What Mac Mini to buy?

Hello all,
I'm about to make the jump to Mac. Having already owned and iPhone and iPad and loved them it's time for me to get ride of my PC and simplify everything.
My questions is what version Mini should I buy.
My goal is this:
Install in my living room as a media center and hook up to my 55in TV. From there I want to be able to watch my downloaded content, play music, web surf, etc. This is pretty straight forward and I'm sure the basic model will suffice. Where my problem comes from is I have a large amount of recorded hockey games from my beer league that I would like to share with all my teammates. What would be the best way to do that? Also since that takes up a considerable amount of storage I'll need to either attach a external hard drive or a external hard drive back up system. Would one need the server version to do this or could I do it on a normal mini? I know just enough to make me dangerous so any thoughts, opinions, suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks!

metro0308 wrote:
Where my problem comes from is I have a large amount of recorded hockey games from my beer league that I would like to share with all my teammates. What would be the best way to do that? Also since that takes up a considerable amount of storage I'll need to either attach a external hard drive or a external hard drive back up system. Would one need the server version to do this or could I do it on a normal mini?
I am assuming that you mean sharing over the internet. Setting up
a Mini as a server is not as much an issue an as whether your ISP
has sufficient upstream bandwidth to accomplish this as well as other
restrictions that the ISP may have for doing such a thing.
There are various means to accoplish sharing over the web without
setting up a server as such in regular OSX Lion. Also, any Mini can
be used as a server. The server function for Lion is now an add on
available through the App Store. I also believe that the new PLEX
server application can work over the internet.
I think more than likely, your real issue will be with your ISP and
having your friends connect to you.
As for use as a media center, I suggest getting the next version
up the line with the discrete AMD graphics card. This will let
future possibilities open that the integrated Intel HD3000 may
not permit.

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{quote:title=http://www.mitsubishielectric.com says:}{quote}
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I heavily use iTunes (190 GB), iPhoto (120 GB) and iMovie (30 GB, but want to do more when I get time). Additionally, I store lots of old videos on circa 10 portable hard drives (1 TB each), which I access occasionally.
The family use all this content and we currently have a MacBook Pro and are considering buying a new computer - either a new MacBook Pro or an iMac. We also have iPads, iPhones etc and a Time Capsule.
[…] We want all our music and pictures in single master libraries that we can all access and update.
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i buy a mac mini from amazon, and it is registered on another Apple ID, and i need to change it to mine, how can i do that, note that i can't contact the previous owner of this mac, what shall i do to set it under my Apple ID.
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What Mac Mini to buy?

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