Apple continues to replace their products’ CPUs with new Intel processors, today unveiling Mac minis powered by the Intel Core Solo and Core Duo. (See product page, full specs from Apple.)

Especially given the price, these look like they’ll be great machines for music production, at least once the software catches up. You won’t want to make the switch until software and plug-ins have been recompiled as Universal binaries for Intel, particularly if this is going to be your primary machine. But when that does happen — many have been announced for release by summer — this should be a blazing machine. As we saw earlier today, benchmarks look promising even for music software that hasn’t been optimized for the dual cores. With software that is optimized for those chips, the dual machine should be even better (and worth the extra money). I’m especially interested in Apple’s own Logic Pro and upcoming releases of Ableton Live and Max/MSP/Jitter. And you can rack-mount Mac minis, as pictured.

Updated: Via the Quartz Composer dev list: in fact the Intel i950 graphics chip on the new Mac minis will support Core Image and Quartz Express, and should perform better than the previous mini’s bare-bones ATI 9200 chip. I would still opt for a more expensive system, though, if you’re serious about live 3D graphics — the iMacs, MacBook Pros, and Power Macs all have more sophisticated graphics capabilities. -PK

Christopher Scheidel has been hard at work cleaning up his sophisticated Apple Logic Pro Environment template, which he uses to manage his guitar + keyboard + Mac Mini rig while performing. He’s been nice enough to share it with us:

Logic template [Download]

See Christopher’s site for further information. He promises more soon, including a full walkthrough with screenshots; I’ll try to offer some additional tips of my own.

Sure, you could just run Ableton Live as your only performance rig, but with the Environment it’s easy to switch guitar effects, synth presets, and, of course, to play Logic Pro-only instruments like the fantastic Sculpture.

Previously: Christopher’s custom rack-mounted Mac Mini music rig

Christopher Scheidel has created an impressive Mac Mini-based rig for playing keyboards and guitars. He’s documented the whole process at his site Heavylift. There’s a lot to be learned there about how to do it yourself (including taking advantage of cheap LCDs for display), but here are the basic specs:

Hardware:
Apple Mac Mini 1.2G G4 / 1 G RAM, Bluetooth, 802.11g, 40G HD
Apple Bluetooth Mouse and Keyboard
Belkin USB extender
eBayed Lilliput 2″ LCD screen ($5 + $25 shipping; replaced a larger touchscreen when it died!)
Calzone 4U rack
MOTU 828 mk II audio interface
M-Audio Radium 61 USB music keyboard; Lexicon MPX R1 processor as foot controller

Software:
Native Instruments Guitar Rig
Apple Logic Pro 7

Wow, mounted in a calzone? Delicious and brilliant! Beef or pepperoni? Oh, wait, guess that’s a brand name. Anyway, I know what my next project will be.

The whole project fits in a VW Jetta’s trunk — perfectly portable, and with all the sonic flexibility afforded by Guitar Rig and Logic. Guitar Rig, says Christopher, is “by far the best software guitar processor I have encountered” and Logic Pro is “amazing” thanks to its live performance power via the Environment feature.

When we return with Part II, we’ll look at Christopher’s custom Environment for Logic Pro 7, which handles MIDI routing and program changes for all those different instruments during performance. (He’s even promised us a copy of the file for you Logic users.)

Thanks to Cris (aka Atariboy) for this one, which all connects back to a post somewhere on the boards for superb music and Comic Life developer plasq.

Related: Hands-on with Native Instruments Guitar Rig (w/ Sound Samples)

Windows users have been begging me for more coverage, but here’s one for the Apple crowd, nonetheless:

Apple has updated both its iBook and Mac Mini. The across-the-board change is more RAM: Finally, every Mac they sell comes with 512MB of RAM. (They don’t deserve any slap on the back for that; the previous RAM configurations were a crime against humanity — though, of course, upgrading yourself is cheaper, anyway.) CDM suggests 1 GB if you can do it, especially if you’re a sample library fan.

In Mac Mini news, you can now upgrade to built-in wireless and DVD burning. The Mac Mini is the interactive art installation guru’s dream, and it remains a good model.

The iBook announcement is the bigger news. iBookers now get better graphics cards, and standard extras from the PowerBook line like built-in wireless, motion sensor, and scrolling trackpad. PCs may appear to be cheaper, and I’m a fan of the Pentium M, but I will say this: Apple doesn’t cut corners. If you’ve been waiting to buy a portable and don’t mind missing out on the big PowerBook screens, your iBook has arrived.

So, Apple, where are our updated PowerBooks? There’s not a whole lot in the PB to justify the big jump in price. And what will happen to the PowerBook line while we wait for Intel chips? I hope Apple comes up with a price cut next month (in time for back-to-school and holiday buying), or I think they’ll see their PowerBook sales sag. (Previous sales history bears out this prediction.)

My friend Scott Shepard has a great lineup for this week's Inside Mac Radio Show. There's a  theme: think iPod + Mac mini + OS X = bigger Mac market share.

• Apple's iPod Czar Stan Ng talks about the much-better battery
  life on last week's new iPod revision and how Apple plans total world
  domination (have to read between the lines for the latter)
• Former PC guy David Coursey talks about why more are likely to switch from Windows to Mac — David's got a book on the subject from Peachpit Press — and how Apple plans world domination
• Brad Gibson explains the new iPod pricing (even I'm confused, so
  thanks, Brad!) and how the iPod is inspiring switchers, allowing Apple
  to plan world domination

What? You thought Apple had become more interested in selling iPods
than selling Macs? Think again. First there's the earbuds, the warm,
fuzzy feeling associated with the Apple logo, all that time spent
looking at the Chicago typeface from the original Mac, minimalist
Ive-designed gadgets around, and then . . . it starts.

Think about it: iPod. As in Pod People. As in body snatchers, invasion of. Pretty
soon the whole planet is building strange physical modeling patches in
Sculpture on Logic Pro 7 running on their Power Mac G5 and Cinema
Display.

Wait . . . I may be projecting here.

But could expanded market share make my buddies over at Cakewalk reconsider the Windows-only status of their software?