i5 or i7 Mac Mini

[secretkillerofnames]

Hi all!

I'm about to upgrade from my tired 2010 Dual Core Mac Mini which is very lacking with regard to what I can do in Usine.
I'm lucky if I can get one sequencer, one synth and two effects working at 1024 buffer.
My budget is limited but my plan is to get at least 8gb, with a 256 SSD.
Looking at whether I should spend more on an iMac for QuadCore i5 or go for a cheaper i5 or i7 Haswell.
My i5 Macbook Air copes much better with Usine but I've read that i5 Haswell chips don't support hyper-threading whereas i7 Haswell chips do.
I've also read some forum posts here stating that hyper-threading is not useful for music making.
I understand that modern OSX supports it at the OS level - so i'm wondering is there any point going for an i7?
I will likely be doing a lot of DAW rendering but i'm not as concerned with how quickly it renders audio that how well the system as a whole copes with real-time performance.
Thanks in advance for any advice.

[secretkillerofnames]

OK... nevermind. I ended up finding an ex demo i7 quad with 16gb 256ssd for nearly half the price of a new one.
Should get me out of trouble.