stick. Then
I exported my settings to a text file on a USB Stick, then on Windows was able to successfully install AirPort Utility and import the settings.
But it still doesn't find my network. I am pretty sure I'm broadcasting my SSID...
So I need to know the following:
1) How to know I'm broadcasting my SSID - where do I find this in settings?
2) How I can install my mac-mini drivers on Windows 7 so I can use my existing wireless network, now that I've gone through the installation without using Bootcamp?
3) Do I need to set up network adapters and all that stuff in Windows 7 first? If so, how and what drivers do I need?
One other thing I tried was downloading Bootccamp 4.x and installing that on Windows 7 to see if it gives me the drivers that were supposed to be written to my USB stick if I had installed Windows 7 using Bootcamp in the first place... However I think the message it said was that it couldn't install as it was the wrong version. So I'm still stuck without drivers and therefore no internet.
And that is my main task - getting the Internet up and running in Windows 7.
Other Info:
I'm running Mac OS X 10.6.8 with 2 GB of memory.
I installed the 32-bit version of Windows 7 and I don't know what version of Bootcamp I'm running...
I can tell you that BootCamp Assistant is v3.0.4, but don't know if that means Bootcamp is also 3.0.4.
Hope you can help.
Thanks.

I tried something that worked for me...
Knowing that after my install of Windows 7 wasn't the correct method (didn't go through bootcamp), and the BootCamp 4.x package wouldn't install under windows 7, I tried reinstalling Bootcamp 4.x in Windows 7 to see what the exact message was it gave me. The message said it couldn't install because of a 32-bit O.S. vs a 64-bit version of the package.
So that got me thinging - my XP version was 32-bit, and so is my Windows 7 installation. So I tried installing the bootcamp that came with my Mac OS X installation CD. This is bootcamp version 3.1.
Not only did it install, but it practically took care of everything driver-wise for me. I was then able to see my wireless network, enter my password and I was connected. The only thing else I had to do to get on the Internet was bring IE8 online (guess it ships offline by default). Firewall and Antivirus are now installed, just a few more things to go.
That's one thing that's just not clear that I'll be sure to note for next time... The Bootcamp packages you download are actually driver packages for Windows. That is where the Windows drivers exists that are necessary to make your Windows 7 PC work on a bootcamp partition!
I didn't need the AirPoirt Utility at all (at least, I never went into it).
Thanks VikingOSX for your post. I will not need to follow the steps you provided, but they may help someone else as all of these bootcamp issues I've been reading seem to be very unique per installation.
Hopefully my solution helps others.

Modify Mac Mini case for access?

Similar Messages

Maybe you are looking for