Hi, new mac user here, thanks to the iPad sucking me over to the fruity side I am interested in doing some iOS development and was wondering what mac would be recommended to go for? This is more for experimenting than creating a business, so I'm looking at the lower end hardware at the moment. Would the mac mini already be enough? The 2GB RAM seem a bit low, but I have no idea so far about the resources needed for the dev tools, so it may be enough? How about the new air? Same 2GB RAM but a much lower SDD size, so not sure if the 64GB would be sufficient or not? And one last stupid question: I am currently in a different country and will be staying here for a few more months. If I get a mac over here and sign up for the developer program, will I be locked in to the local app store or is it possible to chose where to publish your apps to? Thanks for your replies.
A Mac mini will suffice for iOS development but I would recommend upgrading the RAM - 2GB is not very much for a computer in 2010, I imagine it will be a problem as time goes on. You can publish to all app stores worldwide from anywhere, as far as I know. You might have different tax rules depending on geography, which you will need to address when you move. For instance in Canada I have to send Apple paperwork to allow them to collect and remit GST on my behalf.
A mac mini will do. 2gb will not it you actualy plan todo more than just coding on it.. Like graphics, sound and video editing.. As for your legal troubles.. Well it depends on your actual status. You can be in coubtry x for some time and still be citizen of country y with your legal adress in country y etc. Usualy the country you are paying taxes in is the place you will need to make your apple account for. If you can give more detail on your residential status one can be more precise.
Seeing as you don't seem to be too serious about this app development, then I suggest go for the Mac Mini. Maybe ramp up the ram if you have the money, but it will be enough to get you started and see if you like it or not. I am really not sure about the country thing, sorry.
Regarding country, I don't think it matters (but I could be wrong). I'm in the US, but distribute my app to all app stores. I doubt it would be any different for you.
its not about distribution.. its about the legal contract with apple.. what do you think would happen if you move for example to europe? depending on the form of your company you'd would need to cease your us based business and create a new one in the other country where you then live and pay taxes etc.
I signed up for development while in a different country But I think they ask which is your home country and just tell them US. I've released my game in the US without any problem.
From '03 to '07 my main PC was a Mac Mini with "only" 2GB of RAM and it worked great. Never crashed, never got slow or anything. 4 years on one Mac Mini, excellent return on my meager $600 investment. It now serves as a media/file server. I got a Macbook Pro in '07 and it "only" has 3GB of RAM and even running 8-10 apps at a time it doesn't slow down. 3 years on and it's running just like the day I bought it. Next year I'll "upgrade" to a bigger/better Macbook Pro and sell this one to a friend at a nice discount for him. Back when I was running Windows PCs, they were slowing down after only a year and usually had to have the OS and apps reloaded on it to clean it up. I got tired of doing that crap so I went Mac and never looked back. If this is your first foray into iOS development, get a Mac Mini first as a test drive since they're the cheapest ones. 2GB of RAM should be plenty just for beginning iOS development. Use any profits from the first game/application to pay for the Mac mini and future profits can go towards a "bigger" machine.
well i don't see a big difference here.. a mac mini is a mac book / pro without the screen and keyboard.. it uses the same components as the "entry" models so going up is not a macbook.. thats going mobile.. going up would be an desktop mac with quadcore+ tons of ram , fast ssds etc. imho. so if you don't want to be mobile a mac mini will do just fine.
Thank you for all the replies. It looks like the mac mini would be the suitable solution for me then. Thanks again!
