I found the fix for the horribly-slow performance of Safari on the Mac: google chrome.
I'm a relatively new Mac OSX user so I am still getting used to the feel of things, but after upgrading to Snow Leopard last weekend the Mac mini has been noticeably slower, especially when using Safari. I check every now and then for Chrome on the mac and until today always hit a dead end. But, there now is a pre-beta version available for public consumption (google calls the early-access release levels "Dev Channel" and "Beta Channel," where "Dev Channel" roughly equates to "alpha.")
The difference is immediately noticeable: no more wait icon when trying to create a new tab, no more waiting while the tab contents are grayed out when choosing a previous page, etc., and switching tabs is snappy. From google's description of the Dev Channel it sounds like what is reasonably stable today could at any time become unstable, but the build I am using right now is working great, so no complaints at all.
