[jdbrian]

Hi folks
 
I've had a mini since 2010. It's the older type with the fan and the external PS. I have been using it since then to play music with Pure Music. I upgraded to PM 2.0 when it came out. I think it's time to upgrade the OS. A lot of software I am wanting to put on my Mac such as LTSpice does not support 10.6 any longer. The mini is on 10.6.8, has 4gb ram, 150gb internal HD, 2 external 1TB firewire drives(1 for music and the other for time machine) and a 2.2ghz Core 2 duo processor. I have been using USB to feed a DBlabs Tranquility DAC and it has worked pretty well as a music server apart from the occasional glitch caused by PM.
  My question is how far should I go? I'm not sure of the OS name, (Mountain Lion maybe?), but the one before Mavericks may be my best choice. Channel D recommends 8gb for Mavericks, so I would need to pry apart the mini and add ram to do that. Just wondering if anyone has any advice on what to do in this scenario. I'm also wondering if these upgrades generally go smoothly. I wouldn't want to loose 400gb of ALACs on my music drive. 
   Thanks in advance
Brian

[avta]

I have a 2009 Mac Mini with 8 gig ram and have upgraded to Yosemite ( most recent upgrade which by the way is free) without any problems. My experience has been that Yosemite runs faster and has a number of newer features. I would suggest you add ram and upgrade the OS. I also recently changed the HD to a solid state drive with a faster transfer rate. I notice much improved sound as this computer is dedicated to my sound system.

[jdbrian]

Thanks for the advice! Do you think a SS drive would improve sound quality in my case where I am using the external firewire drive to hold the music? My reasoning for going firewire was that it would free up the USB bus from loading music into the computer. The USB only has to send it to the DAC. It also separates the music drive from the main OS drive. It seemed like a good way to go at the time and speed for loading music in memory mode is pretty fast. A second or 2 for even large files. Of course at this point I am only playing 44.1. Things have changed a lot in the almost 5 years since I setup this system. SS drives are larger and cheaper now.
  Did you have 8 gig memory in your mini or did you upgrade to 8? I have seen videos of doing it and it involves a bit of prying on the case to get the mini apart. That doesn't look that difficult and would give the opportunity to clean dust from the innards.  Your advice makes a lot of sense for future compatibility. I must have a look for the memory to do the upgrade and see how PM is working with Yosemite.

Thanks again
Brian

[avta]

I got mine with 8 gigs when I bought it. I have no experience with a NAS drive but I would imagine using a faster SSD would improve sound with that setup as well since the computer's HD handles all the file processing done by your software player. I had the SSD installed by a professional as these models don't allow for easy access to the inside of the computer. Having said that I have seen instructional videos on the macsales site.

[jdbrian]

I decided to upgrade to 10.8. The upgrade went fine but I had some issues with Pure Music afterwards. Once I got all the OSX updates installed and got the latest PM upgrade it's working fine now. I just didn't want to go inside the machine and add ram etc right now so I opted for 10.8 It actually seems to sound better than it did before the upgrade.

[Randy]

I decided to upgrade to 10.8. The upgrade went fine but I had some issues with Pure Music afterwards. Once I got all the OSX updates installed and got the latest PM upgrade it's working fine now. I just didn't want to go inside the machine and add ram etc right now so I opted for 10.8 It actually seems to sound better than it did before the upgrade.

I am also considering upgrading to 10.8.  That is Mountain Lion, right?  How did it go? Did all your files, music and otherwise, most specifically text and photo files, remain intact afterward? I am deathly afraid of losing something I can't recover. Advice? I use an Imac.

[GentleBender]

Anytime you are upgrading I would suggest backing up your important items to a removable HDD. If you don't have one on hand they are cheap to pick up and are quite useful. Safety first!

[Randy]

Anytime you are upgrading I would suggest backing up your important items to a removable HDD. If you don't have one on hand they are cheap to pick up and are quite useful. Safety first!

Thanks, I have a WD "My Passport" I'm using with Time Machine. It that what you meant by a removable HDD? Should I disconnect it while I install the new OS?

[GentleBender]

Yes, but I still keep a backup of my music files on a separate NAS, but another portable HDD would work too. Restoring from Time Machine would be more tedious than just replacing your music and photos. Plus I'm paranoid. You you store all of your music on the iMac HDD?

[Randy]

Yes, but I still keep a backup of my music files on a separate NAS, but another portable HDD would work too. Restoring from Time Machine would be more tedious than just replacing your music and photos. Plus I'm paranoid. You you store all of your music on the iMac HDD?

Thanks. Music files aren't my major concern. There aren't enough for me to worry about. It's my text files (I do a lot of historical research) and photos that I worry about, perhaps needlessly. I put some of the text files on a flash drive and will do the rest before I try anything. It won't be so easy to do that with the photos or can I drag the entire Iphoto to the flash drive or maybe I can do one event at a time as opposed to each photo one by one.

[dB Cooper]

Your files should not be an issue but the standard advice about backing up first is still good. Replied to PM btw.

If you have sufficient HD Space some install the updated OS in a new partition. Then if it doesn't work well you just delete that partition. The firmware won't let you "back up" once you have upgraded.

[Randy]

Your files should not be an issue but the standard advice about backing up first is still good. Replied to PM btw.

If you have sufficient HD Space some install the updated OS in a new partition. Then if it doesn't work well you just delete that partition. The firmware won't let you "back up" once you have upgraded.

Thanks again. Not sure if I could figure out the partition process.  Here's what the "About your Mac" looks like.  Probably not good enough for Yosemite but I don't really know.

Randy

[GentleBender]

It looks like your iMac is ready for Yosemite. Check out this link if you want more info. http://www.everymac.com/mac-answers/os-x-yosemite-faq/os-x-yosemite-compatible-macs-system-requirements.html Make sure your programs are compatible first if you're still running snow leopard. The standard programs will be fine, but some of those really old never updated ones may not be compatible.

You should be able to export all you pictures from iPhoto at once if you have a big enough flash drive. They are pretty cheap now too. Look at Amazon and you may be able to speed up the process with a large one. Just make sure everything you deem sacred is safe before upgrading.

That said, I've never run into any issues upgrading my Macs, all six of them.

[borism]

Just upgraded my 2011 Mac Mini with 8 GB RAM from Maverick to Yosemite. There were no problems. I am still using my PM 1.89 version. However, unexpectedly, and I don't know if that is even theoretically possible, the music sounds clearer to me after the upgrade. Placebo or whatever, I'll take it.

[Randy]

It looks like your iMac is ready for Yosemite. Check out this link if you want more info. http://www.everymac.com/mac-answers/os-x-yosemite-faq/os-x-yosemite-compatible-macs-system-requirements.html Make sure your programs are compatible first if you're still running snow leopard. The standard programs will be fine, but some of those really old never updated ones may not be compatible.

You should be able to export all you pictures from iPhoto at once if you have a big enough flash drive. They are pretty cheap now too. Look at Amazon and you may be able to speed up the process with a large one. Just make sure everything you deem sacred is safe before upgrading.

That said, I've never run into any issues upgrading my Macs, all six of them.

Thanks very much for the information and support.