Got some NOS mac hardware today ;)

[alexrmc92]

These aren't technically PowerMacs, but they are a very close relatives. I picked up these brand new in box, Early 2009 model. These have the dual 2.93 quad core Nehalem processors. They were upgraded from 3GB of RAM to 48GB, but because we are running the free version of ESXi we had to drop them the 32GB.

I would like to eventually source some of the SSD drives that were available for them to replace the stock 160GB SAS drive. The drive is only used to boot up ESXi, VM storage was removed.

All of the VM's are stored on the XServe RAID, which is configured for 7TB of storage. I had to use generic FC cards because the apple cards are not supported in ESXi without modifications. They all connect to each other via a Brocade Silkworm 200E FC switch.

Behind the Cinema Display there is a late 2012 mac mini which manages the os x VM's and also runs windows 7 via a bootcamp/fusion combo to run the VSphere clients. These also an airport extreme up top and a philips hue base station.

Minus the UPS, PDU's, and ethernet switches it all came to $4256.28 which i think is a great price considering everything was NOS. It's a a little bit older hardware but will word great for what we use it for. Too bad we will never see Apple put out any more of these beauties

 

[Wild-Bill]

Nice...

Congrats! That picture is making me DROOL !!!!


Great price for all that gear!

 

[crjackson2134]

Sweet! Sounds like you got a great deal.

 

[alexrmc92]

Yea I was amazed at the price, the reseller that had them just wanted them gone. I guess not many people are looking for an outdated unsupported platform, even if they still preform very well.

 

[brand]

I guess not many people are looking for an outdated unsupported platform, even if they still preform very well.

That is the keyword in your sentence. I cant image putting unsupported hardware in a production environment, especially acting as virtual host servers.

 

[alexrmc92]

That is the keyword in your sentence. I cant image putting unsupported hardware in a production environment, especially acting as virtual host servers.

Well that depends on your definition of unsupported.

A manufacture like dell will supply drivers for multiple OS's, firmware updates, security updates, etc... for their servers.

Apple never did much for the XServe, as drivers and and security updates were built into OS X natively. There weren't any firmware updates, and ESXi natively supports running on them. Apple is still releasing software for them, as in mavericks supports them. The hardware is identical to the 2009 mac pro.

It's not any different than running ESXi on any other supported mac, and runs without a hitch. I would see your point if i were running ESXi on a platform that VMware did not support, but that is not the case.

 

[brand]

Well that depends on your definition of unsupported.

A manufacture like dell will supply drivers for multiple OS's, firmware updates, security updates, etc... for their servers.

Apple never did much for the XServe, as drivers and and security updates were built into OS X natively. There weren't any firmware updates, and ESXi natively supports running on them. Apple is still releasing software for them, as in mavericks supports them. The hardware is identical to the 2009 mac pro.

It's not any different than running ESXi on any other supported mac, and runs without a hitch. I would see your point if i were running ESXi on a platform that VMware did not support, but that is not the case.

You were the one that sad they were not supported so I was going by your definition of unsupported. I just said I would not put unsupported hardware in a production environment. I just checked and for what it's worth both the 2008 and 2009 Xserve are supported hardware by Apple. The 2008 Xserve will only run Mac OS 10.7 while the 2008 Mac Pro will run Mac OS 10.8 and the upcoming Mac OS 10.9. The 2009 Xserve and 2009 Mac Pro will both run Mac OS 10.8 and the upcoming Mac OS 10.9.

 

[derbothaus]

ESXi is supported for OS X server virtualization on Xserve EOL HW. Lol! Apple, always thinking of the people.
Just not in your data center.

 

[alexrmc92]

ESXi is supported for OS X server virtualization on Xserve EOL HW. Lol! Apple, always thinking of the people.
Just not in your data center.

I wish apple would start bringing back server software like snow leopard. It probably wont happen, at least not in the foreseeable future. The only thing it has any good use for now, in a business environment, is iOS management profiles.

Open directory could be a lot better and more simple to use if they took the time to do it, especially if they were to adopt Samba 4 and allow OS X to be a domain controller. If they did that they could easily bring together their email, calendar, and contacts services into one exchange like system the could be replicated to OD and AD.

Probably wishful thinking, i guess thats why we have linux.

 

[derbothaus]

I wish apple would start bringing back server software like snow leopard. It probably wont happen, at least not in the foreseeable future. The only thing it has any good use for now, in a business environment, is iOS management profiles.

…and XSAN is not horrible. At least it is much more compatible.

 

[alexrmc92]

…and XSAN is not horrible. At least it is much more compatible.

Ill agree with you there, xsan is quite straight forward and works well. I never had much time to use it because it requires the apple FC cards which don't work in ESX. But i did have it set up temporarily and it never gave me any issues.

 

[Macsonic]

Hi alexrmc92. Congrats on your new machines. Looks awesome. Whether they're old hardware or no longer supported, as long as it gets the job done at the end of the day, that's great!

 

[DJenkins]

Incredible price for what you got, congrats!