Hey Apple/Mac nerds

  • Thread starter Thread starter Dan Gleesak
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Dan Gleesak

Dan Gleesak

Well-known member
I found this Mac mini in the garbage. I brought it home and surprisingly it booted up pretty good…. It’s running windows though lol

I have enough windows machines, I’m guessing I can do some sort of reset and get it back to being a Mac?

I searched by serial number and it came up as a “late 2014 core i5” but I can’t seem to find any pics of one with the black circle on top.


IMG_4712.jpeg

IMG_4713.jpeg

Did I find something cool? Or just another 10 year old computer that someone else didn’t want. I doubt I’d use it for anything other than internet browsing


Thanks!!
 
Probably running off boot camp or something. It'll be slow. My wife has one she uses for media. She has no idea if it's worth anything, you'll have to look on eBay or something.
 
Great find. It can be useful. You might have to reinstall everything from USB or something if it doesn't have the reset feature. Won't be too difficult to Google for specifics.
 
Bad Brain said:
Great find. It can be useful. You might have to reinstall everything from USB or something if it doesn't have the reset feature. Won't be too difficult to Google for specifics.
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Looks like I can do a reset on the windows side pretty easy so I’m doing that now. I can probably at least run windows 10 on it.
I tried to get into the Mac part and had less success since it asked for a password.

I decided to wipe it before I connected to anything at my house.
 
Dan Gleesak said:
I tried to get into the Mac part and had less success since it asked for a password.
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You can get around that if you want. Personally I think you'd be better off wiping the whole thing and reinstalling the latest macos that it supports. But it can suck away half a Saturday and that's lame.
 
Bad Brain said:
You can get around that if you want. Personally I think you'd be better off wiping the whole thing and reinstalling the latest macos that it supports. But it can suck away half a Saturday and that's lame.
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Maybe I’ll bring it to work and kill the day there.
I read something about how to get to the reset menu on startup but I don’t have a keyboard that has that key on it lol.
 
Dan Gleesak said:
Maybe I’ll bring it to work and kill the day there.
I read something about how to get to the reset menu on startup but I don’t have a keyboard that has that key on it lol.
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Honestly dude, a 2014 is going to be slow. I'd probably just leave Windows on it and use it as a media server.
 
Dan Gleesak said:
Maybe I’ll bring it to work and kill the day there.
I read something about how to get to the reset menu on startup but I don’t have a keyboard that has that key on it lol.
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Pretty sure the apple command key is the windows key on a PC.
 
Floyd Eye said:
Honestly dude, a 2014 is going to be slow. I'd probably just leave Windows on it and use it as a media server.
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I was thinking about putting some kind of monitor over my workbench to look at stuff I’m working on, so it might be a good fit for that. It’ll work for schematics and YouTube.
 
I also found my old digital camera that is pretty sweet but I need a computer to load the pictures on to.
It blew my kids minds having to look through a little hole to take a picture
 
It’s kind of a nice one. Nothing crazy but better than the point and shoots of the era

IMG_4714.jpeg
 
If it were an Apple Silicon Mac, I'd be 100%-confident it's upside-down.

That being an older Intel model, I can't say for-certain 'cause I'm not familiar with them, but you'd have to think that Apple wouldn't have plunked a black circle onto the top of the units when they designed them; the company likes smooth, classy aesthetics and finishes after all. :dunno:
 
Monkey Man said:
If it were an Apple Silicon Mac, I'd be 100%-confident it's upside-down.

That being an older Intel model, I can't say for-certain 'cause I'm not familiar with them, but you'd have to think that Apple wouldn't have plunked a black circle onto the top of the units when they designed them; the company likes smooth, classy aesthetics and finishes after all. :dunno:
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That thought never even crossed my mind lol.
I’m not much of a computer guy…
 
IIRC the tiny-format Macs draw air in through the ring of fins along the perimeter of that plastic circle and blow it out through holes at the back(?) of the unit.

So if placed upright, the air's being drawn-in at the coolest-possible point and expelled a little higher, which makes sense of course.

EDIT:
Just checking your pics now I don't see the "underneath" fins at all.

Either way 'though, I'd say the circle is the base.
 
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