Over the years I've spent many hours tinkering with the little Windows network in our home, and each time I add a PC it gets a little easier.

But the other day was a first. I opened a new computer, hooked up a keyboard, monitor and mouse, and turned it on. After a few minutes answering simple on-screen questions, I was hooked up to our wireless network, browsing the Web and sharing files with our other computers. A few minutes later, the new computer was beaming images to the printer hooked to my computer in the next room.

I've never had a PC as easy to get running on a Windows network as this one. And the astounding thing: It's a Mac.

A new Mac mini, to be precise - a little jewel of a computer that Apple has priced low enough (starting at US$499 or about HK$3,890) to entice some of us old Windows heathens to try out the Macintosh operating system without breaking the bank. Once we've tried it, Apple figures, we may like it and decide to join the Mac cult - at least as an extracurricular activity.

Until now, Macs have been too pricey for this kind of experimentation. In fact, the next cheapest model is the US$800 eMac, designed primarily for the classroom, with the same underlying hardware as the basic mini and a built-in CRT monitor. The elegant iMac, with a built-in 17-inch flat panel screen, starts at US$1,300.

Apple describes the mini as a "bare-bones'' Mac, and it's probably not the best choice for your first or only computer. In fact, the only thing in the box is the computer - you supply keyboard, mouse and monitor. If you have any of these lying around (which might be the case if you've recently bought a new computer), that's almost all you'll need to set up the mini. To start from scratch, you can find a low-end keyboard, mouse and CRT monitor for US$120 or so, which puts you in front of a working Mac with a nice suite of basic software for as little as US$620.

The pricing scheme also gives schools and individual Mac owners a relatively inexpensive way to add to their hardware collections. And the mini is a beautiful piece of hardware.

One reason: Steve Jobs, Apple's chief executive-for-life, has always paid attention to style and design. In fact, the latest iMacs, like the popular iPod music player, are classics of industrial eye candy - clean, svelte and unbearably hip.

The Mac mini is no exception. The rounded, gray-and-white unit is just 16.5 centimeters square and five cm high, and weighs a mere 1.3 kilograms. The front, sides and top are unadorned, with the exception of the Apple logo and a slot for loading a CD.

My wife thought the mini looked like a box of fancy chocolates, and it's just as easy to pick up, which is why Apple included a locking slot for a security cable on the back. Be warned: This little beauty will be a tempting target.

Apple, of course, makes a big fuss about the tiny footprint, but that's more a matter of hype than breakthrough technology. One reason the mini is so mini is that the power supply is an external brick, just like a laptop's. With an external brick, you don't need an internal fan.

In fact, if you do a calculation and figure out the total volume of the mini, you'll come up with about the same volume as a laptop, minus the space required for a screen, keyboard and battery. So any manufacturer can produce a desktop computer this small. The difference is that Apple decided a tiny machine was marketable, and in doing so, produced a cozy little work of art.

The downside of this diminutive-form factor is zero expandability - at least without cluttering your desktop. The back of the mini has a video port, audio output, two USB 2.0 ports for keyboard and mouse, a Firewire port, network and modem ports.

To plug in a USB printer, scanner, digital camera, flash memory drive, PDA, music player or some other gadget, you'll need a USB hub. These aren't expensive - US$50 or so - but it adds to cost and clutter. The same goes for adding a DVD burner or additional hard drive. External devices are considerably larger and more expensive than internal drives that slide into a traditional PC case.

Under the hood, the mini uses Apple's PowerPC G4 processor, a generation behind the G5 in Apple's current desktop machines, but still a workhorse that can handle virtually any job short of rendering high-resolution video.

There are two basic minis to choose from. The US$499 model comes with a 1.25 GHz processor and skimpy 40-gigabyte hard drive. The US$599 model has a 1.42 GHz processor and 80-gigabyte drive, which is more useful. Both come with 256 megabytes of memory, which is a bit on the chintzy side. But a built-in ATI Radeon 9200 video adapter makes the mini a decent game player - probably better than most low-end PCs.

The mini's standard optical drive can burn CDs and play DVD movies. Apple's Superdrive, which can burn DVDs, is a US$100 option. The unit I tested also had Apple's Airport Extreme wireless network adapter built in, which adds another US$79.

Load the upscale mini with 512 megs of RAM, the Superdrive, Airport and Apple's own wired keyboard and mouse, and you'll wind up paying more than US$900, which is US$200 to US$300 more than a decent PC with similar options. Low-end, consumer-oriented PCs come with at least three USB ports, a robust audio card, and often a front-mounted memory card reader. So the mini is cheap by Apple standards, but still more than comparably equipped PCs.

That's why Apple is pitching the basic mini to longtime Windows users who may have spare peripherals lying around. Just for kicks, I hooked mine to a Dell flat-panel monitor and a keyboard and mouse from the Evil Empire (that's what Macolytes call Microsoft).

The mouse and keyboard worked acceptably on a basic level. The dedicated keys and buttons that depend on Windows to launch the Web browser, e-mail and such didn't function. But I was pleasantly surprised when I pointed at a folder, clicked the right mouse button and saw a context-sensitive menu pop up.

For years, the one-button mouse has been part of the Mac catechism - the original Mac designers thought two buttons would be too confusing, a proposition that 200 million Windows users would disagree with. Mac purists probably cringe at this heresy, but it's heartening to see that the programmers of Panther (the latest version of Mac's OS X) recognize the value of a feature that so many Windows users rely on.

I also appreciated the Mac's monitor calibration utility. It turns out that Apple monitors expect higher brightness levels than screens designed for Intel-based computers. As a result, when OS X started up, my display appeared washed out. But a well-explained, step-by-step program allowed me to adjust the brightness, contrast and gamma for my screen.

So there you have it. You can now buy a bare-bones Mac, hook it up to your current equipment, and expect it to play nicely with a Windows network. But the big question remains: Is the Mac operating system really that much slicker and easier to use than Windows?

I'll play with it for a while and let you know.