Mac Mini Duo

davetherave2

davetherave2

davetherave2

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Joined
27 Mar 2003
Posts
2,710
Hi all,

Well the other half has decided to trade in her PC for a Mini Mac Duo. Which is great as I have always fancied having a tinker with a mac and these interested me when they were first released some time ago.

The main use for the mac will be to stream media from my pc's and it seems that VLC will fit the bill quite well for this but what about security? For PC I would use something like Norton, AVG etc but what good programs can you fine people recomend for the mac?

Plus what other interesting programs can I get for the MAC?
 
Hi,

norton, avg etc are not a requirment on macs :)

ass regards other programs there's a thread in here some where with a list of useful mac software and tweaks.

Cheers
Deano
 
Like has been said you'll probably not need av but for the paranoid on a budget clamxav.com is worth a look.
 
well thanks for the replies guys. I didn't think there was much of a need for AV anyway and I have enough security on the network to stop most people from getting in.

Some of the programs that I have looked at in the mac thread look pretty cool so when she gets it I'm sure to have a play.
 
Well after almost a month of waiting for this too come into stock I have to say I am well impressed with this little box. It was simple to set up and after a few teething issues with the wireless network everything clicked into place.

Plus the little remote you get with it is fantastic and comes in handy given that the primary function of this unit is as a HTPC.

Having never used a mac for any length of time about 5 or 10 minutes here and there I have to say that its not that scarey a transitions from the MS way of thinking although I keep wanting to close windows on the right hand side :p

I don't think this will totally convert me over to mac systems but has certainly opened my eyes to another way of computing.
 
I have a G4 mini and have considered changing, but have a few questions.

Have you tried any video editing using iMovie or iDVD? Did it cope ok?

Does it lag much or at all?

Whats it like playing HD video?

Thanx for anyhelp with those questions :D
 
Big-Mac-Please said:
I have a G4 mini and have considered changing, but have a few questions.

Have you tried any video editing using iMovie or iDVD? Did it cope ok?

Does it lag much or at all?

Whats it like playing HD video?

Thanx for anyhelp with those questions :D
Click to expand...

Well haven't tried any video encoding yet but I will try it at some point. Dvd playback is spot on and plays beatifully. Need to test this on the 50" tv now to get the full effects from this little powerhouse.

As for hi-def stuff I have played loads of 1920X1080 and 1280X720 and plays it really smoothly. although VLC doesn't seem to play the movies as well as it does on my Windows based PC's but if you try out a free Hi def movie called elephant's dream you will see the quality instantly.

I'm so impressed with this little unit that I am thinking of getting rid of my existing HTPC and trading it in for another one as it will sit nicely under the TV. :D

Hope this helps and any further questions by all means ask away I will try and answer them as best I can.
 
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Thank you very much for the reply :D

They are great little units! Such a good design its crazy plus now you can dual boot the new intel macs with windows and osx.

You can try mplayer if your not getting on with VLC, i found it often plays videos better. Also flip4mac is a good to play WMV in quicktime player :)

When you try a bit of iMovie and DVD stuff could you let me know how it gets on please because thats where my mini struggles.

Thanx again!

BigMac
 
Do you know what it's like at playing WMV-HD files? Can it do those nicely at 1920x1080p?

And do you have any H.264 HD material you could chuck at it? My Athlon 64 3500+ cannot play 1080i H.264 at all.
 
well it plays 1080P ts files no problems at all. I will try the others when I have downloaded the content. To be honest I am betting it should be fine.

I'll report back in a bit with the findings
 
VLC I have found is absolutely AWFUL for playing anything.

My personal combo is NicePlayer + Flip4Mac + DivX Codecs.

Can play everything, avi, wmv, asf, mpg you name it. And it is much nicer then VLC.
 
ok well have tired it with H.264 720/1080P and it plays it with no problems at all.

I have noticed some slight graining to the images using VLC and Quicktime so will try the combo stuppy uses to see if it improves the quality.
 
Ooo I like nice player but when I play a divx video it has no sound just like in quicktime but mplayer plays it ok with sound?

What do you think I'm missing?

Cheers!!!


EDIT: If you go to the free plugins theres one called xine install that and log out and log in again and then make it the default viewer in preferences and hey presto it played the file ok :D

Looks sexy too!
 
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davetherave2 said:
ok well have tired it with H.264 720/1080P and it plays it with no problems at all.

I have noticed some slight graining to the images using VLC and Quicktime so will try the combo stuppy uses to see if it improves the quality.
Click to expand...

My God! H.264 1080p? No problems?

*shoots off to Apple store* :D

Well... almost. I'm going to wait for a little longer to see if they put Core 2 Duo inside the bugger.
 
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