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Apple Blurs the Server Line With Mac Mini Server
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.
that focuses primarily on the visual aesthetics of the physical box that it's housed in.
So if this is the future...where's my jet pack?
Apple's actually pretty good at this, although it can lead to the same sorts of problems many businesses face with regard to Windows-based server solutions. The easier something is for "anybody" to set up, the less likely an organization will be to keep a good admin around. So when stuff blows up, they can find themselves scrambling for someone to fix problems.
512 MB RAM, 20 GB disk, 200 GB transfer, five datacenters. $19.95/month.
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.
As an admin on a mix mac/linux network(well, we do have to support 4 pcs, but only grudingly), I would say that Apple's tools are pretty nice, and have progressed immensely during the lifespan of Leopard(Tigers Open Directory was buggy as hell, Leopard has been pretty rock solid), the GUIs actually work really well UNTIL something goes wrong. Then trying to wade through the mish-mash of manual configs vs. gui configs(not to mention you don't really know what the GUI is doing) trying to track down the problem is a real mess.
Overall, if you want centralized logins at your mac-centric organization I would definitely recommend a Mac Server, largely because LDAP config on Linux still isn't quite as simple as it is on a mac, but for everything else(web, database, file shares etc.) I would go Linux.
The nice thing about the mac clients is that they support most of these technologies out of the box. For instance sharing NFS between macs and Linux is pretty braindead simple. Of course, that *other* OS still doesn't support NFs out of the box. I mean, I guess you have to give them a little slack, the protocol is only 20 years old....
Monstar L
That is a recipe for disaster waiting to happen. I've been in the unfortunate spot of representing a consulting company called in to configure a Mac OSX Server purchased by less-than-knowledgeable employees. It was a small business, about 5-10 people, that did contract-based graphic design/marketing. They loved Apple stuff, and were suckered into a completely unnecessary Xserve system, complete with overpriced external rack-mount tape backup drive. Being young and mildly tech-conscious, they overestimated their ability to manage this thing, doubtlessly egged on by some "whiz" at a Genius Bar waxing their balls about how well they'd be able to run it on their own.
Wrong. Granted, it's not hard to someone like me who does this sort of thing for a living, but managing backups was way out of their league. The backups weren't even running, though they remained blissfully unaware of this fact, and setting up network shares/user permissions was beyond their capability. This ended up costing them way more than ever needed to spend to get what amounted to a file server up and running, and I blame this on bad marketing.
Oh, we tried to convince them to sell their ridiculously overpowered server equipment before it depreciated in value, but they were insistent on using it, because it's Apple.
Misleading marketing like this is exactly what drives the borderline masochistic relationship Apple nuts have with Apple. All I can do is shake my head.
Seriously, this thing could be a nice little Subversion/backup/collaboration server for a small iPhone development shop. With built-in CalDAV, email, wiki, svn, time machine, rsync, web server, etc., it's a nice little small workgroup server. It would be nice if they could have made it cost a little less, but having a small, quiet server in a home or small office is pretty valuable.
E pluribus unum
"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"
A caveat: the server does not have an optical drive (that's where they stuffed the other HD). Still a good deal, just not quite as good as on first glance.
"As God is my witness, I thought turkeys could fly." A. Carlson
Don't use the Guest Account!
Do they come in pink?
Fail. Epic fail.