I'm in the planning stages of a Mac Mini purchase. Its main use will be in the living room hooked up to the TV and playing video.

1.83GHz mini - I add memory afterwards, right? I'll need a video converter until I upgrade the TV. Any recs for a good wireless keyboard? I'll probably need a trackball, since mousing surfaces are in short supply.

I thought the Minis were difficult to add memory to? I remember someone here telling me that. I bought one on eBay that already had 2Gig.

I bought a used Apple wireless bluetooth keyboard which is good except that the spacebar doesn't always work unless I slam my thumb on it. I assume a new one would work better.

My Logitech bluetooth optical mouse works great. I can use it on the seat-cushion next to me while sitting on the couch.

I thought the Minis were difficult to add memory to? I remember someone here telling me that. I bought one on eBay that already had 2Gig.

Yeah, I seem to recall it's difficult to add memory to the new ones. (Don't you have to pull the optical drive or something first?) Which is too bad, as the with the earlier PowerPC ones it's easy to do.

I also use the Apple wireless keyboard with no problems, and an optical MightyMouse (I think) that works fine on my leg or the arm of the sofa or any book that is lying around.

I added EyeTV to my mini to use it as a tuner, it also acts as a converter, but I think the Mini came with an assortment of converters. I could be misremembering.

I know I got talked into buying the higher memory initially but I don't remember the reasoning, sorry. I will say that the LaCie Mini external hard drives look great with the MacMini and work seamlessly

Also, I often find it easier to control the Mini via VNC from the laptop rather than trying to futz with the resolution on the TV so it's readable, so my keyboard doesn't actually get much use. Application menus, for example, always seem to be offscreen. I don't know if that's specific to my old-ass TV, though.

And went and looked at the actual connection between the Mini and the TV and I can't remember if that converter came with or if I bought it, so I retract everything I said above about converters as quite probably wrong.

Application menus, for example, always seem to be offscreen. I don't know if that's specific to my old-ass TV, though.

That was a problem with the older Minis. The newer ones have a checkbox somewhere that fixes the problem. I posted about that upthread somewhere.

So it does. I could have sworn I tried that before with no results. Weird.

I've been trying to break myself of the VNC habit, but as long as I have the laptop here anyway it's just too easy. And I'm not gonna keep the laptop anywhere else until I get used to using the wireless keyboard and mouse. "Luckily" the laptop will have to go off to be serviced soon and I should be able to adjust.

Apparently the logitech dinovo edge keyboard with work with the mac bluetooth even though it doesn't claim to.

It has a trackpad built into the keyboard.

The ones that were pre-intel were easy for the general computer user to put memory into. Intel minis are a fucking pain in the ass, and I broke off a couple of casing pieces when I did it, not to mention screwing up the slot for the memory so that it didn't sit completely right. And I repaired minis in my job! They purposefully made it 10x more difficult for non-Apple techs to do something as simple as memory upgrades for the fucking money bump.

If you're getting a pre-Intel, though, you should be fine. If you're not, get the memory pre-installed. It's a headache you'll never have to have. (Er, that wasn't meant as a pun, ita, even though it sounds like I'm an asshole. Sorry.) If you *do* want to try installing memory yourself, you're going to need two pristine putty knives, a set of general screwdrivers, a set of specialized computer repair screwdrivers, a shock bracelet, and a whole Saturday to fart around with it. And the number of Applecare handy with your warranty agreement.

The putty knives should have somewhat sharpened edges to them, rather than completely blunt. On my pre-Intel Mini, anyway, removing the case with the putty knives was much easier than I thought.