Amid all the weird and wonderful announcements at CES 2025, there is one accessory for an Apple product that caught my eye. Remember the M4 Mac mini's awkwardly placed power button, which requires you to lift the device to power it on? It's one of the most baffling design decisions Apple has ever made. Now, accessory maker Satechi has a solution for that.
The company's CES launches include the Mac Mini M4 Stand & Hub with SSD Enclosure, which has a cutout exactly where the Mac mini's power button is located. This means that you can press the power button without moving the Mac mini all that much. The dock sits flush against the base of the Mac mini, and only raises the height of the device a little bit. That, coupled with the cutout, is enough to let you easily press the power button.
The Satechi dock has a USB-C cable that allows it to connect to the M4 Mac mini, which means that you'll have to sacrifice one USB port on your computer to use this dock. It also has an SSD enclosure that lets you expand your Mac mini's storage by up to 4TB. Additionally, it includes useful ports on the front—an SD card slot and three USB-A ports. (Every photographer will tell you that it's incredibly convenient to not have to contort yourself to plug in an SD card.) Satechi claims that the aluminum dock has heat-dissipating vents that keep the device cool, but those claims remain untested at the moment.
This Satechi dock is scheduled to release in Spring 2025; there's no price for it yet. If it's priced well and works as advertised, then it may offer a nice alternative way to upgrade the storage on the new M4 Mac mini. Now, someone: Please make something as elegant to let me charge Apple's Magic Mouse.
