Please. For small and medium workgroups OS X server offers good control over network macs and has speedier file transfers (if you want GPO like control and need AFP which is faster than SMB).
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Apple Considering Discontinuing More Server-Focused Products?
- Thread starter MacRumors
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
Please. For small and medium workgroups OS X server offers good control over network macs and has speedier file transfers (if you want GPO like control and need AFP which is faster than SMB).
Servers for schools are a tiny market. And small businesses rather buy a cheaper Dell or HP server with NBD service + Windows SBS, and they're actually making a very good choice. Apple has nothing to compete with that combination.
Apple has more than enough money to take Oracle and HP head-on. But why? It would only destroy their margins and make them compete in an area where they have no expertise or strategy. Also they would have to compete against Microsoft on their home turf, on which they are still playing very well. Good luck with that.
I love all these people coming out now declaring their love and prolific use of the Xserve. Fact of the matter is nobody seemed to buy and use them, not even Apple themselves. So, why should Apple continue making them if their not making any money off of. Take a note from all the people crying about AAPL stock price in the "Steve Jobs is Taking a New Leave of Absence" thread. It's all about money.
You will need to do what responsible admin have been doing for years. Position yourself to take advantage of the changes coming instead of resisting them. You can scream all you want but from Apple's perspective they numbers just aren't there. This reminds me of all of the Novell Netware guys who refused to even consider switching to Active Directory because "M$ sucks" etc. etc. Now those guys are screwed because they never took the time to retrain themselves. You're not an Apple employee. You an IT professional. Professionals need to retool themselves from time to time. This is especially true in IT where there is a new revolution every few years. Today it's cloud and virtualization. Start retraining gents.
They haven't always been clearly consumer oriented. Is the whole advertising world consumer? Desktop publishing? Production houses? Have you ever worked in the creative field?
Who said I get zero support? I get plenty of support. Apple engineers are great. Clearly you have never interacted with their education support. I have had the engineers help over the phone, come on-site, etc. Seems you don't know what you are talking about.
Doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that if students use a product, like it, they will buy it. My video production students that go onto college to study in the area, typically buy a Macbook Pro and use Final Cut because that is what they learned and what they are familiar with. 9 out of 10 documentaries at last year's Oscar's were edited on Final Cut.
It has been very obvious where I was working before (large international fashion house) that there was no real enterprise support from Apple happening. We had repeated problems with AFP / XSAN and although I believe the network was to blame a little there were (and are) numerous issues that meant people were not able to work properly. Other companies would have sent out a senior rep to sort it out, given the amount of product purchased... The silence from Apple was deafening..
Although XSAN and FC Server are less of a concern for me personally now, I really hope Final Cut Studio is not another for the scrap heap.. I did a Premiere CS5 evaluation and although the rendering times are impressive, it has a whole other set of bugs and issues - so current FCS is the best of a bad bunch...
Although XSAN and FC Server are less of a concern for me personally now, I really hope Final Cut Studio is not another for the scrap heap.. I did a Premiere CS5 evaluation and although the rendering times are impressive, it has a whole other set of bugs and issues - so current FCS is the best of a bad bunch...
OS X Server
Considering that OS X and OS X server are essentially identical minus a couple of front end apps to configure some of the services. I don't see killing a product that only needs a minimal amount of programming for the GUI tools. And third party GUI tools are out there if you want to run an OS X server but only buy OS X. And if you have some CLI skills you don't even need third party GUI.
Considering that OS X and OS X server are essentially identical minus a couple of front end apps to configure some of the services. I don't see killing a product that only needs a minimal amount of programming for the GUI tools. And third party GUI tools are out there if you want to run an OS X server but only buy OS X. And if you have some CLI skills you don't even need third party GUI.
I find OS X Server inexpensive, neat, easy to use, and fast. I got a Mac Mini with Server from eBay for $500, and even the $1000 new price is really cheap. My old school was all Mac, and the server worked beautifully. It is also more secure than Windows Server (my new school had to put a crazy antivirus that deletes even AIF files since they were getting virus'd too much). My Mac Mini server would work fine in a small business.
Windows Server sucks; you can guess that before using it (which my school does) since it is made by MS, which has not invented anything good (Office was bought from another company, and the XBOX is only good since they have a lot of developers for it). I agree with you about Oracle. Apple can take them on, but it would be self-destructive.
Full of Win is so correct. I just talked to a guy last month that bragged about switching his entire environment over to Mac servers. Then he went on to complain about the instability of Open Directory.
Kind of like how you can tell that you won't be able to do any serious work on an Apple product... because it's made by Apple. What a retarded position.
You make it sounds like pros have never had to re-tool before. Change is part of the game. For TV guys that have been around for a long time they started cutting film, then cut video tape on linear editors, now cut file based formats on nonlinear editors and will be cutting 3D, or god knows what, 5yrs from now.
The 15" MacBook Pro and iMac lack expandability so they are limited in what they can do. Maybe that will change if Apple adopts USB 3 or LightPeak finally comes out and gets adopted in record time.
Lethal
But it isn't short term thinking. Their focus is on the consumer market now. You can still use your Macs in the lab and have a different solution on the backend such as Active Directory. Most environments are heterogeneous, especially large environments. You're going to have to retool yourself and adjust to the changes or be left behind.
becuase consumer desires are fickle and not a good way to run a company probably. i wouldnt want to own stock knowing all they were doing was making iphones. what happens when people think they're not cool anymore and suddenly switch to another company? you're screwed, and your company just tanked, because it had no diversification.
actually they were pretty solid with their pro offerings for a while.
yeah but no sysadmin who desires to keep their job will run a server with no support available, no updates coming, etc etc.
I guess it's possible, but I can't really see Apple exiting the server market. Apple Consultants big business is OD/AD integration. Macs are the gold standard now and there really isn't anything I know about that will manage groups of OS X clients like OpenDirectory. I can see Apple letting another vender have that market, I just don't know of anyone competing in it.
-I can see Apple letting Quantum replace XSAN with a mac native version of StorNext. (for those that don't know, XSAN is based on the same stuff and is fully compatible with it.
-Final Cut I don't know anything about.
-I can see Apple letting Quantum replace XSAN with a mac native version of StorNext. (for those that don't know, XSAN is based on the same stuff and is fully compatible with it.
-Final Cut I don't know anything about.
The Mac Pro is clearly a corporate device, the rest, I agree.
However, it's not because they don't have those ports (and what you listed is often easily fixable). It's because you can't buy on-site support with guaranteed short reaction times, it's because there are no docking stations for the laptops. There are no programs for guaranteed long-time availability of parts. You have to send in your Macbook if your want to change the battery. Nearly all displays are now mirrors. And so on.
That might be ok for consumers, but companies don't like it.
the whole reaction in any xserve/macpro thread is hilarious
why are people surprised or outraged? the xserve userbase is too small and marginal to sustain the cost of developing and supporting the product. Good riddance. Sun, IBM, HP etc flush off any money losing server products all the time.
But to take this as a sign that they will drop os x and be only a mobile hardware maker is stupid. iOS is designed to be a peripheral device to another computer (preferably running os x). the only way to develop for iOS is with a os x computer.
why are people surprised or outraged? the xserve userbase is too small and marginal to sustain the cost of developing and supporting the product. Good riddance. Sun, IBM, HP etc flush off any money losing server products all the time.
But to take this as a sign that they will drop os x and be only a mobile hardware maker is stupid. iOS is designed to be a peripheral device to another computer (preferably running os x). the only way to develop for iOS is with a os x computer.
Why? Because they are short sighted and a bit over zealous. This has been my experience with people who have switched their entire environment to Apple. Desktops are one thing but the back end also??? These people think more about themselves than what is best for their companies in the long run.
In the one data center in NC is Oracle. HQ is mostly Apple hardware. Everything iPhone, iOS, and AppStore is in Cupertino and running on Apple hardware. I know because I interviewed for the SysAdmin position supporting it.
Kind of like how you can tell that you won't be able to do any serious work on an Apple product... because it's made by Apple. What a retarded position.
Hey, that wasn't my reason. If I had reasons listed, it would take forever. First of all, Windows server is very unstable as it runs on MS DOS instead of UNIX.
And I would consider Apple a much better company than MS considering that they invented many successful and great products (Mac OS, iPod, iPhone, AirPort, Final Cut, iLife), and their stock rose very quickly while MS's didn't. They are now larger than MS as compared to before when they were dying due to these devices. MS...they copied all of those listed except for Final Cut and failed miserably.
Anyone here agrees that UNIX is a better server OS than MS DOS.
It is likely an issue of recognition of a few realities.
For one thing Mac OS/X is UNIX, UNIX is a server class operating system. So why bother with two OS'es that for the most part are the same thing? Sure a server will have different software installed for whatever service they are running but those types of apps can be easily downloaded.
Apple has the Mac App store now so if that is adapted to permit the installation of server apps or other software that needs to operate outside of the sand box then Apple solves its server needs. The nice thing is this would address one big issue with which Apple gets hammered with, that is slow updates to critical software in the server distro. Distribute the software via an app store like service and you get updates out to customers really quick. This in effect is the way many Linux distros work.
The other goofy thing with mac OS Server is that it is largely Open Source software but yet they charge a good penny for it. I'm certain this has not gone unnoticed. However you can't manage to offer up the functionality for free, so maybe the "SERVER APP STORE" will become a paid for service itself. That is you pay X dollars a year to be able to continue to download your updates and new server software. I think many businesses would love this approach.
In any event I do have a hard time believing that Apple would leave its customers high and dry with no supported server functionality. On the contrary I see them looking for ways to support their customers that are more manageable for both them and their customers. Walking away form server hardware is one thing, but I suspect that walking away from some of the functionality will be a lot harder.
For one thing Mac OS/X is UNIX, UNIX is a server class operating system. So why bother with two OS'es that for the most part are the same thing? Sure a server will have different software installed for whatever service they are running but those types of apps can be easily downloaded.
Apple has the Mac App store now so if that is adapted to permit the installation of server apps or other software that needs to operate outside of the sand box then Apple solves its server needs. The nice thing is this would address one big issue with which Apple gets hammered with, that is slow updates to critical software in the server distro. Distribute the software via an app store like service and you get updates out to customers really quick. This in effect is the way many Linux distros work.
The other goofy thing with mac OS Server is that it is largely Open Source software but yet they charge a good penny for it. I'm certain this has not gone unnoticed. However you can't manage to offer up the functionality for free, so maybe the "SERVER APP STORE" will become a paid for service itself. That is you pay X dollars a year to be able to continue to download your updates and new server software. I think many businesses would love this approach.
In any event I do have a hard time believing that Apple would leave its customers high and dry with no supported server functionality. On the contrary I see them looking for ways to support their customers that are more manageable for both them and their customers. Walking away form server hardware is one thing, but I suspect that walking away from some of the functionality will be a lot harder.
We have Exchange at our school. It is horrible.Why use Exchange when you can use IMAP?
The problem is the Apple folks simply can't see beyond Apple solutions. MS offers hosted Exchange accounts direct for $5 per user per month. Google Apps is 4.16 per month per user. Why bother with an in house email server of any kind for 9 users??? These guys really need to update their thinking.
You are absolutely correct. I work with school districts and many of them have been getting rid of the Macs. It is Windows server on the backend running in a virtualized environment. Macs are usually relegated to labs and other specialty areas.
Sadly, yes. My old school had Macs, though, and they worked great.
But the fact is that the schools are moving away from them.