[X4U] Help needed in transition to iCloud

[Jim Scott]

On Jan 12, 2012, at 4:59 PM, Ken Johnson wrote:

> Ugh.  So, I have 2 choices, neither of which are desireable:
> 
> 1. Replace the Mac Mini with one that is at least a Core-2-Duo
> 
> 2. Switch the sync tasks to Google - that's all I ever used Mobile Me for
> 
> I dod understand the economic logic of this, just not very happy about it (especially after being a loyal mobile-me subscriber for several years.
> 
> Ken

Dang people, they keep reinventing the wheel. Why doesn't time just stand still … for a while?

Philosophizing aside, you have a third choice, which another post mentioned: Upgrade your Core Duo Mac Mini to a Core 2 Duo processor. You then can run OS X 10.7 Lion and use iCloud. I did just that with a Core Duo 1.66 GHz Mac Mini. I bought a Core 2 Duo 1.83 GHz cpu on eBay for less than $30 and swapped out the processor. I then installed Lion on the Mac Mini after doing a work-around to get past the program in Lion's installer that looks for Lion-compatible identifiers (MacMini3,1, for example) tied to specific Core 2 Duo or Intel i3, etc. processors.

All you need is the upgrade processor and new thermal paste, an external hard drive, a fresh copy of Lion and access to a Core 2 Duo or better Mac so you can Install Lion on the external hard drive, tweak it, then clone it to your upgraded Mac Mini. 

I did this to a Core Duo Mac Mini and a Core Duo iMac last August. They're still running fine and the new owners were very glad to get an inexpensive Lion Mac. The only problem is that after doing a Lion update from 10.7 to 10.7.1 and 10.7.2 your Mini will refuse to boot until you boot from the external hard drive, remove one file from the updated Lion install on the Mini, then reboot the Mini.

If you're interested, I can send you complete written instructions, off-list, about how I did the Lion install/upgrade. As for how to replace a cpu in an Intel Mac mini, you'll have to Google for instructions, which are out there to be found.

Or you can curse the gods of innovation, who keep fixin' what ain't broke. Or defect to Google. Whatever, you have until June, I believe, at which time Apple will discontinue what's left of MobileMe.

Hope this helps.

Jim Scott