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I was able to cancel my ebay order, and I opted for a better mac mini still 2012 but with 16tb and a fusion 1tb SSD/HDD(half and half) It was 220$ Canadian bought from someone so I got it the next day
Got it all set up and it works like a charm for infuse and I'm sharing with a cousin for plex.

I compared it to the one on macsales and exchange rate wise woul'dve been more expensive not to count the shipping as well and possible duties.
 
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I just grabbed a cheap M1 mini to replace my 2014 mini server, and sent the 2014 to the garage wall mounted.

I use the mini as a headless file server, primarily running a dual 3.5 inch drive dock with a 3rd redundant backup drive that remotely backs up using SyncFolders Pro+ from my upstairs backup drives. When using the mini as a headless server, if you want to screen share to it in order to administrate it remotely, you need to plug in a dummy HDMI dongle that virtualizes having a monitor attached. Those are like $6 on amazon. I had an Etsy seller who I used a lot for my server rack print me up a Mac mini 1U mount.

IMG_2652.jpeg
 
I've got one 2014 mini (2.6 i5, 16 Gb, 256 SSD) running Ubuntu 22.04 LTS as a server doing homebridge/Pihole duties (with HDMI dummy plug), and a 2014 21.5" iMac (1.4 i5, 8 GB, 256 SSD) with some large external hard drives as my Time Machine backup/file server. I would have used a mini as a fileserver instead, but I already had the iMac and don't want to spend any money if I have something that works fine. It's a great system, and both machines sip electricity (~5 watts each during normal operation with screen off). Back in the day my old file servers (first a G4, then G5, then MP 3,1, etc.) would use 100-200+ watts running 24/7. I'm very happy with the electricity savings.
 
I was able to cancel my ebay order, and I opted for a better mac mini still 2012 but with 16tb and a fusion 1tb SSD/HDD(half and half) It was 220$ Canadian bought from someone so I got it the next day
Got it all set up and it works like a charm for infuse and I'm sharing with a cousin for plex.

I compared it to the one on macsales and exchange rate wise woul'dve been more expensive not to count the shipping as well and possible duties.
Anyone having issues with theirs?
Mines constantly ends up with a black screen with the mouse frozen. I realize this when I try to log in through screen sharing when I can't log in "Unable to communicate with “ip adress”. Make sure the remote computer is available and the firewall is not blocking screen sharing."
So I end up getting my screen connected through it and then I see it has a black screen with the mouse frozen.

At least I can still view my files on infuse on my apple tv. However its rather quite annoying since I have to end up rebooting it which could potentially mess up with ext hdd connected to it.

I'm close to just getting a M2 Mac Mini from the apple store however I don't know if 8GB would be enough. I don't really care about the disk space.


I've read online that Open Core Legacy Patcher to update might fix this.
I think this will be my last resort with updating it to Sonoma.
 
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Mine opens right up in screen sharing. It runs (headless) 24/7 as a file server and time machine destination with four 5tb hard disks attached and MacOS on the original internal SSD. I have a base 2014 Mini that I use as a dedicated media server.

Screen Shot 2024-06-25 at 11.11.46 AM.png
 
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A couple of notes in no particular order:

• The power efficiency of 2012 Intel processors is below subpar by modern standards. Might be important if electricity is expensive in your region.
• Back in the day, there used to be macOS Server, which was a viable alternative to storing data in iCloud. It's not anymore. You won't be able to store your data (except for files) in a convenient matter, no matter how you try.
• Automating this **** with Ansible might be really fun
• The only real advantage of macOS over Linux is support for Content Caching, and convenient remote desktoping experience from other macOS computers. Also iTunes home libraries but nobody uses that in the age of Apple Music.
• You can fit two SATA SSDs in there if you really want. Forget about HDDs, they're not worth it anymore.
• Docker on macOS is somewhat limited to its real Linux counterpart
• Don't you dare use this as so-called HTPC. Just don't. This idea always sucked.
• Use Ethernet. Wi-Fi is a shared resource, which means network load will be essentially doubled.

Other that that... Plex is a nice app for watching pirated/backed-up media from your Apple TV. File sharing and remote access can be set up with native macOS tools.
 
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I might purchase a OWC mac mini 2012 i5 bare boned TODAY and use that instead of my monterey mac mini M1 that is incredible, but too much  pestering and nudging me poor tender soul with tv and music subsc wanting me to join their thankless icloud cult.
i have not used the macbook air m1 today and prob wont.
 
A couple of notes in no particular order:

• The power efficiency of 2012 Intel processors is below subpar by modern standards. Might be important if electricity is expensive in your region.
• Back in the day, there used to be macOS Server, which was a viable alternative to storing data in iCloud. It's not anymore. You won't be able to store your data (except for files) in a convenient matter, no matter how you try.
• Automating this **** with Ansible might be really fun
• The only real advantage of macOS over Linux is support for Content Caching, and convenient remote desktoping experience from other macOS computers. Also iTunes home libraries but nobody uses that in the age of Apple Music.
• You can fit two SATA SSDs in there if you really want. Forget about HDDs, they're not worth it anymore.
• Docker on macOS is somewhat limited to its real Linux counterpart
• Don't you dare use this as so-called HTPC. Just don't. This idea always sucked.
• Use Ethernet. Wi-Fi is a shared resource, which means network load will be essentially doubled.

Other that that... Plex is a nice app for watching pirated/backed-up media from your Apple TV. File sharing and remote access can be set up with native macOS tools.
I find this is a really limited view.

  • Just because it’s not in iCloud doesn’t mean it’s inconvenient. You can back up your Macs to it and use it as a large USB for all the stuff you don’t need constant access to outside of the house. OWC has a USB C enclosure for $220 or so to store up to I think 80TB.
  • On a Mac forum, easy Remote Desktop and a familiar interface is huge. I’m a big macOS and somewhat windows user, so having an OS I’m comfortable with was a big one for me.
  • HDDs are absolutely worth it to store over, 1-2TB.
  • If you need docker, you can run a lightweight VM.
  • On the topic of home theater, a Plex server is a great to serve media to your home theater. I prefer using Infuse on Apple TV. Have your Mac server and Apple TV on Ethernet and you can stream Bluetooth.

I had a 2012 Mac mini for a while. I got a crazy steal on a 2018 15” MBP with a cracked screen for $180 or so. So I removed that screen and have a Thunderbolt OWC dock with 24TB of storage in RAID10, a power adapter and a 2.5 Gigabit Ethernet adapter connected. Here’s some features my server has had over the years, for those looking for ideas:

  • Plex media server
  • Photos server (photos app now LR)
  • FCPX project server long term storage
  • General long term storage
  • Backup destination for my Macs
  • Rclone drive for sensitive information
  • Web server in a VM for testing
  • Docker stack in a VM.

That’s just what comes to mind
 
A couple of notes in no particular order:

• The power efficiency of 2012 Intel processors is below subpar by modern standards. Might be important if electricity is expensive in your region.

If it's still sipping 5W, does it really matter that newer processors have better performance/watt if you don't use the performance and the other overheads of newer systems mean they are using more than 5W?

• The only real advantage of macOS over Linux is support for Content Caching, and convenient remote desktoping experience from other macOS computers. Also iTunes home libraries but nobody uses that in the age of Apple Music.

Unless of course you like macOS and don't want a different GUI or command-line experience between this machine and your other machines.

Also not everyone uses Apple Music and some people don't want to be logged into Apple/iCloud 24x7.

• You can fit two SATA SSDs in there if you really want. Forget about HDDs, they're not worth it anymore.

The use cases where HDD make sense continues to narrow but there are still some. I'd say the generalization should be unless you know why you need an HDD you should get an SSD.

• Docker on macOS is somewhat limited to its real Linux counterpart

True but it still works surprisingly well for enthusiast (as opposed to enterprise/HA) purposes.

• Don't you dare use this as so-called HTPC. Just don't. This idea always sucked.

And yet some people do just that.
 
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I find this is a really limited view.

  • Just because it’s not in iCloud doesn’t mean it’s inconvenient. You can back up your Macs to it and use it as a large USB for all the stuff you don’t need constant access to outside of the house. OWC has a USB C enclosure for $220 or so to store up to I think 80TB.
Sure, but this solution won't be integrated well into Apple's ecosystem. Even connecting to shared file storage is still a bit messy in macOS, it just doesn't feel right compared to iCloud Drive.

And I think that's done intentionally, so users won't dare to own their data and host everything locally. It's easier for NSA to access your data when it's offloaded to some cloud server... okay sorry for bringing up the conspiracy theories.


  • HDDs are absolutely worth it to store over, 1-2TB.
Disagree :)

Mac mini has limited space inside. It can fit up to two 9.5 mm drives. Any 2.5" drives of 3 TB or higher capacity will be thicker, usually 12 mm or 15 mm. It's possible to fit one "the hard way", but that won't look nice.

Also HDDs tend to fail, while SSDs are not. Higher upfront cost of SSD will be compensated by lower power consumption + you won't have to urgently replace it after 5 years when the spinning rust dies. Flash storage simply saves money in the long term.

Plus, SSDs are silent and don't vibrate, so you don't have to hide that server in the closet; you can keep it visible and even sleep alongside it.


If it's still sipping 5W, does it really matter that newer processors have better performance/watt if you don't use the performance and the other overheads of newer systems mean they are using more than 5W?
Where 2012's Ivy Bridge consumes 5W, 2018's Coffee Lake will consume ~3W, M1 will consume less than a watt, and Raspberry Pi 5 probably even less than that. Multiply that by 365 days of uptime and savings might become noticeable.


And yet some use HTPC.
And I feel sorry for them! They get lacklustre movie playback experience (no 24 Hz support, no color space matching, no Dolby Vision or HDR10+), wacky interface that's not optimised for the big screen, lack of HDMI-CEC support and many other inconveniences. It's a thing of the past. Just use Apple TV instead.
 
Sure, but this solution won't be integrated well into Apple's ecosystem. Even connecting to shared file storage is still a bit messy in macOS, it just doesn't feel right compared to iCloud Drive.

And I think that's done intentionally, so users won't dare to own their data and host everything locally. It's easier for NSA to access your data when it's offloaded to some cloud server... okay sorry for bringing up the conspiracy theories.

I mean you go to your computer network, hit sign in, and that’s it. You can save credentials. And if there’s a folder you have an alias or shortcut for that’s on the server, and you select it, it’ll auto-connect. Can’t get much easier…

Disagree :)

Mac mini has limited space inside. It can fit up to two 9.5 mm drives. Any 2.5" drives of 3 TB or higher capacity will be thicker, usually 12 mm or 15 mm. It's possible to fit one "the hard way", but that won't look nice.

Also HDDs tend to fail, while SSDs are not. Higher upfront cost of SSD will be compensated by lower power consumption + you won't have to urgently replace it after 5 years when the spinning rust dies. Flash storage simply saves money in the long term.

Plus, SSDs are silent and don't vibrate, so you don't have to hide that server in the closet; you can keep it visible and even sleep alongside it.

I have a couple 8 year old drives churning. Outside of a They’re more reliable than they used to be, especially if you keep them spun up. You’d be surprised how much storage is still spinning. Sure, if you must use the Mini footprint, then go for it. As I shared previously, OWC makes a fantastic external array.

SSDs also don’t love lots of writes, they get “tired.” Not good for say, an NVR.

I have roughly 24TB of misc data. I could put that on a single $500 drive. To do that on an SSD, I’d need roughly $1200. That’s before we talk about redundancy… (1,2,3 method!). There’s the right storage for the right use case.
 
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Sure, but this solution won't be integrated well into Apple's ecosystem. Even connecting to shared file storage is still a bit messy in macOS, it just doesn't feel right compared to iCloud Drive.

And I think that's done intentionally, so users won't dare to own their data and host everything locally. It's easier for NSA to access your data when it's offloaded to some cloud server... okay sorry for bringing up the conspiracy theories.



Disagree :)

Mac mini has limited space inside. It can fit up to two 9.5 mm drives. Any 2.5" drives of 3 TB or higher capacity will be thicker, usually 12 mm or 15 mm. It's possible to fit one "the hard way", but that won't look nice.

Also HDDs tend to fail, while SSDs are not. Higher upfront cost of SSD will be compensated by lower power consumption + you won't have to urgently replace it after 5 years when the spinning rust dies. Flash storage simply saves money in the long term.

Plus, SSDs are silent and don't vibrate, so you don't have to hide that server in the closet; you can keep it visible and even sleep alongside it.



Where 2012's Ivy Bridge consumes 5W, 2018's Coffee Lake will consume ~3W, M1 will consume less than a watt, and Raspberry Pi 5 probably even less than that. Multiply that by 365 days of uptime and savings might become noticeable.



And I feel sorry for them! They get lacklustre movie playback experience (no 24 Hz support, no color space matching, no Dolby Vision or HDR10+), wacky interface that's not optimised for the big screen, lack of HDMI-CEC support and many other inconveniences. It's a thing of the past. Just use Apple TV instead.

It's okay you can still be happy even when people make different choices than you.
 
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Man its still crashing now completely.
panic(cpu 2 caller 0xffffff802e2b089b): userspace watchdog timeout: no successful checkins from WindowServer (2 induced crashes) in 120 seconds


WindowServer has not exited since first loaded


service: logd, total successful checkins in 34850 seconds: 3485, last successful checkin: 0 seconds ago


service: WindowServer (2 induced crashes), total successful checkins in 34810 seconds: 3469, last successful checkin: 120 seconds ago


service: opendirectoryd, total successful checkins in 34850 seconds: 3484, last successful checkin: 0 seconds ago


service: configd, total successful checkins in 34850 seconds: 3485, last successful checkin: 0 seconds ago





Panicked task 0xffffffaa627259d8: 3 threads: pid 87: watchdogd


Backtrace (CPU 2), panicked thread: 0xffffffa59706e598, Frame : Return Address


0xffffffcea718f520 : 0xffffff802b626481 mach_kernel : _handle_debugger_trap + 0x4b1


0xffffffcea718f570 : 0xffffff802b78bb10 mach_kernel : _kdp_i386_trap + 0x110


0xffffffcea718f5b0 : 0xffffff802b77b0cc mach_kernel : _kernel_trap + 0x55c


0xffffffcea718f630 : 0xffffff802b5bf971 mach_kernel : _return_from_trap + 0xc1


0xffffffcea718f650 : 0xffffff802b62676d mach_kernel : _DebuggerTrapWithState + 0x5d


0xffffffcea718f740 : 0xffffff802b625e13 mach_kernel : _panic_trap_to_debugger + 0x1e3


0xffffffcea718f7a0 : 0xffffff802bddb3de mach_kernel : _panic_with_options + 0x89


0xffffffcea718f890 : 0xffffff802e2b089b com.apple.driver.watchdog : __ZN10IOWatchdog14userspacePanicEP8OSObjectPvP25IOExternalMethodArguments.cold.1 + 0x27


0xffffffcea718f8a0 : 0xffffff802e2b0356 com.apple.driver.watchdog : __ZN10IOWatchdog14userspacePanicEP8OSObjectPvP25IOExternalMethodArguments + 0x2e


0xffffffcea718f8c0 : 0xffffff802e2af41d com.apple.driver.watchdog : __ZN20IOWatchdogUserClient14externalMethodEjP25IOExternalMethodArgumentsP24IOExternalMethodDispatchP8OSObjectPv + 0x83


0xffffffcea718f9f0 : 0xffffff802bd507a6 mach_kernel : __ZN12IOUserClient18callExternalMethodEjP25IOExternalMethodArguments + 0x86


0xffffffcea718fa20 : 0xffffff802bd50b1d mach_kernel : _is_io_connect_method + 0x31d


0xffffffcea718fb90 : 0xffffff802b73393f mach_kernel : _iokit_server_routine + 0x3aef


0xffffffcea718fcb0 : 0xffffff802b5fe82c mach_kernel : _ipc_kmsg_send + 0x55c


0xffffffcea718fd70 : 0xffffff802b616e24 mach_kernel : _mach_msg_overwrite_trap + 0x5a4


0xffffffcea718fde0 : 0xffffff802b6173ef mach_kernel : _mach_msg2_trap + 0x30f


0xffffffcea718fee0 : 0xffffff802b75ff1b mach_kernel : _mach_call_munger64 + 0x22b


0xffffffcea718ffa0 : 0xffffff802b5bfdd6 mach_kernel : _hndl_mach_scall64 + 0x16


Kernel Extensions in backtrace:


com.apple.driver.watchdog(1.0)[2D007C64-EF78-3276-A014-C76E314452E2]@0xffffff802e2ae000->0xffffff802e2b0fff





Process name corresponding to current thread (0xffffffa59706e598): watchdogd


Boot args: keepsyms=1 debug=0x100 ipc_control_port_options=0 -nokcmismatchpanic





Mac OS version:


23F79





Kernel version:


Darwin Kernel Version 23.5.0: Wed May 1 20:09:52 PDT 2024; root:xnu-10063.121.3~5/RELEASE_X86_64


Kernel UUID: 7B071FD2-9FDC-344E-8483-47EC972A105E


roots installed: 0


KernelCache slide: 0x000000002b200000


KernelCache base: 0xffffff802b400000


Kernel slide: 0x000000002b2e4000


Kernel text base: 0xffffff802b4e4000


__HIB text base: 0xffffff802b300000


System model name: Macmini6,1 (Mac-031AEE4D24BFF0B1)


System shutdown begun: NO


Panic diags file available: YES (0x0)


Hibernation exit count: 0





System uptime in nanoseconds: 34850388594647


Last Sleep: absolute base_tsc base_nano


Uptime : 0x00001fb23d0864e2


Sleep : 0x0000000000000000 0x0000000000000000 0x0000000000000000


Wake : 0x0000000000000000 0x000000097209cd2d 0x0000000000000000


Compressor Info: 0% of compressed pages limit (OK) and 0% of segments limit (OK) with 0 swapfiles and OK swap space


Zone info:


Zone map: 0xffffff9a61ebb000 - 0xffffffba61ebb000


. PGZ : 0xffffff9a61ebb000 - 0xffffff9a63ebc000


. VM : 0xffffff9a63ebc000 - 0xffffff9f306bb000


. RO : 0xffffff9f306bb000 - 0xffffffa0c9ebb000


. GEN0 : 0xffffffa0c9ebb000 - 0xffffffa5966bb000


. GEN1 : 0xffffffa5966bb000 - 0xffffffaa62ebb000


. GEN2 : 0xffffffaa62ebb000 - 0xffffffaf2f6bb000


. GEN3 : 0xffffffaf2f6bb000 - 0xffffffb3fbebb000


. DATA : 0xffffffb3fbebb000 - 0xffffffba61ebb000


Metadata: 0xffffff9a3df44000 - 0xffffff9a5df44000


Bitmaps : 0xffffff9a5df44000 - 0xffffff9a60f44000


Extra : 0 - 0

I have no idea what this means, but I disabled the screen saver with Sonoma, and hopefully it doesn't crash again. If it does I'll have no choice but to go get a M2 ugh.
 
My 2012 i7 headless, the CPU package sips about 6-7W power when on idle, I find this good enough even compared to M1 M2 minis, since all I need this to do is to run an older Mac mail client and has a searchable Time Machine. But I can easily imagine someone needing higher demand serving like Plex, a CPU with its efficiency from a decade ago makes little sense.

To me the main value in this generation of minis has always beens its external and internal I/O, and then the ability to run 32bit Mac apps.
 
Man its still crashing now completely.


I have no idea what this means, but I disabled the screen saver with Sonoma, and hopefully it doesn't crash again. If it does I'll have no choice but to go get a M2 ugh.
Yeah still crashing **** this. I’m buying a M2 Pro 512GB and 16GB of ram.
 
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