BIOS: Technology Means Business

Promising up to four times the performance of its predecessor, Apple’s new Mac mini sports Intel’s brand-new Core Duo processor. With the new Mac mini, Apple has now moved 50 per cent of its entire product line to Intel within 60 days.

Using the same innovative and incredibly compact design, the system is available from just £449 and is the most affordable way to enjoy iLife ‘06, the next generation of Apple’s suite of digital lifestyle applications. It even supports Apple’s Remote and Front Row so you can play your music, enjoy your photo slideshows, watch your DVDs, iMovies, music videos and television shows from across the room.

Featuring the next generation of Apple’s Front Row media experience, the new Mac mini gives you a simple way to enjoy your digital lifestyle content on the Mac mini including music, photos and videos from across the room using the Apple Remote. With the latest version of Front Row, you can now access shared iTunes playlists, iPhoto libraries and video throughout your home via Bonjour, Apple’s wireless networking built into Mac OS X.

The new Mac mini offers a completely new system architecture for performance up to four times as fast as the previous Mac mini, including a 667MHz front-side bus and 667MHz DDR2 SDRAM memory expandable to 2GB. With the latest high-performance connectivity options, every new Mac mini now includes built-in Gigabit Ethernet for high-speed wired networking, built-in AirPort Extreme 802.11g Wi-Fi for fast 54Mbit/s wireless networking, Bluetooth 2.0+EDR (Enhanced Data Rate) and a total of four USB 2.0 ports, twice as many as the previous generation.

Mac mini includes a DVI interface and a VGA-out adapter to easily connect to a variety of displays, including many of today’s most popular flat panel televisions, and now features both analogue and digital audio outputs to easily connect to a home stereo.

The new Mac mini includes iLife ‘06, the next generation of Apple’s suite of digital lifestyle applications featuring major new versions of iPhoto, iMovie HD, iDVD, GarageBand and iWeb, a new iLife application that claims to make it super-easy to create ‘amazing’ Web sites with photos, blogs and Podcasts and publish them on .Mac for viewing by anyone on the Internet with just a single click. All the iLife ‘06 applications are Universal applications that run natively on the new Intel-based Mac mini for maximum performance.

Every new Mac mini comes with the latest release of Apple’s operating system, Mac OS X version 10.4 ‘Tiger’, which includes Safari, Mail, iCal, iChat AV and Front Row, running natively. Mac OS X Tiger includes an innovative software translation technology called Rosetta that lets you run most Mac OS X PowerPC applications seamlessly.

The new 1.5GHz Mac mini starts at £449. For this price you get a 1.5GHz Intel Core Solo processor, 512MB of 667MHz DDR2 SDRAM (expandable up to 2GB), slot-loading DVD-ROM/CD-RW combo drive, 60GB Serial ATA hard disk drive (5400rpm), Intel GMA950 graphics processor, four USB 2.0 ports, one audio line in and one audio line out port, DVI-out port for external display (VGA-out adapter included, Composite/S-Video out adapter sold separately), and infrared Apple Remote.

Spend £100 more and you get a 1.66GHz processor, slot-loading 8x SuperDrive with double-layer support (DVD+R DL/DVD±RW/CD-RW), and 80GB Serial ATA hard disk drive (5400rpm). Build-to-order options and accessories include up to 2GB DDR2 SDRAM, 80-, 100- and 120GB Serial ATA hard disk drives, AirPort Express and AirPort Extreme Base Station, Apple Wireless Keyboard, Apple Wireless Mouse, Apple USB Modem and the AppleCare Protection Plan.

[Best Apple Mac Pricing UK]
[Best Apple Mac Pricing US]

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