Upgrade my mini or buy new again

I have a new mac mini purchased in 12-07.
Mac OS X version 10.4.10
1.83 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo
1 GB SDRAM
Im currently working with final cut express 4 video editing program.
my current projest is going to be 90 to 120 minuets long but im trying to keep it at 90. i recently stopped working on the project. i found my mac does not burn a dvd, and i am running out of space fast on my hard drive. Now should I spend the cash and purchase an external hard drive and dvd burner and also upgrade the mac mini to a 3 or 4 gig ram. will this produce the quailty video or should a scrap the project start over and purchase the mac pro and sell the mini for what ever i can get for it. any help in this matter will be great.

There is such a gap between you Mini and the Mac Pro its almost difficult to begin. If you are serious about editing, if you are going to be doing multiple projects and especially if you are going to be working in some flavour oh HD ... and if you can actually afford to go Pro ... then do so.
I have one of the original single core Minis and nowadays use it basically to load footage onto an external HDD, scan pictures, that sort of thing. All the real editing is done on my G5
I believe you can only upgrade the Mini's RAM to 2 gigs (could be wrong there) and if you don't even have a burner ... All Mac Pros come with a burner you can put a ton of RAM in them and a ton of internal HDD so that really does make sense.
The "quality" of your video will not change, that is dependent on your original cam footage and you will be using the same editing program. Everything will be faster, you will likely have more RT to work with and you will have a more dedicated editing work station.

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Upgrade mac pro or buy new imac

Really need some help here. My base machine is a quad-core Nehalem Mac Pro running at 3.33 with 8Gb of RAM and using a ATI Radeon HD 5870 video card. My choices are:
Buy a new iMac 3.4 Ghz quad core i7, 16 Gb RAM, nVidia GTX 680MX, 750 Gb SSD drive (about $3500)
OR
Buy 16 Gb RAM, nVidia GTX 680 (about 900 dollars)
Is there much of a performance differece between the 2 to justify the difference in cost?

The Mac Pro you own has way more headroom to upgrade for short money.
The 2009 and later can upgrade RAM DIMM modules by the each -- don't buy new memory modules for these Macs smaller than 8GB per module (cheaper than two 4GB). These are as cheap as US$70 + shipping from Mac-Centric vendors such as Data Memory Systems:
http://www.datamemorysystems.com/apple-mac-pro-quad-core-intel-xeon-nehalem-3-2g hz-mc560ll/a-cto-mid-2010-memory-upgrades/

Upgrade old iMac or buy New??

I have an early 2006 iMac (1.83 intel core duo), I am running leopard and upgraded my ram to 2GB a few years ago. I am running 2 external HD to hold my home movies, itunes. I updates iphones with OS5 and realized that I cannot run Lion on my Mac and will not be able to access iCloud. My question to you all is this: Should I explore options to further upgrade my Mac or just purchase a new one. If I purchase, what woudl you recommend? I am not a gamer, I use my mac for personal use and managing/editing our family photos and videos. I appreciate any advice you offer. The apple store has been so busy, it's hard to have a conversation about this. - Jamie P

You need to check to see if your machine can handle Lion, it needs 4GB to run well and a Intel Core 2 Duo or better.
Download the free MacTracker and see more specifics of everything.
http://mactracker.ca/
Next, you must realize that your Rosetta PPC based programs will not operate under Lion, likely you will have to buy all new programs.
If you machine is dated, a lot of the trackpad gesture features you won't have.
Check the source of all your third party sofftware and hardware drivers for scanners, all-in-one's and the like to make sure they work or there are updates, or upgrades available and how much.
http://roaringapps.com/apps:table
IDEALLY, it's best to backup files and then "fresh install" Snow Leopard clean, then upgrade to Lion.
Also you should make a option bootable clone of Snow Leopard on a external drive, this will allow you to return if something doesn't work.
You can learn all of this and more at my exhaustive post here, enjoy.
https://discussions.apple.com/message/16276201#16276201

I have cs3 want to upgrade to cs4 and buy new computer that will be good for while, what should i get

This is what i bought but i am wondering if i should of gotten 64bit xp and note 32 bit because my computer is only registering 2g ram this is my setup: (i have 2 hard drives 160 each RAID 0 and i have two 512 graphics cards capable of 4 monitors but i was told the graphics cards are taking the ram away. whats better more ram in graphics cards or more free ram in the system? i was told with xp a 32 bit system will limit ram to 4g min only shows 2 see here:
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Item Number
Description
1
224-4422
Dell Precision T3500,CMT, Standard Power Supply
1
317-0892
Dual Core Processor W3503 2.40GHz,4M,L2, 4.8GT/s,Dell Precision T3500
1
317-0102
4GB, DDR3 non-ECC SDRAM Memory1066MHz, 2X2GB Dell Precision T3500
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330-3203
Dell, USB, Quiet KYBD, No Hot Keys, PWS, Black
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320-3316
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320-7902
Dual 512MB PCIe x16 NVIDIA Quadro FX 580 Quad Monitor DVI+ 2DP Dell Precision TX500
1
341-8999
160GB SATA 3.0Gb/s with NCQ and 8MB DataBurst Cache, Dell Precision T3500
1
341-8563
C4 All SATA Hard Drives, RAID 0 for 2 Hard Drives, Dell Precision T3500
1
341-5255
No Floppy Drive, Dell Precision
1
310-9161
Vista Premium Downgrade Relationship Desktop
1
468-1223
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311-7463
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313-7457
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420-7980
Roxio Creator Dell Edition,9.0Dell Precision
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421-0536
Cyberlink Power DVD 8.2,with Media, Dell Relationship LOB
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313-2663
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1
330-3156
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1
330-3157
Power Cord,125V,2M,C13,Dell Precision
1
341-9003
160GB SATA 3.0Gb/s with NCQ and 8MB DataBurst Cache, Dell Precision T3500
1
341-9289
Integrated Intel chipset SATA 3.0Gb/s controller,Dell Precision T3500 and T5500
1
330-3201
Energy Smart Not Selected Precision T3500
1
330-4025
Resource DVD contains Diagnostics and Drivers,Dell Precision T3500
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330-4020
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1
330-3209
Shipping Material for System Dell Precision T3500
1
410-1862
Adobe Acrobat 9.0 English and French,BND,Dell OptiPlex Precision,and Latitude
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468-2240
Microsoft Office Professional for Latitude, OptiPlex, Precision
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468-2315
$100 MICROSOFT OFFICE PROFESSIONAL MAIL IN REBATE REDEEM AT https://microsoftoffice09552.young-america.com/
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992-9112
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984-5790
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468-3168
Visit www.dell.com /windows7upgrade for Windows 7upgrade eligibility, RLOB
1
310-8977
Info SKU-Software and Peripherals products and solutions catalog included in system boxes
HERE IS THE RAM WITH ONE GRAPHIC CARD VS TWO
WITH BOTH GRAPHICS CARDS
1) Right Click on My Computer, then properties:
   - 2gb ram
2) Start, accessories, system tools, system information:
     Total Physical: 4096.00 mb
        Available Physical: 1.49gb
        Total Virtual Memory: 2.00 gb
        Available Memory: 1.96 gb
WITH ONLY ONE GRAPHICS CARD
1) Right Click on My Computer, then properties:
    - now its 2.5 GB of RAM
BUT HERE:
2) Start, accessories, system tools, system information:
        Total Physical: 4096.00 mb
        Available Physical: 1.97gb
        Total Virtual Memory: 2.00 gb
        Available Memory: 1.96 gb
SHOULD I KEEP THIS OR BUY ANOTHER ONE WITH 64 bit I WANT TO USE ADOBE cs3, and will upgrade to CS4 soon. i use primarily dreawweaver and i want to learn graphics and want to do tons of multitasking

Seems like you have very much overkill in certain areas and not enough in others. If you will be running Dreamweaver, you don't need a lot of RAM! If, on the other hand you will be using Photoshop, you need a lot of RAM. I've been using Photoshop since 1992 and the more RAM the better, up to about 6 GIGs, then it really doesn' make much of a difference. As for the Graphics cards, not sure why you need 2?? I use Photoshop professionally and have never needed 2. As for the RAM, the graphics cards have their own RAM built in and it should not rob from you system. I use a Quad processor HP running Vista 64 bit. Photoshop flys, as do my other programs. However, I will tell you, if you change to 64 bit, be prepared to upgrade most all of your software, and on top of that, a lot of software is not capitable with 64 bit at this time. I played Hell getting my system set up running 64 bit. If you are not going to be using Photoshop, which is RAM hungry, you do not need more that 4 gigs of RAM.

If I buy an iPad mini now, will its OS be upgradable (for free) to the new iOS7 next year?

If I buy an iPad mini now, will its OS be upgradable (for free) to the new iOS7 next year?

Yes.
iOS 7 will be compatible with:
iPhone 4
iPhone 4S
iPhone 5
iPod touch 5th generation 16GB
iPod touch 5th generation 32GB/64GB
iPad 2
iPad with Retina Display
iPad mini*

HT202157 So why doesn't the new software upgrade the Apple TV to 1080hp...from the 720hp? Do I have to buy a new Apple TV to get that Upgrade? Mine is only about 2 months old! Very frustrating if thats the case!

So why doesn't the new software upgrade the Apple TV to 1080hp...from the 720hp? Do I have to buy a new Apple TV to get that Upgrade? Mine is only about 2 months old! Very frustrating if thats the case!

If you want 1080, you will need to purchase the new Apple TV.

Is any one tired of buying apple products to have them die or become obsolete in 1 to 3 years? I have 2 Ipod touch 5 nanos 1 pad out of all 3 are useable. Batteries die or you can't upgrade to use them with new apps. BIG WASTE OF MONEY.

I have gone through so many apple products to have the battery go out in 1 year or become obsolete in 3 years. I don't believe new apps can't be made to work with older devices and batteries should last more than a year. At this point I feel it's like so much in our world to force us to buy new or use our 3 year old ipod touch as a glorified MP3 player. Some of us can't afford to replace our devices if your like me you expect to use Apple products for a long time that's why you purchase Apple. I bought a ipad so i wouldn't have to carry a laptop but if I want to download music or a book to my nano or ipod touch I can't and who want to take a walk carrying a ipad? Would it be so hard to make a cord to attach a nano to a pad so you can download stuff? What happened to making the consumer happy? Then you call to get answers and you get, sorry that's the way it is we can't help you. I have a box full of apple devices that aren't working or can't be upgraded, I just purchased a nano7 to replace my nano 4 ( the battery dead) this will be my last Apple product until they start standing behind there products like they use to. Far beyond not happy

I have two old ipod classics ( 6 and 7 years old), an ipod nano, the original iphone, iphone 3gs, iphone 4, iphone 4s and an iphone 5. All still work just fine.
You may be the exception.
Apple Tops Customer Satisfaction Again, Samsung Gains (AAPL)
Apple tops in customer satisfaction for 8th year | The Digital Home ...
Apple Tops Customer Satisfaction Again, Samsung Gains ...
Apple No. 1 in customer satisfaction for 8th year: report - MSNBC.com
Apple Still Reigns Supreme In Customer Satisfaction - TechnoBuffalo
Apple keeps top spot in customer satisfaction - Computerworld

To overhaul/upgrade MBP or buy new?

Hey guys, apologies in advance for submitting such a commonly asked question, but circumstances are always unique so I hope I can still appeal to the collective brain trust for some feedback
Quick rundown: I have a Spring 2010 MBP 15-inch (version 6,2) with anti-glare screen. Ram is maxxed out to 8gb.
I am not a power user. I’m a writer, so I use Word, Safari (usually when I should be using Word ;)), Evernote, FaceTime, and do some light Photoshop work. I occasionally use iTunes and watch movies. This computer has been fabulous. When I bought it new, it was obviously overkill for my needs, but I wanted the size, antiglare-screen and keyboard real estate, so I went big and have been very happy.
I’m coming up on the 5-year mark and the most pressing issue for me is battery life is, of course, getting very bad, at <2 hours. It’s also running a bit slower lately, and I wonder if it’s because I only have about 10% of the HDD left, or that Mavericks (need to upgrade to Yosemite perhaps) just doesn’t like how old my laptop is. It’s maybe both?
I was thinking I could do one final upgrade to eke out 2 or even 3 more years of this workhorse - and perhaps that’s overly optimistic, but again, with my light user needs, it seems realistic. The upgrade would be installing a new 512GB SSD and a new battery, with total cost being about $360
Talking to my tech-savvy buddy, he’s a strong proponent of me just dumping the old computer and getting a new MBA 13 or MBP 13, but I feel like I’d miss the screen size and the anti-glare screen (i work in bright environments about 30% of the time). I understand the Retina screen is awesome, but I’m not a photo/video guy, and I understand it still has a layer of glass that would give off a good bit of glare.
That aside, I also know I could do what i did 5 years ago and throw down for a new rMBP 15 with all the bells and whistles, but I feel like it would be a waste of money given my light usage, and I also feel there’s still some good life left in my old MBP 15, especially if i upgrade it.
I know this sounds like I’ve already made a decision to just upgrade the old rig, but I really am open to any and all suggestions. So, what are your guys’ thoughts?
Thanks for reading!
Dan

OK, you sound as though you've thought the SSD thing through, so go for it. As for the backup instead of paying BackBlaze each month buy a backup drive instead so your data are right there when you need them and won't take hours to get over the Internet. If you buy a 500 GB SSD then you just need a 500 GB backup HDD. OWC has just your ticket: OWC 500GB Mercury On-The-Go Portable FW800&400-USB3 for $125.99. Here's some good backup software to use with it:
Suggested Backup Software
1. Carbon Copy Cloner
2. Get Backup
3. Deja Vu
4. SuperDuper!
5. Synk Pro
6. Tri-Backup
Others may be found at MacUpdate.
Visit The XLab FAQs and read the FAQ on backup and restore. Also read How to Back Up and Restore Your Files.

G4 400: Upgrade or Buy New?

Hi Everyone,
This is my first post after lurking in the shadows for a while. As you can probably guess I have a G4 400 that I've owned from new. It's getting slow(er) and I'm thinking of upgrading/buying new. I fancy a new Intel iMac but my budget can't stretch to it. Also the lack of CS in Universal is a MAJOR factor. I mainly use the Mac for general browsing etc and CS for Photoshop and graphic design. It's not a work machine so speed is not so important.
I was thinking of buying a G4 Macmini as a stop gap until I can afford the Intel iMac. Would this be better than upgrading the G4 400? See below.
On the upgrade path I was looking at: More RAM, CPU upgrade to 1.4MHz, bigger harddrive (I already have a 2nd 40GB drive).
What graphics card can I upgrade to? I'd like to be able to run a 2nd monitor if possible.
Any and all advice would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks
Steve
G4 400MHz, 448MB Ram, Mac OS X (10.3.9)

Hi i've just upgraded my Sawooth G4 to 1.4Gh Sonnet. It flies now! There used to be long waiting times in between rendering in Photoshop (but i'm used to it, then), but now, the spinning beach ball rarely make an appearance.
I was like you a few months back, and lots of people/friends adviced me to get a Mini instead. I'm glad i sticked with my G4 and upgraded parts, one at a time. I'm a Graphic Designer too. Though i'm using Photoshop 7, Illustator 10, Freehand MX, etc... Basically older versions.
Next up for me will be a Pioneer 110D, and i'm looking for ATI 8500 or 9000 through ebay. And maybe, just maybe a SATA card and HD.
Sawtooth G4 Sonnet 1.4Ghz Mac OS X (10.3.9) 1.75GB RAM 120GB + 40GB HD iPod 4G 40GB

Upgrade MBP or buy new?

Hi!
I am currently using an early 2011 13"mbp. As of recently it has started being sluggish and showing its age. I also get to work on a late 2013 13"mbp which makes mine look really slow!
I have though of buying a brand new one, like the one I use at work ,but I also thought that maybe if I upgrade the RAM and the HDD to an SSD i just boost its performance close to the 2013 model.
Has anyone made such an upgrade? And if yes, is the speed boost worth it?
PS1
For those who will tell me to check WHY my computer became sluggish.. I am very carefull not to install app i dont use. I also use Appcleaner so any app I used once and got deleted I delete all asociated files with it. Plus I check to have enough space on my HDD.
PS2
My personal computer specs are: MBP 2,3GHz Intel core i5, 4GB 1333 MHz DDR3 ram, 320Gb HDD, OSX Mavericks.
The computer i use at work is: MBP-Retina 2,4 GHz Dual-Core Intel Core i5, 8 GB 1600 MHz ram, 256 GB PCIe-based SSD, OSX Mavericks
So what do you think? Should I upgrade or buy new?
Money is not a problem but I also dont want to spent upgrading to an SSD, RAM and installation costs and then go buy a new MBP if the speed bump was not worth it.

There's no telling why your computer is sluggish. It could be a number of things: eminent hard drive failure, software conflict, bad system configuration, etc.
I upgraded my Late 2011 with 15" 16GB of RAM and a SSD shortly after I bought it. It's a very fast machine.
Upgrading the RAM will allow you to run more apps concurrently and will boost some applications speeds. A SSD would speed up disk intensive tasks. Upgrading your model would be less expensive that configuring a new model with 16GB of RAM and a 256-512GB SSD.
My 2¢...
Clinton

Power Mac G5: A common dilemma: to upgrade or buy new

I know there are a lot of discussions on this topic going around, but everyone's needs and uses are different, so I'd appreciate any input on my situation.
I own a Dual 1.8 GHz Power Mac G5 with only 1GB RAM and a failing 160GB hard drive.
At this point, I basically only use this machine for web browsing, iTunes, and Garageband, and am running Tiger.
I had been having some major hard drive problems so I wiped my system and re-installed Tiger , importing everything from my iBookG4 (which, I recently dropped and the screen connection has failed and is unusable except for as an external hard drive in target disk mode. it is probably too expensive to fix for what its worth so I will probably try to sell it for scrap).
Anyway, everything was ok for about a week until I opened firefox and noticed all my settings and bookmarks were gone. When I restarted my computer, my music, pictures, documents, and movies folders were all unable to be located (although my applications were fine and my hard drive still showed that the space was the same). I'm not sure if I imported some problem from my iBook or if my hard drive was just messing up again, but I've decided that I either need to upgrade or get a new computer.
Basically, I am thinking about upgrading my memory, getting a new hard drive, and upgrading to leopard (mostly for time machine). Or, possibly getting a new iMac or waiting a bit and then getting a new iMac or even (gasp) a PC (highly unlikely).
I was going to get the memory from ramjet and I was thinking of only adding 1GB to make 2GB but could be persuaded of getting more but 400Mhz DDR memory is a bit more expensive than other types. As for the hard drive, I was thinking about getting a Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 SATA 3.0Gb/s 320-GB Hard Drive with a 16 MB cache. I could pay $15 more for a 500GB with 32 MB cache but i really don't need the space and am unsure whether the cache will really help much. Seagates used to have a pretty good rep I thought, but now they seem to be getting mixed reviews, so I don't know.
Obviously, I am no computer expert, so any help would be great. Would it be worth it to spend between $250 and $325 to get the memory, drive, and leapord when I could maybe sell my G5 and my 23" apple cinema display (the old clear kind) and get an iMac? I could maybe get about $700 - $800 for the G5 and around $300 - $350 for the display. Will an iMac be faster than my G5 with the upgrades? I don't think I need a mac pro for my current uses.
Thanks for your help. Feel free to offer advice on what to do with my iBook too.
-rhineth

Memory: $60 for 2 x 1GB, I'd call that very affordable.
http://eshop.macsales.com/item/Other%20World%20Computing/3200DDR2GBP/
Disk drives: 2 x $69 for pair of WD Caviar 640GB
http://eshop.macsales.com/item/Western%20Digital/WD6400AAKS/
It is not about capacity as much as speed and quiet, cool, and how well it handles OS X. I use half the drive, other half is unformatted free space. I'd skip the Seagates. 7200.11 is current.
I expect new iMacs in '09 as they are overdue.
Hard drives you keep or put in FW case.
Current Leopard is 10.5.4 DVD but would be nice to see another DVD now with 10.5.6, $109 (Amazon, maybe less Newegg?).
iMac vs others:
http://www.macworld.com/article/133467/2008/05/imaccomparison.html
http://www.barefeats.com/harper7.html
http://www.barefeats.com/imp02.html
Sounds like three things you may not be doing or have:
SuperDuper for backups. You don't need Leopard.
Disk Warrior. Everyone, or I should say "HFS+" needs #1 disk repair utility.
Backup drives. Two backup sets you switch between, and a small "emergency" partition on one for running Disk Warrior and such.
I replace or move older drives to backup use and put new boot drive in on a yearly basis. Some new drives and memory should be all you need. A couple people even stress their system with graphics and video, and upgrading to 3 or 4 new drives revived their system so that they could hold on and wait another year.

!!!HI, SO I BOUGHT MOUNTAIN LION ON MY MACBOOK PRO TRYING TO UPGRADE FROM SNOW LEOPARD, AND WHILE TRYING TO REINSTALL THE OS SETUP AS IT SHOWED IT COULDNT BE VERIFIED, I CROSSED OUT MOUNTAIN LION FROM MY PURCHASES, ITS NOW GONE, DO I HAVE TO BUY IT AGAIN?

HI, SO I BOUGHT MOUNTAIN LION ON MY MACBOOK PRO TRYING TO UPGRADE FROM SNOW LEOPARD, AND WHILE TRYING TO REINSTALL THE OS SETUP AS IT SHOWED IT COULDNT BE VERIFIED, I CROSSED OUT MOUNTAIN LION FROM MY PURCHASES, ITS NOW GONE, DO I HAVE TO BUY IT AGAIN?

Please google search for "Mountain Lion disk crash" before upgrading you mac pro. You might need to replace you Mac hard drive after the upgrade.So many people had the same problems including me.
Be aware of the Mountain Lion upgrade problem.

What happened to the nifty "sync" button in iTunes? It syncs as soon as I plug it in, and that's great! BUT! When I go to the iTunes Store and buy new stuff, I can't just 'sync' the device again so my new stuff gets added. Why?

What happened to the nifty "sync" button in iTunes? It syncs as soon as I plug it in, and that's great! BUT! When I go to the iTunes Store and buy new stuff, I can't just 'sync' the device again so my new stuff gets added. Why?

Nothing happened to it.
It is still there. Maybe it says apply now, not sure, but it is still there.

If I bought a new mac, but have match on my old pc, do I need to buy it again?

Bought a new mac and on my old pc i bought match.
But on my new mac it says i dont have match, do i need to buy it again?

You will just need to sign in to the match service under the store section at the top tool bar. You might need to authorize your apple id as well to work with the new computer.
But the service can be transferred from authorized computer to authorized computer no problem.

I bought an iphone 5 about 4 months ago and got applecare. yesterday I had to get on a different plan within the same company so i traded in my phone and got a new iphone 5. can i transfer my applecare to this new phone or would I have to buy it again?

I bought a 16gb iphone 5 about 3 months ago and got applecare. yesterday I had to get on a different plan within the same company so i traded in my phone and got a new 32gb iphone 5. can i transfer my applecare to this new phone or would I have to buy it again?

As this is a WW forum with different AppleCrare offerings you need to specify which Country
as in North America has AppleCare+ and everywhere else AppleCare ,very different products
So to avoid incorrect guidance suggest you specify Country

Upgrade my mini or buy new again

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