Small Mac Mini M1 Review
TLDR background: My macbook pro finally stopped building apps. As resistant as I was it was time to upgrade since I'm actively working on 2 projects.
Now that the background is out the way I want to tell you my thoughts so far. Initially my thing was "this is only a mobile dev machine", but survey says that was a lie. I did find the development experience on the M1 to be pretty amazing. Some of this is new computer speed but the computer didn't stress on me running android studios which I'm not use to. Usually you can hear the computer fighting for it's life.
What apps?
Ah the important question of what is on my machine. Well here is what I have:
- homebrew
- ozsh
- android studios
- docker engine
- todoist
- obsidian
- dropbox
- notion
- vs code
- brave
- draft
The only new app here is Draft. I pretty much use everything else on all other computers. Drafts seems to be great for quick notes while working but I'm not sure how I will use it long term so I have 30 days before I make a final choice.
Will You Keep It?
I don't know. Mac minis hold value pretty well and I probably will be "sick" when they announce the mini with the M1 Pro. On the other hand I actually don't like buying computers. I know that is shocking but I really would prefer only buying once every 5yrs like the tech "rules" intended.
P.S. Desktops are not included in that last sentence
What Have You Built So Far?
I haven't had the computer a week, but I was able to update Trade Book and have it published. I also started a new buildspace project. I'll pause here and say you might have thought I stopped doing blockchain and devops things but I haven't. I've been pretty chill on blockchain dev since I missed submitting my project (I'll talk about it later) and instead going really hard in learning containers. I hope to build a k8s cluster soon so I can also make a judgement there, but I'm gonna assume it will be an experience worth crying for.
In conclusion, I missed the ease of the linux terminal for everything so this entire experience has been pretty relaxing. I'm still going to develop on windows but I think this was a good move for me building bigger projects.