Just like the Apple TV attached to the TV in our kitchen. 
It’s also how my Apple TV is actually attached to the shelf under the TV in the living room. It keeps getting jostled when we’re doing other stuff by the TV, so I just used a couple pairs of command strips to hold it in place.
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If anyone is curious as how “custom” orders for new Macs work, I know I was, here is what happened with my Mini order. The only thing custom on it was I got the 10 GB ethernet port on it. Apple said it would be here November 21-25 (the model was otherwise not back-ordered). On Friday 11/8, when everyone was getting their “non-custom” Macs, I got an email from Apple that said mine would arrive Monday, 11/11. It shipped that day from China. Which I didn’t think Apple was doing now with non-iPhone product releases, but apparently I was wrong.
At least in my case, their custom order delay was no where near as bad as they had forecasted.
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About the M4 Pro Mini, count me unimpressed with the fact that they removed one of the 4 TB ports on the back of the device, I need to use them all 
Well, let’s see what Satechi or Belkin come up with…
Replacing an M1 Pro MBP 14 for M4 Mac Mini 24/512. Still wanted to use MacOS but my iPad has pretty much replaced laptop-related work.
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hey all,
I am trying to upgrade my M1 Mac Mini, 16GB, currently 1TB, with only 215GB of free space. Just for background on the space usage:
Applications ~120Gb
Current Active Documents ~50Gb
Messages ~72Gb
Photos ~195Gb
macOS ~32Gb
System Data ~287Gb
In activity monitor, I am usually in the yellow almost all day for memory pressure.
Configurations I thought about
M4, Mac Mini, 32Gb, 1TB, and the 10 gig ethernet port (~$1500 before AppleCare)
M4 Pro, Mac Mini, 14/20. 64Gb, 1 TB, and 10 gig (~2500 before AppleCare)
Main constraints
- Heavy user of Logos, researching docs, pdfs, etc
- Heavy audio editor
- Notorious for have multiple browser pages, multiple browsers, and lots of pinned tabs to infinity and beyond!
- Notorious for having multiple apps open forever
You don’t say how you do from a Processor usage perspective normally, on the assumption that you don’t feel that the M1 is regularly slow and that you want to keep it for 3+ years again, plus the fact that you only have 215GB of free space.
I’d stay with the M4 and double the on board storage to 2TB which would be a happy medium.
That’s a lot of system data (and a ton in Messages). Have you checked the size of ~/Library/Caches? And I’d consider moving Photos to an external drive.
Thank you! To be fair, I haven’t paid attention to the Processor usage. I started looking it after your post.
My idle usage seems to fluctuate from 40% to 78%. I am not sure how it functions. As of right now, the apps I use for research are open and its hovering idle between 70-75%. I get random spikes of WindowServer, kernel_task, usernotificationsd, Logos, Spark, and Safari.
Logos upon startup spiked to 127% somehow and then dropped to 5%, then when I started using it, stayed above 50% processor usage (spiked to 102%) and then stayed in the 40%
Library Caches is around 40Gb
Messages are huge because I never delete them. I need to be able to retrieve conversations when needed for documentation purposes. Maybe finding another way to read, archive, retrieve workflows in the future?
If Photos are moved over to an external drive, how is the experience in terms of iCloud, etc. Does the Photos app point to the external drive?
According to an Article Mac mini comparison: M4 vs. M2 vs. M1 | Cult of Mac
“ The performance leap proves even bigger when you compare the M4 Mac mini to the M1 model:
- Performs spreadsheet calculations up to 1.7x faster in Microsoft Excel.
- Transcribes with on-device AI speech-to-text up to 2x faster in MacWhisper.
- Merges panoramic images up to 4.9x faster in Adobe Lightroom Classic.
That’s not it, though. You should see faster performance across all everyday tasks, like browsing the web, opening apps and editing pictures, Apple says.”
You should be OK for processor
I’ve never had a problem storing Photos on an external drive.
There are apps available should you ever want to archive your messages. I use iMazing to save Messages as PDFs, and export attachments.
Update: Cancelled that one and ordered a M4 Pro 12/16 48GB 512GB mini.
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Similar situation to you, moving from M1/16 GB/1 TB laptop. I went with an M4 Max/36 GB/1 TB laptop. I don’t consider the disk space to be a significant problem at 200GB or so free - but I’m working to be a little more intentional about rotating things off to my “server” and/or an external drive.
For the “apps open forever,” look into Quitter by Marco Arment or QuitAll. I find I don’t need most of those apps open, and if I run an auto-quitter it won’t quit any app that has unsaved data. So no harm.
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