It can be a helpful start, but color is a tricky thing in mineralogy, since small impurities can change the color of a mineral.
I always say it like this: when you think of macaroni and cheese, you always think of it being yellow. A nice bowl of yellow macaroni and cheese (mmm!). Do you use color to identify it? Sure, but you use other things, too: smell, taste, composition (it's noodles and cheese), and such.
But how about if you dropped a bit of blue food coloring in the bowl? Suddenly you have blue macaroni and cheese. It looks weird, sure, but does it smell different? no. Does it taste different? No. Is the composition different? Not really (a small drop of food coloring is added, but what is a drop compared to a whole bowl?). All in all, it's still just a bowl of macaroni and cheese. But if you were just using color, you would have said it wasn't, because mac and cheese "is usually yellow". That "usually" is the kicker which can give a geologist a head start, but it's not an absolute. The drop of food coloring is like little chemical impurities or additions in minerals which can give them another color without really changing their composition or chemistry (this is why quartz has so many color varieties [citrine, amethys, rose, smoky] but at the end of the day they're all just quartz, SiO2)
Minerals can change color based on small impurities.
color streak cleavage fracture hardness transparency luster
Minerals will have many different characteristics which can be used together to identify them.Density or specific gravity would be one element of the identification.You might also use: Color & Texture Melting Point Reactions with various chemicals. Identification of reaction products.
cause some minerals have the same color streak as others
there is no such indicator.the only way is to add the acidic and basic indicators ,if it does not change the colour of the solution then it is neutral.
Color can change in a mineral when in certain temperatures
Because some minerals dont have a streak, or may share a streak colour with another mineral.
You can test its hardness on other minerals to find it hardness. It can help classify it better.
yes it is
yes it is
cheese
Since some minerals are magnetic and some are not, that can be one of several criteria used to distinguish different minerals.
Minerals can change color based on small impurities.
I think its Specific Gravity :)
x-rays
chemical tests and x-rays
The stripe, and color