Hand him a 512MB video card and have him let you know when he's got it installed in the Mini.
"Hand him a 512MB video card and have him let you know when he's got it installed in the Mini."
Irrelevant. The Mini is just a well designed micro PC, not intented for the uber cards for gaming or 3-d, but it's specs are as good or better than your average desktop tower. (Which will never get a $500 video card, either, not everyone is an uber gamer or CAD user). Yes, it has limitations - it uses slower laptop drives, limited in the amount of ram it can have, small power supply, but it's got a LOT of bang for it's buck - and the thing is really dinky -they did a great job engineering the thing. Expect a refresh at Macworld next week, or sometime this spring.
Apple did'nt invent the form factor, but they improved on it (and been copied already), and as a cheap entry to the Mac world it can't be beat, as it'll run most applications just fine, and now the Intel version will dual boot to Windows XP or run XP in Parallels in a virtual box. Not bad for $500 - or cheaper if you pick one up used.
I hear it runs Vista just fine, too...