Mac Mini Late 2014 - macOS Sonoma and SSD Upgrade

In this video, I will upgrade the slow hard disk in an Apple Mac Mini Late 2014 to a SATA SSD and I will also install macOS Sonoma on it. As part of this, we will also check the performance before and after the upgrade.
These two actions extend the useful life of this nice device significantly.
As mentioned in the video, I did a more detailed video on installing macOS Sonoma on unsupported Apple Mac models
- You can find the video here: • Install macOS Sonoma o...
- And a detailed blogpost: jensd.be/1998/apple/install-m...
Chapters:
00:00 - Introduction
01:37 - Required Tools
03:38 - Performance before
04:35 - Prepare Sonoma Installer
04:59 - SSD Upgrade
15:05 - First boot
15:44 - Erase/format SSD
16:15 - Sonoma Installation
16:59 - Post-installation steps
18:04 - Performance after
19:19 - Outro

[@itstheterranaut]

A tip for anyone doing this. The logic board exhaust fan connectors on these are notorious for lifting off completely when you attempt to remove the 4-wire fan connector plug from them. A combination of 9 years of thermal stress and a weak mounting. If this happens, they can be soldered back but its a fairly expert job. To prevent this happening to you, use either superglue or a glue gun, dependant on what you have available. Take the glue and, on 3 sides of the "C" shape of the logic board connector, carefully drop some glue to form a 'bridge' between the side of the connector and the logic board. The idea is to create a union that will help secure the connector to the board. Leave this to fully cure, and then carefully insert a thin spudger beneath the 4-wire connector and lift up, very very gently. You should then be good to go.

[@arfrans]

Fantastic! No missing steps, every detail covered in this video! Thanks a lot!

[@ronshansby4438]

Excellent presentation. Thank you. Your analysis of the performance is a plus and answers a lot of questions about this Mac Mini.

[@MangKokow]

Wow, how come I'm not knowing this before! Thanks for the info 🤘

[@hm_09865]

Thanks for the video. Great content.

[@Marius_CN]

Bonjour. Très bonne vidéo. Merci.

[@laurencejohnson4106]

Patience is definitely required when working with Mac Minis, so well done!👍👍 In my opinion, soldered on ram., is a bad idea. I fit the mechanical drives into external enclosures so that they can be used for storage.

[@antoniosousa_61]

@jendbe, I’ve just made the hardware upgrade like you did with success. 💪 Thank you very much for your support. 👏 Next step will be the sonoma upgrade using your tutorial from the next video. I’ll keep you posted. Regards, António

[@jensdbe]

Sounds great! Good luck with the upgrade.

[@onixtreasure4408]

Great video. Only apple can make complicated what should be simple, I mean this hd socket. Fortunately they didn't soldiered it like the ram.

[@iqbalshah_musician]

Nice❤❤❤

[@glootfrootswoot]

I repurposed my 1TB as a Time Machine drive. While not a fast drive the storage could still be put to good use

[@LubomirGeorgiev]

Yup makes sense. Since its laptop chip its only 2 cores so about the performance of desktop i3.

[@mattbaker7284]

Great video, is there a limit for the storage of this Mac mini?

[@ernestgalvan9037]

At 03:10 , where did that lake/mountain wallpaper come from? It is gorgeous.

[@jensdbe]

That's the default macOS High Sierra wallpaper as far as I know. Just Google "apple high sierra wallpaper" and you'll find it :)

[@ernestgalvan9037]

@@jensdbe …thank you, i will have to track that down.

[@ANTIPLANETRECORDS]

i brought up the base of off the IR sensor connector on accident. Is it bricked and nothing I can do to fix it?

[@jankilo3682]

Great job but did you repaste the cpu ? Bench be a bit higher .

[@jensdbe]

I didn't do that but looking at other tested Mac Mini Late 2014's with the same CPU, I see very similar mumbers. So unfortunately the difference wouldn't be very big.

[@ElVecioGian]

Excuse me, at the minute 17:30, when you boot from SSD after installation of Sonoma, the boot time is real or you have speed up the video ? In my Mac Mini 2014 the boot time is much longer...

[@jensdbe]

It's definitely not real time. Takes a lot longer normally :)

[@ernestgalvan9037]

If one installs an MVMe drive, will it run at a higher rate than the SATA drive? And if so, can the Mac boot from that faster NVMe drive?

[@jensdbe]

Yes and yes. You can boot from the NVMe drive, when using such an adapter and the speed will be higher (depending on which NVMe SSD you choose) than what is the maximum of SATA. Just not sure with the limited CPU power if it is worth it.

[@ernestgalvan9037]

@@jensdbe …ok, thanks… though I don’t understand your reference to “limited CPU power”. As to speed, the NVMe is probably sitting on a version 2 PCIe structure , so about a five-ten times speed boost over SATA. Very worthwhile , in my opinion…

[@nandobeatsmusic369]

@@jensdbeI just hit my Mac mini in angry like I always do but today I went to hard and I damage the apple logo and it went inside the Mac mini I don’t want else I could have damage and I turned it off now and want to fix the logo before anything bad happens to it what do you think I can do to get that logo back in place ? With out spending a arm and leg

[@flyingplayer9993]

I have never had a Mac or Apple product, I am thinking of getting the late 2014 model since the 2018 models are still quite expensive. My question is, does Sonoma run well on it? I see some people complaining about overheating and a laggy interface. Also, since I've never used it, is OpenCore that reliable and safe for private information on it? I'm asking since it's nothing official from Apple.

[@jensdbe]

Depends a bit what you want to do with the machine. Sonoma does run quite nicely but the 2014 model was never really a very powerful machine. 10 years later you definitely start to notice that.

[@flyingplayer9993]

@@jensdbe Just basic stuff. My major concern would be how secure it is to use oclp.

[@kosmicjedi]

Hi there, I would like to ask an amateur question, please: Currently, I am looking to get a refurbished Mac, and my choices are between a Mac mini, late 2014 with 16 GB RAM and 512 SSD hard drive VS Apple Mac Pro (trash can) Intel Xeon 2.7 GHz 12-core 2.70 (2013) Please kindly inform me which one of these 2 will be good for video editing, Photoshop, and After Effects projects? Thank you very much in advance. Currently, I have an old iMac since mid-2011, and it has served me well so far. Please note that I have no interest in getting the M1 or M2 versions or any current desktop iMacs at the moment.

[@fernandaa274]

Hi , can i create the Sonoma flash drive in a different mac?

[@jensdbe]

Sure, have a look at this video I did which covers that: kzbin.info/www/bejne/l5TTgqh5ft5mfaM

[@nicodeb8559]

why not just add an nvme ssd and leave the HDD in ? This way you don't have to open it up completely and still get both to use ?

[@jensdbe]

Yeah but that comes with the additional cost of the adapter (and waiting for it) and I still had that SSD laying around anyway :)

[@imacattackau5635]

@@jensdbe Mine must have been upgraded by Apple as it has both M.2 SSD and the 2.5 SSD.

[@Moustafa11]

@@imacattackau5635Apple offered an option at purchase back then of getting a Fusion drive, which is a hybrid drive that includes both an HDD and an SSD/flash drive. Although it looks like NVMe, it’s not and is actually an Apple proprietary design so it won’t fit NVMe drives.

[@DivineVegan]

​@@imacattackau5635that's the fusion drive

[@blackholegaming69]

Bro please upload "How to download and Install Windows 11 2023 Update l Version 23H2 on unsupported Hardware" waiting for it very badlyyy 😭😭😭😭😭

[@em8969]

Is it easier to add nvme add with an adapter

[@jensdbe]

Not necessarily easier but the advantage is that an NVMe drive is (a lot) faster and that you can use both the NVMe drive and SATA drive.

[@nikolaystepanets2483]

NVMe drives are more stable than SATA SSD and don't have problems with Trim command

[@PedroPizza-pv9mh]

Whta about a 1.4 ghz 4 GB Ram Mac Mini? Will it pay out? Or is it a waste of time?

[@jensdbe]

If you can't upgrade the memory, 4GB starts to be really sluggish for day to day use.

[@PedroPizza-pv9mh]

it payed out. I use it as media center and it is quite fast compared to the old HDD.

[@jensdbe]

@@PedroPizza-pv9mh glad to hear. Would be a pity to see it being unused.

[@raphaelmanuel5284]

Where you get the installer?

[@jensdbe]

I cover this in a separate video. You can find it here: kzbin.info/www/bejne/l5TTgqh5ft5mfaM

[@JQUICK21]

Using an external hard drive is better I think....no need to tear into the Mini like this.....

[@Dwq47]

I have a 2012 Mac mini… so you would recommend a sata SSD? Which would you recommend? Trying to modernize my old Mac mini and update it.

[@LubomirGeorgiev]

As long as you are experienced/comfortable with opening computers, it pretty easy.

[@CanerDeniz1]