A few frustrations with Apple's designs
While my experience with being a Mac user nearing the two month mark, I've found a couple of things that have proven to be slightly annoying with Apple's design philosophy. Don't get me wrong, I love my Macs and will probably never go back to using Windows. I also absolutely love the design of both my MacBook Pro and Mac Mini at work. They're definitely the sexiest computers I've ever used. Apparently with good looks, comes restrictions.
My Mac Mini at work was feeling a little sluggish with the default 1GB of RAM that it shipped with. My work is very browser-heavy, leaving me with an average of 10 tabs open in Firefox at any given time, Thunderbird open and receiving emails frequently, Adium up and receiving messages, multiple Terminal tabs open, and usually iTunes going for some audio entertainment. While OS X handles 1GB infinitely better than any Windows OS and is fully capable of doing these tasks with just 1GB RAM and a little bit to spare, things did start to get a little slow every once and a while. I decided it was time for an upgrade. Boy, was I in for it.
I had my manager grab me a 2GB stick of RAM to bring the total to 3GB. I figured that I'd just run the Mini into the local Apple Store and have them install the RAM. I started looking online to find some Apple memory for the Mac Mini, and found that they don't sell any online. I called the Apple Store and they said they don't sell any in-store but that I cound, in fact, get some from Apple online. I used the online chat feature to try and locate some RAM for the Mini and was told that Apple doesn't sell any, but they'd install 3rd party RAM at the Apple Store for $30. I didn't believe this and called the Apple Store to confirm. Just as I thought, they won't install 3rd party RAM. Great.
We wound up grabbing some RAM from another company and I decided that I'd try and tackle the upgrade process myself. I say tackle because Apple did not make this an easy process on the Mac Mini. I've been building computer systems, modifying them, upgrading them, etc... for many years but never a Mac until now. I guess the Mini isn't a great way to get started. Apple made this nearly impossible. After prying the bottom apart with a razor blade, inserting putty knives, and applying scary amounts of pressure on the plastic insert, I finally popped it open. I then had to dissassemble nearly the entire computer to get to the RAM which is, of course, beneath everything. Thankfully putting it back together was much easier than taking it apart and everything worked great.
Soon after that I decided to upgrade my MacBook Pro to 4GB from the standard 2GB RAM it comes with. I grabbed some cheap memory from OWC and received it a couple of days later. I flipped over my MacBook Pro and realized that I don't have a screwdriver small enough to fit in the screw heads. I have a number (at least two) kits of very small screwdrivers meant for use with computers. None of these fit the ones in my MacBook Pro. Luckily Fry's had a kit that had a screwdriver that fit, and I drove down there to spend $15 on a kit of ~30 drivers just to get that one I needed. Thankfully it worked. This dissassembly process was easier than the Mac Mini, but it was still annoying that you had to unscrew so many screws when every other laptop I've used has a nice little RAM slot on the bottom to open to expose the RAM directly. Either way, it was fairly easy. Unfortunately the RAM I received from OWC was bad. It booted fine the first time, then locked up 2 minutes later and wouldn't boot anymore with their RAM in it. I called their support team and they sent me out a new 4GB kit and I received that 2 days later. That worked fine and I've now running faster than ever.
These annoyances are a mostly small price to play for having some of the nicest looking and well built computers on the market. I do wish that Apple made the Mac Mini a bit easier to upgrade, though. I really don't see any reason that making damaging the unit a requirement for upgrading something as trivial as RAM. The bottom of the unit is totally scratched up from having to pry things and insert razor blades and putty knives, and there was literally no way around this. With that said, I'm happy to say that these are literally the only complaints that I have with my Macs so far and I don't forsee anything else causing any issues in the future.
My Mac Mini at work was feeling a little sluggish with the default 1GB of RAM that it shipped with. My work is very browser-heavy, leaving me with an average of 10 tabs open in Firefox at any given time, Thunderbird open and receiving emails frequently, Adium up and receiving messages, multiple Terminal tabs open, and usually iTunes going for some audio entertainment. While OS X handles 1GB infinitely better than any Windows OS and is fully capable of doing these tasks with just 1GB RAM and a little bit to spare, things did start to get a little slow every once and a while. I decided it was time for an upgrade. Boy, was I in for it.
I had my manager grab me a 2GB stick of RAM to bring the total to 3GB. I figured that I'd just run the Mini into the local Apple Store and have them install the RAM. I started looking online to find some Apple memory for the Mac Mini, and found that they don't sell any online. I called the Apple Store and they said they don't sell any in-store but that I cound, in fact, get some from Apple online. I used the online chat feature to try and locate some RAM for the Mini and was told that Apple doesn't sell any, but they'd install 3rd party RAM at the Apple Store for $30. I didn't believe this and called the Apple Store to confirm. Just as I thought, they won't install 3rd party RAM. Great.
We wound up grabbing some RAM from another company and I decided that I'd try and tackle the upgrade process myself. I say tackle because Apple did not make this an easy process on the Mac Mini. I've been building computer systems, modifying them, upgrading them, etc... for many years but never a Mac until now. I guess the Mini isn't a great way to get started. Apple made this nearly impossible. After prying the bottom apart with a razor blade, inserting putty knives, and applying scary amounts of pressure on the plastic insert, I finally popped it open. I then had to dissassemble nearly the entire computer to get to the RAM which is, of course, beneath everything. Thankfully putting it back together was much easier than taking it apart and everything worked great.
Soon after that I decided to upgrade my MacBook Pro to 4GB from the standard 2GB RAM it comes with. I grabbed some cheap memory from OWC and received it a couple of days later. I flipped over my MacBook Pro and realized that I don't have a screwdriver small enough to fit in the screw heads. I have a number (at least two) kits of very small screwdrivers meant for use with computers. None of these fit the ones in my MacBook Pro. Luckily Fry's had a kit that had a screwdriver that fit, and I drove down there to spend $15 on a kit of ~30 drivers just to get that one I needed. Thankfully it worked. This dissassembly process was easier than the Mac Mini, but it was still annoying that you had to unscrew so many screws when every other laptop I've used has a nice little RAM slot on the bottom to open to expose the RAM directly. Either way, it was fairly easy. Unfortunately the RAM I received from OWC was bad. It booted fine the first time, then locked up 2 minutes later and wouldn't boot anymore with their RAM in it. I called their support team and they sent me out a new 4GB kit and I received that 2 days later. That worked fine and I've now running faster than ever.
These annoyances are a mostly small price to play for having some of the nicest looking and well built computers on the market. I do wish that Apple made the Mac Mini a bit easier to upgrade, though. I really don't see any reason that making damaging the unit a requirement for upgrading something as trivial as RAM. The bottom of the unit is totally scratched up from having to pry things and insert razor blades and putty knives, and there was literally no way around this. With that said, I'm happy to say that these are literally the only complaints that I have with my Macs so far and I don't forsee anything else causing any issues in the future.
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