dead mac mini time for a change

Well off the bat it sounds like a software issue rather than hardware for the mac?

I would be looking at an intel NUC, mac minis are grossly overpriced for old hardware, apple are really taking the piss here now.

Personally I have a dell core i5 6th gen optiplex hid in a cupboard, this is connected to a DAC  V1 running jriver and controlled by the jriver app or a 24 in touch screen on the wall. You could do all that for less than a new mac mini. ( well not the dac, but you know what I mean)

Keep the Mac mini running as NAS: restore the old OS but then turn off it's internet access (for security reasons); as a NAS / Media Server only it'll function perfectly happily and securely like that.

Why would you turn off its internet access??

Because it will be running an out of date OS & BSD kernel that may have security vulnerabilities that have been fixed in later OS releases.

I bought solid state drives for my old minis and installed them myself.  New lease on life.  As long as you can run High Sierra, it is a no-brainer, IMHO.  For NAS duties, any recent Mac OS version is fine.

The Mac aftermarket specialist on the Internet is very good.

Nick

The very small risk of security vulnerability can be managed by having a good back up regime and by having a separate admin account on Mac OS (run your music apps on an account without admin rights). - assuming here that the mini is for music only. Anyway Apple take a Long time to stop supporting ageing OSs.

I'm in a similar if slightly better position with a 2011 mac mini (waiting for it to die!) feeding a DAC-V1.

After lots of research, I'm going down the Roon route for streaming from now on.  An Intel NUC is the obvious answer, as recommended by Roon themselves. 

However, the NUC is so compact that its cooling fan tends to run a lot, which I would find annoying, as it would be right next to the DAC-V1 and speakers.  Hence, a fanless Roon solution is necessary for me, if not for you.

This leads me to either a Vortexbox or other Audiostore server.  I spoke to Martin at the Audiostore about this and he was very, very helpful indeed.

Hope this helps, FT

Out of interest, were you running a renderer on the Mac Mini (which one),or just using as a NAS?

6 years isn’t very old ((makes me worry for my ‘late 2012’ model). You said it failed after updating. What was the update? (OS?) And you say it wants updating then black screen - do you mean that it is fine then you follow the request to update? If so, it may be that the update is incompatible with your MM version, in which case simply do not update, and stay on the current OS version, ignoring the prompts.

I have stuck with ‘El Capitan’ on mine because ‘High Sierra’ removes some options that third party software could access with the earlier software, so, for example, Audirvana would no longer be able to run in ‘direct mode’ necessary for highest quality (though there is a work-around,reinstalling part of the old kernel, but that would have to be applied again after every subsequent update).

Just wondering whether your Mini’s display is a TV, monitor, a VNC app (headless) - as Garyi says the isssue may be software related (VNC app or video setting for display sleep etc).

I run my Mini headless and have the Display settings (energy savings) in Sys PRefs to ‘never sleep’ (this setting may have changed after your update)

SJW

Just like to echo Foot Tapper's comments re: Audiostore.

I upgraded, from Squeezebox Touch (SBT) and QNAP NAS, to a Vortexbox Media Server solution, about 6 months ago, and have been very satified.

I'm running Logitech Media Server(LMS) as I have still use other Logitech devices.

If you look on the bay there's a Vortexbox, less than a year old, for sale.

Dave

I note that Foot Tapper has said that Intel NUC cooling fans run quite a bit. I am currently looking at Intel NUCs with a view to buying one to replace my Mac Mini as a desktop machine. My understanding is that it is possible to buy a "fanless" version (albeit in a different case) so it should be possible to obtain one and use it in a room with no fan noise to interfere with listening.

thanks 

the mac has taken up 1/2 and even with 2 sessions with apple phone support - restore from scratch . It then wanted another update - and... it black screened again . I fact its 2011 and has has 2 motherboards in the past under warranty

My present thinking is a vortexbox as the ipad is also now getting old and slow and the squeeze type apps seem to be android mac and kindle fire. 

I've gone off ipads etc and use an android phone /android tablet and kindle fire so I have 3 devices that i can use with appropriate apps.

As it would be a repair cost on a 7 year old mac mini - even if it is software (I have no warranty /after care ) on it plus a new ipad £300+ in the soonish future 

or an innuos mini .....?

thanks!

Roon have just launched a fanless NUC called the Nucleus, which would be an option.

The Sonic Transporter i5 (either with or without SSD storage inside it) is perhaps a more cost effective way to achieve the same end result.  I don't see any advantage of a Nucleus over a Sonic Transporter.   However, if you are UK based, I'm not sure if you can buy a Sonic Transporter i5 with onboard storage.  I suspect that the Audiostore will refer you to their Vortexbox products which run the same software and are very similar.

At a slightly higher cost and for the big system, I am looking at an Audiostore Prestige 2, or for considerably more, an Antipodes CX (which is not yet listed on their website).  All of the above are fanless.  These 2 really compete head on with the Melco servers but will run Roon Core.

Do let me know how you get on, as I'm still learning about this myself.

Best regards, FT

sjw posted:

thanks 

the mac has taken up 1/2 and even with 2 sessions with apple phone support - restore from scratch . It then wanted another update - and... it black screened again . I fact its 2011 and has has 2 motherboards in the past under warranty

My present thinking is a vortexbox as the ipad is also now getting old and slow and the squeeze type apps seem to be android mac and kindle fire. 

I've gone off ipads etc and use an android phone /android tablet and kindle fire so I have 3 devices that i can use with appropriate apps.

As it would be a repair cost on a 7 year old mac mini - even if it is software (I have no warranty /after care ) on it plus a new ipad £300+ in the soonish future 

or an innuos mini .....?

 

thanks!

Yes.  I would abandon that Mac.  Mine were all 2011’s, coincidentally, and got dodgy, but in my case it was always the drives that were failing.

Nick

DWO-Naim posted:

My understanding is that it is possible to buy a "fanless" version [of the NUC] (albeit in a different case) so it should be possible to obtain one and use it in a room with no fan noise to interfere with listening.

There is not a “standard” NUC without a fan, but various manufacturers such as Akasa, Streacom and Silverstone build bespoke cases that you can put the NUC board in and make it fanless.

A company such as QuietPC.com will sell you a NUC (limited to i3 or i5 versions) already installed in one of these cases.  If you want to run Roon then just download the ROCK files from Roon.  Cost around £700 plus £80 for a 2TB “data” (music files) HDD; if you’re happy to buy the components and install in a case yourself you can buy the parts from Amazon UK for around £520).

NickSeattle posted:

 

 

Yes.  I would abandon that Mac.  Mine were all 2011’s, coincidentally, and got dodgy, but in my case it was always the drives that were failing.

If it is the drive(s) (which the symptoms don’t) suggest), then that is easily fixed (DIY), and can be replaced with SSDs if desired. However, at some point of course it reaches thecstage where things aren’t worth repairing, especially when no longer supported, and sadly that could well be the case with a 6+ year old computer.

Sonicorbiter offers a fanless i5 running roon or upnp on top. 

If not wanting Roon (which some peolle love for its funcrptionality, but others don’t), then if the renderer is independent of the Mac Mini then all that is needed may be a NAS, in which case Qnap is popular and has the avpdvantage of being silent - which is no small consideration (when I originally got my Mac Mini, it was to act as a NAS, replacing an annoyingly noisy one).  However I’m still unclear as to where the renderer is in the OP’s system. If that is on the Mac Mini then the choice of renderer to replace it has to be a prime consideration - presumably wanting something at least as good sounding. If, say, Apple’s own iTunes has been doing the rendering on the Mac Mini then it may be easy to better it, but more challenging if something better has been used, like optimised Audirvana.

For the highest quality straightbout of the box then things to consider include the likes of Melco, Innuos Zenith, Uniti Core etc, though they are relatively expensive. Roon on a suitable box as has already been suggested may be an option, though various assessments on this forum and elsewhere have tended  to suggest that as renderer Roon may not yet be is as good as some others - however there’s a recent thread discussing the recently released nucleus box for Roon, which may update on this. From a different angle, if not averse to a bit of research and DIY setup, there are other relatively low cost options like microRendu as renderer and a store based around a Raspberry Pi - and there is also much about that somewhere on this forum.

Innocent Bystander posted:

 various assessments on this forum and elsewhere have tended  to suggest that as renderer Roon may not yet be is as good as some others - however there’s a recent thread discussing the recently released nucleus box for Roon, which may update on this. 

Just to note, afaik the Nucleus box is simply Roon ROCK - a bespoke Linux distribution on a cots (common of the shelf) Intel NUC, but in a custom (fanless) case and ready for a dealer to sell.

edit: I see that the Nucleus does come with a linear PSU which may offer improvements if connecting directly to a DAC.  Though a NUC with ROCK and then using a Raspberry Pi or Allo USBBridge or Sonore microRendu or SotM SMS200 would maybe be even better for less money.

if you are using the Mac Mini with A+ with integer mode enabled, then I think it is very hard to find something else that sounds better.

Btw, on a related topic, for someone who is running MacOS Sierra or later, if you are interested in restoring the A+ integer mode, it is very easy to fix it with the file IOAudioFamily.kext from El Capitan in /system/library/extension.

Foot tapper posted:

I'm in a similar if slightly better position with a 2011 mac mini (waiting for it to die!) feeding a DAC-V1.

After lots of research, I'm going down the Roon route for streaming from now on.  An Intel NUC is the obvious answer, as recommended by Roon themselves. 

However, the NUC is so compact that its cooling fan tends to run a lot, which I would find annoying, as it would be right next to the DAC-V1 and speakers.  Hence, a fanless Roon solution is necessary for me, if not for you.

This leads me to either a Vortexbox or other Audiostore server.  I spoke to Martin at the Audiostore about this and he was very, very helpful indeed.

Hope this helps, FT

Fit PC make a range of small, fanless computers with nice die-cas aluminium cases and configurable interfaces. I am pretty sure that you can run a Roon server on any of their fitPC4, Intense or Fitlet2 microservers. Their new Fitlet2 models will be supported for 15 years. You can see the whole range of Fit PC servers at "tiny green pc".