After the new HomePods, Mark Gurman returned to another product in his latest edition of the Power On newsletter. These include the future Mac mini with the M2 and M2 Pro chips, a desktop computer which is still in the pipeline and which should be presented before the end of the year.
No Mac mini M1 Pro
The prolific journalist explains that Apple had been working on an M1 Pro version of the current Mac mini, which was supposed to launch later last year, but scrapped the idea halfway through. This has been revealed by several sources in recent months. Instead, the firm has planned two lines of Mac mini:
Instead, expect a Mac mini refresh that will include M2 and M2 Pro options. I also don’t think the machine will get a major overhaul in the short term.
Under the codename J473, the new Mac mini will logically be powered by the M2 chip. The Mac mini M2 Pro, on the other hand, is codenamed J474 and will feature an eight-core performance and four-core efficient processor. All in a possibly thinner case and in two colors. On the other hand, there would be no Mac mini M2 Max or Ultra, it will be for a future Mac Studio 2023.
But Gurman thinks the Mac Studio could be a short-lived product since it doesn’t seem “useful to have both a Mac Studio and a Mac Pro”. We are not entirely in agreement on this point.
As for the launch date, the new Mac mini M2 Pro will be launched at the end of the year, just before the upcoming MacBook Pro M2 and M2 Max in 2023.