Mac mini as a server?

[Neodym]

You won't find anyone here taking the decision for you. It sounds as if a mini would be suitable. Plus you could have it with guarantee when buying new. You should avoid the entry model, though. 4 GB Ram is tight and together with the missing SSD would make it a poor experience for your use case.

If you're unsure, buy the mini new, give it a try and return it during the grace period if it doesn't work as expected. Or pay a consultant to analyze your situation in detail and give you a more precise recommendation than what can be offered here in the forum.

 

[Smellmet]

Basically I'm after something that will have 4 imacs connected to it using it in a design studio capacity, saving work, reading linked images from mainly indesign files etc with 4 pcs attached for just distributing files to. I'd like it to be able to perform as if the files are stored locally, which is what the used mac pro managed at my last place.
[doublepost=1509298442][/doublepost]

You won't find anyone here taking the decision for you. It sounds as if a mini would be suitable. Plus you could have it with guarantee when buying new. You should avoid the entry model, though. 4 GB Ram is tight and together with the missing SSD would make it a poor experience for your use case.

If you're unsure, buy the mini new, give it a try and return it during the grace period if it doesn't work as expected. Or pay a consultant to analyze your situation in detail and give you a more precise recommendation than what can be offered here in the forum.

Yeah I'd always avoid any entry level mac anyway as they tend to be poor performers. If I went the mac mini route I'd get a maxed out one.

 

[MarkJames68]

I doubt number of cores represent the bottleneck

Basically I'm after something that will have 4 imacs connected to it using it in a design studio capacity, saving work, reading linked images from mainly indesign files etc with 4 pcs attached for just distributing files to. I'd like it to be able to perform as if the files are stored locally, which is what the used mac pro managed at my last place.
[doublepost=1509298442][/doublepost]

Yeah I'd always avoid any entry level mac anyway as they tend to be poor performers. If I went the mac mini route I'd get a maxed out one.

the big questions are file sizes and read/write frequency. If it’s a few files every few hours and aren’t many GB in size any solution would work.

Maybe try a Mini that has a return policy just to be sure?

 

[Sky_Pie]

I doubt number of cores represent the bottleneck

the big questions are file sizes and read/write frequency. If it’s a few files every few hours and aren’t many GB in size any solution would work.

Maybe try a Mini that has a return policy just to be sure?

Wondering sm

We're looking at getting a server for our small studio, but are not 100% sure what's the right solution. Initially I've suggested to my bosses that we get a second hand 'cheesegrater' Mac Pro from 2010 onwards for around £1500 with SSD and at least 16GB RAM as they're still pretty beefy machines when they were specced up, and provide nice storage bays for extra drives etc.

I've also considered getting a Mini to cut costs, but I'm not sure what the ramifications are of plumping for one of these are over the Pro, obviously they're inferior machines but it is just for use as a server with 4 iMacs and 4 PC's needing to be connected to it, so is it just a case of plugging an external drive into one and sharing it via the Apple Server software or is there more to it?. Would it need to be a top spec one with maxed out RAM? Or would the Pro be the better choice?

Wondering what you ended up going with? I’m in a similar situation with a small design / video studio with 4-5 macs. Considering getting new 6-core mini... Thoughts?

 

[Smellmet]

Wondering sm



Wondering what you ended up going with? I’m in a similar situation with a small design / video studio with 4-5 macs. Considering getting new 6-core mini... Thoughts?

We ended up getting a Synology NAS.

 

[chrfr]

Wondering what you ended up going with? I’m in a similar situation with a small design / video studio with 4-5 macs. Considering getting new 6-core mini... Thoughts?

For just file sharing, don't waste your money on the 6-core model. I'd strongly consider other options before buying any Mac as a file server these days, though.

 

[Sky_Pie]

We ended up getting a Synology NAS.

Do you like the Synology? We tried one of those a couple years ago but it wasn't fast enough for video editing. Then we tried the biggest Q Nap- and it was great until we found out that it didn't support Mac indexing so THAT was a no- go. Ended up buying a G-Tech Shuttle XL (8bay) which has the speed we need and my trashcan Mac Tower (6core) is doing double-duty as the server and my machine at the same time.

Would love to separate the server from my machine- and we're going to keep it Mac at this point.
So as far as the mini's- what specs are important?

Will definitely be getting 10GB ethernet port upgrade as we're planning on moving the whole network to 10G next year. It seems that when I look up server machines- they are decently fast and have multiple cores etc. Im assuming that I should get the i5 model at least if not an i7- the quad core model is i3. Thoughts?

Thanks in advance!

 

[Neodym]

Im assuming that I should get the i5 model at least if not an i7- the quad core model is i3. Thoughts?

The i3 moniker is a bit misleading here, as it is basically the i5 of the previous generation, with slight optimizations (e.g. clock speed or production process, which is still 14nm btw.). Completely different beast than the rather measly i3ˋs of earlier times.

To put it differently: Assuming both were badged “i5” - how would you then decide between them, only based on things like number of cores and frequency?!

 

[chrfr]

It seems that when I look up server machines- they are decently fast and have multiple cores etc. Im assuming that I should get the i5 model at least if not an i7- the quad core model is i3. Thoughts?

We can't give useful advice without knowing exactly what the server would be doing. File sharing is not CPU intensive at all and will be more than adequately served by the i3.

 

[Smellmet]

Do you like the Synology? We tried one of those a couple years ago but it wasn't fast enough for video editing. Then we tried the biggest Q Nap- and it was great until we found out that it didn't support Mac indexing so THAT was a no- go. Ended up buying a G-Tech Shuttle XL (8bay) which has the speed we need and my trashcan Mac Tower (6core) is doing double-duty as the server and my machine at the same time.

Would love to separate the server from my machine- and we're going to keep it Mac at this point.
So as far as the mini's- what specs are important?

Will definitely be getting 10GB ethernet port upgrade as we're planning on moving the whole network to 10G next year. It seems that when I look up server machines- they are decently fast and have multiple cores etc. Im assuming that I should get the i5 model at least if not an i7- the quad core model is i3. Thoughts?

Thanks in advance!

It's... OK. Nowhere near as quick as a wired connection. It does the job it needs to but that's it, it's ok when you're working on it but searching on it it is very slow. We're supposed to be getting superfast internet in the new year here so hopefully that should speed things up.

 

[shaunp]

A NAS from either QNAP or Synology would serve you much better. They are designed to be a server not a mini desktop computer. They have multiple network ports and more importantly have support for multiple drives and RAID as standard. They are also cheaper than the Mini. It's just a case of getting the right tool for the job.

 

[Smellmet]

A NAS from either QNAP or Synology would serve you much better. They are designed to be a server not a mini desktop computer. They have multiple network ports and more importantly have support for multiple drives and RAID as standard. They are also cheaper than the Mini. It's just a case of getting the right tool for the job.

That's what we ended up getting - a Synology NAS

 

[msh]

I know you went with Synology but I would vote for a Freenas server: either build one or buy a turnkey one from ixsystems. I like ZFS, ECC ram, true server grade PSUs, motherboards, Intel NICs etc.