Apple Considering Discontinuing More Server-Focused Products?

[PinkyMacGodess]

Home servers are the way of the future I think. A server of some kind...

How many people value their picture collections and have lost them on a system that has a hard drive crash or falls over or... Quite a few.

Having a 'server' that is out of the way and has RAID could go a long way towards keeping things safe...

And think about music and video. One central place and a lot of new TV's are setup to connect to them out of the box...

Home servers are not as strange as they sound.

I'd like to see a server and a firewall appliance in every home.

 

[Jody Bevan]

Crazy Move to get rid of Server Platform

Apple has not done well in the server market because those companies big enough to use servers were Windows centric companies. Now that Apple is making its way into organizations through the back door (iPhones, iPads) it makes the name of 'Apple' more palatable to these organizations. We have less problems putting in OS X servers into these organizations now.

If Apple really pulls the plug, then I will never push another Apple box again. I am tired of the effort to get Apple into business. They are great products, easy to administer. Now Apple pulls the plug on these so we have to redevelop our software to be ALL WINDOWS rather than giving a choice.

No more, too many products pulled.

I would really like to find a place to get Apple's ear. Unfortunately I don't know where to find it. This is another issue. Our users all know where they can make comments that will get to the decision makers. Apple is now so big that is just not made available.

 

[Rodimus Prime]

Apple has not done well in the server market because those companies big enough to use servers were Windows centric companies. Now that Apple is making its way into organizations through the back door (iPhones, iPads) it makes the name of 'Apple' more palatable to these organizations. We have less problems putting in OS X servers into these organizations now.

If Apple really pulls the plug, then I will never push another Apple box again. I am tired of the effort to get Apple into business. They are great products, easy to administer. Now Apple pulls the plug on these so we have to redevelop our software to be ALL WINDOWS rather than giving a choice.

No more, too many products pulled.

I would really like to find a place to get Apple's ear. Unfortunately I don't know where to find it. This is another issue. Our users all know where they can make comments that will get to the decision makers. Apple is now so big that is just not made available.

I think a huge reason why Apple has failed in enterprise market is no one there trust Apple. Apple time and time again has proven itself to be very untrust worthy. I am not going to trust all my servers and IT system to a company that will randomly upgrade it stuff or let it lag behind everyone else by a long time. On top of that I am not going to trust a company that will make my older stuff force obsolete even though what they new offer does not really make it obsolete. Just they are putting software blocking for nothing new.

This is just the latest reason on why Enterprise does not trust Apple. They provide no long term road map and then they yank out any support. That and from what I have read is that Apple own on site support for the servers is crap compared to dells. Apple service cost more money for less and slower support. Were lets say Dell with provide 24/7 2 hour support, Apple provide business hours only and next day and oh yeah Apple's cost more. This is Enterprise support. Different than the lets say us the normal consumer calling in for support so please do not try to compare it.

 

[sgtmaj]

This may be the most short-sighted decision Apple has ever made. A large chunk of the publishing (newspapers) world uses Mac, and if discontinuing servers is their aim, it will come back to bite the company big time in the future. If I was a stockholder, I would question this decision.

 

[gctwnl]

People are about to get pissed off about this.

I will if they do. What should I move to with my server... Linux? What about things like Portable Home Directories for Macbooks? So much will be lost in that case.

I wonder if this can be correct: taking over the home will need some sort of server appliance.

 

[MacConvert]

Who cares??

Linux will fill in the "OS X server gap" - if it can even be called that, more than adequately.

I like the way things are evolving - Linux rules the server, OS X rules the mobile/laptop/notebook space, Google rules the online/mobile (Droiddddd ) space.

Linux will eventually rule the desktop once Wayland comes to fruition and X is running seamlessly on top of it.

Someone remind me of what was it that Microsoft rules?

 

[Silas1066]

Unfortunately, I think Apple is going in this direction:

Get rid of the Mac and OSX (along with XSan, etc.) and produce iOS enabled devices such as the iPhone and iPad

End users will not be able to access a terminal (console), nor will they be able to manipulate many system settings. Developers will not have many options when trying to build custom apps (if they are allowed to at all).

The Apple will go from being a Tool to a Toy. The company will be a telecommunications firm such as RIM or maybe Samsung. People will refer to Apple as "that company that makes phones and ipads." The Mac will be a distant memory.

Apple will also sell cloud computing services (as they do now), complete with Chinese labor camps and programmers with AK47s pointed at them. The other developers will be in camps in rural India, making pennies a day. The servers will be UNIX and Windows, and our iPads will connect to them. Apple, along with Microsoft and others, will be flagged for human rights abuses and horrible work environments: but people will still buy the products.

But before that happens, I will be happily running Linux, because I sure as hell am not going to run Windows (which is like the Amtrak of the computing world -lousy service, lousy product, but the "only way to get from point A to point B").

 

[Yebubbleman]

The 12 core machines could be wonderful. But it is bundled with anemic ram, a slow graphics card which is hamstrung by Apple's implementation of Open GL, and Apple's own "Pro" apps which cannot take advantage of the incredible system they have built.

So yes, they took a big bad beast and neutered it. The simplest way to give a Mac "Pro" its balls back is to run windows on it.

Wouldn't that then be the software that's neutered and not the Hardware?

Home servers are the way of the future I think. A server of some kind...

How many people value their picture collections and have lost them on a system that has a hard drive crash or falls over or... Quite a few.

Having a 'server' that is out of the way and has RAID could go a long way towards keeping things safe...

And think about music and video. One central place and a lot of new TV's are setup to connect to them out of the box...

Home servers are not as strange as they sound.

I'd like to see a server and a firewall appliance in every home.

As more people adopt laptops, the one or two desktops in every home will slowly be replaced by a home server. It's making more and more sense every day.

 

[Mattie Num Nums]

Someone remind me of what was it that Microsoft rules?

I'm so sick of this Linux servers blah blah blah.

Linux also has a niche like Apple in corp. infrastructures. Microsoft will always be a player, a big one at that, in corp infrastructures. Unless you can show me something that is more versatile and cost effective than Active Directory, Exchange, Microsoft Clusters, and Microsofts EA/SA agreements?

 

[KnightWRX]

Wouldn't that then be the software that's neutered and not the Hardware?

What about eSATA ? USB3 ? More RAM support (really, 32 GB max) ? Better choices of video cards (a pro card other than the Quadro 2 generations behind maybe ?)

There is some neutering on the hardware side too.

 

[Mattie Num Nums]

What about eSATA ? USB3 ? More RAM support (really, 32 GB max) ? Better choices of video cards (a pro card other than the Quadro 2 generations behind maybe ?)

There is some neutering on the hardware side too.

Proper LOM management. I find the LOM management on the Xserves to be dreadful.

 

[KnightWRX]

I'm so sick of this Linux servers blah blah blah.

Linux also has a niche like Apple in corp. infrastructures. Microsoft will always be a player, a big one at that, in corp infrastructures. Unless you can show me something that is more versatile and cost effective than Active Directory, Exchange, Microsoft Clusters, and Microsofts EA/SA agreements?

Microsoft Clusters ? Veritas has a much more solid product there.

Microsoft Exchange is not particularly cost effective or versatile either, it's just there due to inertia on the client end with Outlook. Really, there's tons of groupware out there that is much more versatile and multi-client agnostic.

Active Directory is not the only SSO and Account management solution, it just integrates very well with Windows clients. If you manage infrastructure that isn't Microsoft to begin with, the benefits are really limited.

All in all, Microsoft is good at locking you in and helping you forget the broader world out there.

Proper LOM management. I find the LOM management on the Xserves to be dreadful.

This sub-thread was for the Mac Pro, not Xserves. LOM isn't required on workstations. To get you up to snuff, PeterQVenkman was arguing that the way things are going, Apple is probably going to drop the Mac Pro sooner than later too with YeBubbleMan arguing that no they weren't.

The topic came onto the Mac Pro already being a neutered hardware/software platform.

 

[VoR]

The story that I got, from what I thought was a reputable source, was that Novell was being basically being carved up and sold for scrap and that once done they wouldn't exist as a standalone company. To me that means that Novell will just exist as a 'ghost company' or like a wholly owned company. A shell.

To be honest, in my opinion, Novell stopped existing to me when they dropped Netware. Reselling someone elses product with some features added in is a heck of a long fall from selling your own NOS that competed rather well with Microsoft.

Whatever...

There's already been a proper response, but I hope not - we just renewed our £150000+ zenworks maintenance for the year

OSX Server is/was an utterly rubbish product that suited a very small niche market (who had better alternatives anyway) - but it certainly wouldn't surprise me to see it get the i-device makeover for all the 'apple house' users.

 

[Mattie Num Nums]

The topic came onto the Mac Pro already being a neutered hardware/software platform.

That I can agree with. Most of our high end editors are on i7 iMacs now. The Mac Pro has been a waste for quite a while.

 

[Mattie Num Nums]

Microsoft Clusters ? Veritas has a much more solid product there.

At one point maybe. Anything Symantec touches it ruins. Case in point, Altiris.

 

[KnightWRX]

At one point maybe. Anything Symantec touches it ruins. Case in point, Altiris.

VCS is still much more capable and flexible than Microsoft Cluster, which is a barely functioning mess though. Symantec has not dramatically changed this.

I'd argue even HP Serviceguard/MetroCluster XP is a much stronger offering, but it only runs on HP-UX nowadays, not particularly useful if you're trying to flip Windows services around.

 

[Mattie Num Nums]

VCS is still much more capable and flexible than Microsoft Cluster, which is a barely functioning mess though. Symantec has not dramatically changed this.

I'd argue even HP Serviceguard/MetroCluster XP is a much stronger offering, but it only runs on HP-UX nowadays, not particularly useful if you're trying to flip Windows services around.

I just don't trust Symantec. We have been totally screwed by them since they bought Altiris.

 

[Yebubbleman]

This sub-thread was for the Mac Pro, not Xserves. LOM isn't required on workstations. To get you up to snuff, PeterQVenkman was arguing that the way things are going, Apple is probably going to drop the Mac Pro sooner than later too with YeBubbleMan arguing that no they weren't.

The topic came onto the Mac Pro already being a neutered hardware/software platform.

I like the emphasis on the characters in my name.

What about eSATA ? USB3 ? More RAM support (really, 32 GB max) ? Better choices of video cards (a pro card other than the Quadro 2 generations behind maybe ?)

There is some neutering on the hardware side too.

I'm not saying there isn't, the guy who I was arguing with was only mentioning software shortcomings, so I responded accordingly. Otherwise, I agree, there's no reason for the Mac Pro to not have any of that tech.

 

[0racle]

OSX Server is a brilliant platform -- it would be such a shame to lose it. I can see scaling down dedicated hardware, but I don't think it makes as much sense to discontinue the software side of things, as that is scaleable to the rest of the OS, and fairly profitable.

I'd rather see them make the OpenDirectory, Mac Client management tools and whatnot available on Linux/Unix/Windows Server Platforms instead. OS X Server's tools are what is nice about the server platform, not the underlying OS.

 

[Marcos Cerutti]

Guys, Im sorry, but I have read so many non-sense comments here...

First off, this is not a rumor, Xserver is going to die. period. just read @ apple.com

Second, for you guys talking about windows servers... I work in a environment with more than 9000 servers, almost 3000 are windows boxes(all others are Solaris, Red Hat, AIX and HP-UX), guys, you got no idea how crap and unstable they are, we never saw an server with an uptime longer than 4 weeks. Before arguing the company is bad, this is the top 5 IT oursourcing companies on the globe. Windows servers dont work for brutal workloads... Try run oracle on it...
1U hack mount servers are meant to be used in a hack, how many Xservers apple sales a month? 1% of macpros sales maybe. There is no reason to keep production of such really expensive hardware if few ppl buys it. Its business, sorry.

Also, they will discontinue Xserver, NOT mac OS X Server. There is no reasons to worry about such thing. they need server side products, regular Mac OS wouldn't have the tools right now to serve content like QT streaming or podcasts...

No panic folks, it all gonna be fine ;-)

 

[LethalWolfe]

Guys, Im sorry, but I have read so many non-sense comments here...

First off, this is not a rumor, Xserver is going to die. period. just read @ apple.com

Unfortunately I think you've added to the non-sense. Yes, Xserve is no longer going to be sold after this month, but that's not what the thread is about (or at least what it originally was about). The rumor is not that Xserve is going away but about the discontinuing of the Xserve is a sign that other server-type products from Apple are on the chopping block.


Lethal

 

[hss1]

Oracle Servers

I heard a rumour that the Xserves will be replaced by Oracle servers, and possibly Solaris steve Jobs and larry Ellison are good friends this adds fuel to this rumour

MY COMPANY USES !
We are ALL MAC with ONLY 3 PC LAPTOPS.
THIS REALLY PUT A DAMPER ON OUR FUTURE PLANNING.
THEY ARE STARTING TO MESS WITH PEOPLE'S LIVELIHOOD NOW!
(SYS ADMINS LIKE ME)
MORE NOISE NEEDS TO BE MADE ON THIS MATTER !!!!
ESPECIALLY SINCE I-PADS ARE BEING INTEGRATED INTO ALMOST EVERY BUSINESS AND LEARNING INSTITUTION !

 

[SamuraiArtGuy]

Fuzzy rumor or not, this WOULD be consistent with Apple's headlong plunge into the Consumer Computing market. Interest in, and support for, Pro Applications and Hardware has been waning in recent years.

I would not be the least bit surprised if Apple over the next year, completely stepped away from server products entirely. Also witness the recent rather lackluster "upgrade" of the Mac Pro line. Nothing to be excited over. The fact that the recent iLife upgrade completely passed over iWeb and iDVD suggest that this is not a significant area of interest for Apple. The recently announced enhancements to Mac OS X Lion are all primarily consumer friendly, but aren't all that interesting news for Pro users.

We've become such a tiny fraction of their market, that it's a sound business decision to kick us to the curb.

 

[SamuraiArtGuy]

Most of our high end editors are on i7 iMacs now. The Mac Pro has been a waste for quite a while.

I have to agree. I'm a solo freelancer print and web designer. I am currently running an older Power PC G5 tower. But I will most likely go for a high end iMac over a Mac Pro when the inevitable hardware upgrade catches up to me. While I like the build quality and expandability of the tower, I just cant bloody afford it.

The price/performance gap between the current generation of i5 and i7 iMacs and the crushing price of the Mac Pro tower and an Apple Display is NOT attractive, especially considering what clients and employers are willing to pay for design in the current economy. The Mac pro is becoming increasingly marginalized, is no longer a dominant workstation choice with similar offering now available from Sony, HP, Levono and even *gasp*... Dell, and represents an ever shrinking part of Apple's profits compared to iOS devices.

It's days may be numbered as well.

 

[karsten]

I think a huge reason why Apple has failed in enterprise market is no one there trust Apple. Apple time and time again has proven itself to be very untrust worthy. I am not going to trust all my servers and IT system to a company that will randomly upgrade it stuff or let it lag behind everyone else by a long time. On top of that I am not going to trust a company that will make my older stuff force obsolete even though what they new offer does not really make it obsolete. Just they are putting software blocking for nothing new.

This is just the latest reason on why Enterprise does not trust Apple. They provide no long term road map and then they yank out any support. That and from what I have read is that Apple own on site support for the servers is crap compared to dells. Apple service cost more money for less and slower support. Were lets say Dell with provide 24/7 2 hour support, Apple provide business hours only and next day and oh yeah Apple's cost more. This is Enterprise support. Different than the lets say us the normal consumer calling in for support so please do not try to compare it.

i agree. it's a shame apple doesn't want to pony up and be a real legitimate company, providing decent support, and competing with the other big boys on an even field. rather they build niche products that are unique enough that there's no real competition and they have no reason to have a culture of competition. these products end up getting in through the back door and it's like apple is sucking profit by doing nothing. of course competing in the enterprise would force them to absolve their high level of secrecy and tight-lipped product releases so it's like they'd rather maintain this mystique and culture than doing what other business do. they could really apply their engineering and production knowledge to build some great pro/enterprise stuff, and i'm sure they could be successful at it, and make a lot of money (for their shareholders .. ) but its like they are making a conscious decision to turn down profits. frustrating