2012 Mac Mini - Anyone using old Mac Mini as a home server?

[Minato1990]

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.

 

[fricotin]

That's what I have and and use it for everything since it's my only computer, hope it will last until the M4.

 

[dictoresno]

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.

 

[uller6]

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.