How to Get More Power From Photoshop on a Mac Mini

The Mac Mini is Apple's entry-level desktop computer aimed at price-conscious consumers who wish to use the Mac OS X operating system. Due to its low price, the internal hardware components of a Mac Mini are not as powerful as other Macintosh computers. Adobe Photoshop, which is recognized as the de-facto standard for digital photo editing and graphic design, requires a lot of computer resources for adequate performance. You can get more power from Adobe Photoshop on a Mac Mini by upgrading the hardware and software on the computer.

Instructions

1. Upgrade the RAM in the Mac Mini. Photoshop is notorious for being memory-hungry, and with more RAM available to the system, Photoshop performs better. The latest Mac Mini revision at time of publication has a maximum capacity of 8 gigabytes of DDR3 RAM.

2. Upgrade the hard drive in the Mac Mini. Photoshop PSD documents can grow to be hundreds of megabytes in size. A large, fast hard drive makes a difference in the performance. For the ultimate in power and performance, replace the Mac Mini's internal hard drive with a flash-based Solid State Disk.

3. Upgrade the computer's software. As new software is released, more features become available. Upgrade the Mac Mini's operating system to the latest version. Each new version of Photoshop contains powerful features the previous version did not have.