Apple Blurs the Server Line With Mac Mini Server 557
Toe, The writes "Today Apple announced several new hardware offerings, including a new Mac mini, their (almost-literally) pint-sized desktop computer. In a bizarre twist, they are now also offering a Mac mini with Mac OS X Server bundled in, along with a two hard drives somehow stuffed into the tiny package. Undoubtedly, many in the IT community will scoff at the thought of calling such a device a 'server.' However, with the robust capabilities of Snow Leopard Server (a true, if highly GUI-fied, UNIX server), it seems likely to find a niche in small businesses and even enthusiasts' homes. The almost completely guided setup process means that people can set up relatively sophisticated services without the assistance of someone who actually knows what they are doing. What the results will be in terms of security, etc. will be... interesting to watch as they develop." El Reg has a good roundup article of the many announcements; the multi-touch Magic Mouse is right up there on the techno-lust-inspiration scale.
I can see plenty of uses for it. (Score:5, Interesting)
The small form factor would make it easy for a developer to keep one on the (literal) desktop alongside a workstation. Personally, I'd use virtualization instead, but others may prefer having a physical box to play with.
Re:I can see plenty of uses for it. (Score:5, Interesting)
If you're going to put Debian or Ubuntu on it, you might as well get the regular mini. Part of the value is that the Mac mini Server is only $100 more than the standard mini equipped with a single 500 GB drive, when OS X Server costs $500 on its own. I think it's an interesting package. Not everyone needs a Mac Pro or XServe for a server. The mini is plenty for a small scale server, and OS X Server is easy to set up.
Re:I can see plenty of uses for it. (Score:3, Interesting)
I've done this for years.... (Score:5, Interesting)
I put OS 10.4-Server (10-Client version) on a Mac Mini back in 2006 and continued to pick up used mac minis for less than $200 each to play around with Xgrid. Eventually I moved the server over to an old dual core PowerMac G4 tower and used all the Mac Minis as render nodes, but it was a fun little project and worked extremely well for rendering blender, compressor, and Final Cut projects. I even put screamernet II on them for lightwave rendering as well. I had about $4500 invested in the project, the price of a decent Macpro, and had a distributed rendering grid.
With the release of some tools like Xgrid Lite, there wasn't the need to go with the full blown Server version of OSX in OS 10.5 or 10.6. Everything I needed could be downloaded with the xserve remote admin kit and a default install of OSX.
But for the year or more I used the Mac Mini as a home server, it worked extremely well. It just sat on the bookshelf and frankly I just ignored it 90% of the time because it did exactly what it needed. I'd log in every month or so to do updates, etc. But it was pretty much turn on and forget. Plus it didn't suck down as much power as the PowerMac. Something I learned once I moved out of an apartment with the utilities included and into my house.
Re:For those who need a server... (Score:4, Interesting)
Yeah, or universities and such in need of a budget supercomputer. You can easily create a cluster of these things by using Xgrid [apple.com] and because of the small form factor, you won't have to reserve an entire room for this setup.
Or if you do have a room to spare, you can cram insane amounts of gigahertzes and terabytes in there for relatively little money.
Real shot is at Microsoft for small business... (Score:5, Interesting)
For small business purposes, Microsoft server offerings are horrid. Windows Server OEM price! is $800, and then there is the whole "client access liscence" crap where until you pay even more if you want more than 5 computers to talk to your server!
This, on the other hand, is a complete system for $1000, thats silent (so you can have it in your office, suprisingly important!), doesn't have client access liscence crap, and can support a bunch of windows systems as well as macs for file sharing, email, calendaring if you want to use Mozilla rather than Outlook, etc etc etc.... Don't have enough storage for your liking? Simply add a 4 TB external USB array for $800...
Its a really brutal product to deal with if you are Microsoft.
Re:Passive-aggressive mice (Score:3, Interesting)
But Jobs put two buttons on the NeXT mouse!
Re:Snow Leopard is not a "true UNIX" (Score:2, Interesting)
Apple's been using the UNIX trademark in relation to Snow Leopard for quite a while. Either 10.6 is certified (as Apple's website seems to imply), or The Open Group is in danger of losing their trademark.
New imacs make the mac pro look even more over pri (Score:3, Interesting)
New imacs make the mac pro look even more over priced pay $1000 more to get smaller HD, much weak video, and less ram. Also why still 9400m in the $1200 imac? and the base mini should have bigger then a 160g and better video then 9400m at $600 and $800. The imcas just keep getting bigger and bigger how about people who don't have room 20inch+ systems to get new hardware.
also only dual cores in $1200, $1500, $1700 imacs?
Re:I can see plenty of uses for it. (Score:3, Interesting)
Asus Eee Box
My eee gets "hot" in an hour and approaches boiling water temperature in two or so... Luckily the battery only lasts a couple hours.
On the other hand, my wife's mac mini runs DVD transcode jobs overnight with no obvious temperature problems.
Have you actually tried running an eee more than a couple hours?
Note that we probably have different eee models, yours might run cold or have a fan that actually does something.
mod parent up (Score:3, Interesting)
Excellent point - iPhoto is one area where Apple seems to continue to miss the boat. It is very slow for what it does, and sharing photos (which it already does do from the client) takes forever over gigabit networks. Backup is theoretically easy ("just copy the iphoto library from one computer to another!) but in the real world is a mess (not at all automated, and when you take two different computers to different photo shoots, for example, you wind up with different libraries and synchronizing them is not as easy). It's quite frustrating to have your slideshow up on a projector and then think, oh, those photos are on a different computer...
I have to say I have the same problem with iTunes. Lots of great potential there but the actual sharing software is way too slow to be useful with large libraries, and there is no easy way to maintain one master music collection on a hard drive being served to different computers. Instead you wind up with several different libraries across different boxes, each incomplete in a different way. It would be great to see Apple integrate server technology into these tools for home entertainment centers and other home server applications.
Re:I can see plenty of uses for it. (Score:4, Interesting)
No. Can you buy one that fits in 6.5x6.5x2", has gigabit ethernet, 802.11n, FireWire 800, dual display support, and uses 16w? I don't see that listed anywhere BUT apple.com. Nice try at trolling though.
Re:Real shot is at Microsoft for small business... (Score:2, Interesting)
Unless your small business gets free IT support, I'm not sure how you can claim Microsoft's offerings are overpriced. SBS retails at $600 with 5 CALs, OEM is cheaper. Service ends up being the major cost regardless of platform and much as it pains me to give props to Microsoft, SBS runs pretty darn well.
I would never run a Mac server at this point because it can't be virtualized. For a small business virtualization is a godsend (your server is no longer tied to a particular piece of hardware.) The fact that Apple is still obsessed with their sexy hardware suggests to me that they're about to miss the biggest change in IT in quite a while.
Now a small server appliance that's simply a bridge to "Other People's Servers" (i.e. cloud computing hype) and you have something - that may be the direction they'll go.
Good idea (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:For those who need a server... (Score:3, Interesting)
Well, the original poster said "cramp LOADS of those things in a small space", which I would interpret to be more than 8 at least. Plus, the price doesn't account for the numerous nice things blades get you over a shelf full of minis, like a backplane instead of individual cables all over, organization, remote console, more efficient energy use, hot swap stuff...
Re:I can see plenty of uses for it. (Score:5, Interesting)
Lenovo sells what's essentially an Eee Box (atom processor+motherboard) in a midtower case for $200 shipped if you shop around on their website. I've seen it for less. It includes a DVD+/-R optical drive and 1 spare SATA port, for a total of three drives. It also includes a PCI slot where you could add a 4 SATA port expansion card. Hard drives only eat about 5w a piece, so the meager power supply shouldn't have trouble with the "extra load" at all. My buddy just put together something similar from newegg, but he went with the Atom 320 processor (64 bit, dual core atom) for a few bucks more. It's his primary file server now.
We've been using a Mac Mini as a server... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:I can see plenty of uses for it. (Score:5, Interesting)
That's not actually that much of a hinderance. None of my servers have an optical drive, either. When I need to load something from CD, I have a USB Blu-Ray drive that I can cannibalize from my HTPC for the purpose.
I can see a definite market for this, too. I built a super-server a year and a half ago (you know the type, multipe physical CPU's representing 8 logical cores, 16GB of RAM, multiple terabytes of storage, running half a dozen virtual machines, each one having its own set of services, in order to present a complete framework, etc.), but other than that, the overwhelming majority of the servers I run/administrate would do just fine with Mac Mini hardware. They're small purpose-built servers whose primary design goal beyond its actual purpose is power efficiency. At home, for example, I have a small file server. It serves up MP3's and videos to my HTPCs. It also has a network share drive for saving/sharing documents between computers on the network. Beyond that, it's also got a small MySQL/Apache/PHP implementation, and I use it to test web pages when I'm designing them... I just save/work on the files on the appropriate folder on the network drive, and they're live to the internal network immediately. This system is low end... aside from the hard drive (which is as big as I could get in the system), it's running a Via C7 1.5GHz, with 2GB of RAM. I could very easily replace that system with a Mac Mini.
Re:DC Power (Score:2, Interesting)
Plus I'd assume that it needs close to bang on 18.5V, whereas 48V enterprise stuff is good within ±25%, generally...
Not that I see central offices lining up to get mac minis anyways.
Old news to those who know (Score:3, Interesting)
Apple did not do this because they are trying to gain new customers. They did it because existing Apple customers already have been doing this for a long time.
Putting OSX Server onto little Mac Minis has been going on for a long time. People strap them to the back of plasma TVs, use them in point-of-sale, put them in kiosk boxes that use a modem for remote administration, or use them for a test server on their desk. Let's face it, I don't want to put a rack mount 1U XServe on my desk when I could just use a Mac Mini and basically get the same software features on much MUCH cheaper hardware.
That is why people want OSX Server on the Mac Mini; dev/testing, kiosks, and other rough-environment deployments.
Re:I've done this for years.... (Score:3, Interesting)
Mine sits under my TV and acts as a file server, SSH box if I need to bounce something through it, VPN server if I don't want my e-mail traveling over public wifi or something and a PVR that records (over firewire) from the cable box then compresses to highdef h264, all scheduled by iCal events. All while sipping power.
This is awesome and just what I need (Score:3, Interesting)
This mini server would complete the picture and do it without requiring a server closet...which is good because we don't have the room for one. We don't need or want massive processing power...we want compactness, reliability and energy efficiency. Our server is mounted on the wall of a warehouse room where we store large quantities of wiring, tools and other supplies, and as we are short on space this would be very welcome. I imagine the reduced frustration would increase our productivity and make management a lot easier without needing to call up the IT company all the time. We install a lot of renewable energy equipment so energy consciousness in our own office is something we pay attention to. People who scoff at this thing simply don't work with or see applications where this would be a perfect drop-in solution. Apple is once again offering something that nobody else is capable of and I am glad they have paid attention to something a lot of people need but cannot otherwise find. At my company Linux is not even remotely an option, so fanboys can go pound sand.
Re:I can see plenty of uses for it. (Score:4, Interesting)
Thanks for mentioning that. I was about to bring up www.macminicolo.net [macminicolo.net] and others like it. Lots of colo sites love the mini because they are only equivalent to 1/2U of rack space (about 1/3U wide x 1.5U tall), but a mere fraction of the depth of most rackmount server gear. In terms of server hardware, you can't even approach that level of density without using blade servers, and you'll spend more for an empty blade server chassis than you spend for two decked out Mini servers running Mac OS X Server (at the new price).
Easy. The server model has no optical drive. This means that you'll have to have another Mac (remote optical thing) or an external drive when you need to upgrade the OS. Otherwise, for a server box, you'll never use one anyway, so it makes a lot of sense. :-)
For whatever it's worth, I'm using a Mac Mini for my personal server and couldn't be happier. I used to run an old Mac G4 tower, but wanted to be able to do faster photo rendering for generating thumbnails, etc. The Mini fit the bill perfectly, bringing the time per photo down from 30 seconds per RAW file to about 5 seconds, and a subsequent software rewrite from using dcraw and Imlib2 to using sips (Mac OS X's built-in image processing tool) cut that time in half again.
I back it up with Time Machine to the same Airport base station that I use for backing up my laptop, so I just don't have to think about it. It just runs. Every so often, I turn on the monitor and log in to install software updates or security updates. Would I expect my parents to run a server like that? Probably not. Do I think the Mini makes a great personal server for the sorts of people who are inclined to use one? Absolutely.
Re:I can see plenty of uses for it. (Score:3, Interesting)
Mythic beasts [mythic-beasts.com] have been using Mac-Minis and even Apple TVs for web hosting for years.
I have never used them myself, but it looks interesting.
Re:I can see plenty of uses for it. (Score:3, Interesting)
Website hosting on mac mini (Score:1, Interesting)
I host my website on a mac mini, and in fact manage a few mac minis as dedicated servers. They make pretty good machines for web hosting, due to low power consumption, and the fact you can fit about 8 in 3U of rackspace/
Photo:
http://www.exotica.org.uk/wiki/File:Macmini-rack.jpg [exotica.org.uk]
Not running OSX mind, but Debian. More info on http://www.exotica.org.uk/wiki/ExoticA:Hosting [exotica.org.uk]
Re:Ouch! (Score:3, Interesting)
Yes, it's a slick strategy. You're right: Apple doesn't compete in the commodity PC space.
But why are you picking on your art department?
You say that people buy Macs because they are "chic, cool, and exclusive -- a luxury item", as if your fellow employees wanted them just to boost their egos. To say that, you need to deliberately ignore a very important fact, and what is probably the real reason your art department wants Mac hardware: Mac hardware runs OS X, and runs it well.
Why not give your artists the benefit of the doubt?