peterjhill
macrumors 65816
Re: you're kidding right?
ROFL, that is hilarious. I'll have to remember that.
(I think you meant RISC)
ROFL, that is hilarious. I'll have to remember that.
(I think you meant RISC)
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Rackmount Servers: May 14th
- Thread starter arn
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peterjhill
macrumors 65816
Re: G5 vs. G4 chips
Cisco is rumored to be using the G5 chips in their routers and switches to replace the MIPS R5000's that they use now.
With only the iBooks running with G3's now, I think there is a good chance that we will see a G5 server. Either that or an upgradable processor. That would be the right thing to do in a server. If there are models that can take 4 processors, It would be great if they put two on a daughtercard, and had the ability to put two cards in the system. If you could buy a system with 2, then upgrade later to 4, or upgrade to a faster processor.
Yum
Cisco is rumored to be using the G5 chips in their routers and switches to replace the MIPS R5000's that they use now.
With only the iBooks running with G3's now, I think there is a good chance that we will see a G5 server. Either that or an upgradable processor. That would be the right thing to do in a server. If there are models that can take 4 processors, It would be great if they put two on a daughtercard, and had the ability to put two cards in the system. If you could buy a system with 2, then upgrade later to 4, or upgrade to a faster processor.
Yum
Re: i wonder
I believe SJ's announcement was totally premeditated and calculated.
SJ doesn't want hardware announcements at WWDC to overshadow his software announcements. Look what just a pre-announcement is doing?
At WWDC, there are a hell of a lot of reporters, zealots, and others with baited breath. Next week, without the pre-announcement, there would still be coverage. But, with the pre-announcement, there are people like us spending much time on the web speculating about the content of next week's announcement. The periodicals have geeks like us on their staff. Their geeks are reading what us geeks write and are themselves getting their geek all in rapture so that next week's announcement will command a hell of a lot more attention than the eMac's announcement; the announcement will ejaculate into the mainstream press. The education target market is far more accessible to Apple's publicity machine than Apple's new target markets for its rack mounted servers.
So, again, Apple is ramping up the PR machine. SJ is quite the PR dude. 'Hey dude, you're gettin' an Apple rack!'
If, despite my expectations, Apple's rack includes g5's, then I believe we'll hear an announcement shortly afterwards yet well ahead of MWNY of a new PowerMac. If the rack includes G4's and nothing else unusual, who knows when Apple will update its PowerMac? But anything in the rack announcement that further induces people like me to wait for the PowerMac update, would cause Apple to announce a PowerMac prior to MWNY or suffer diminished sales until MWNY.
Eirik
I believe SJ's announcement was totally premeditated and calculated.
SJ doesn't want hardware announcements at WWDC to overshadow his software announcements. Look what just a pre-announcement is doing?
At WWDC, there are a hell of a lot of reporters, zealots, and others with baited breath. Next week, without the pre-announcement, there would still be coverage. But, with the pre-announcement, there are people like us spending much time on the web speculating about the content of next week's announcement. The periodicals have geeks like us on their staff. Their geeks are reading what us geeks write and are themselves getting their geek all in rapture so that next week's announcement will command a hell of a lot more attention than the eMac's announcement; the announcement will ejaculate into the mainstream press. The education target market is far more accessible to Apple's publicity machine than Apple's new target markets for its rack mounted servers.
So, again, Apple is ramping up the PR machine. SJ is quite the PR dude. 'Hey dude, you're gettin' an Apple rack!'
If, despite my expectations, Apple's rack includes g5's, then I believe we'll hear an announcement shortly afterwards yet well ahead of MWNY of a new PowerMac. If the rack includes G4's and nothing else unusual, who knows when Apple will update its PowerMac? But anything in the rack announcement that further induces people like me to wait for the PowerMac update, would cause Apple to announce a PowerMac prior to MWNY or suffer diminished sales until MWNY.
Eirik
sjs asked earlier: who will be the target market for Apple's new efforts in servers?
That was my earlier question. Thanks for several good, informative answers!
That was my earlier question. Thanks for several good, informative answers!
I personally reckon we're going to see G4's in these, unless they've quietly slipped G5 support into 10.1.5 without anybody noticing. Perhaps faster G4's than we've seen before, perhaps with larger L3 caches or DDR though.
As for whether they sell - when you get into the area of decent quality rackmount servers, the gap between Apple's pricing and those of the major PC manufacturers isn't that big. Yes, you can do a homebuilt 4U rackmount easily and cheaply enough, but when you get to the smaller form factors you're getting into a whole new area in terms of cooling and board layout and so forth. You're also getting into a whole new price range.
Example - Dell's entry-level 1U server, the PowerEdge 350. It's got 256MB of PC133, an 850MHz PIII, a 40GB IDE hard drive, dual NIC, a mouse, a set of rails for mounting it, no OS installed, and a decent 4hr onsite support contract. Price- $2483. This is way different from the "I can build an AthlonXP 2000+ system for $500" homebuilt market.
I can definitely see Apple being at least somewhat competitive with this sort of price range. As for resistance to the OS - UNIX is UNIX. As has already been stated, OS X can run most of the major applicatons you'd expect in, say, an ISP environment, straight out of the box. I imagine we'll also find quite a few of these boxes ending up running Linux PPC.
Finally, there's the pretty factor. A lot of the 1U servers out there are butt-ugly. This doesn't really matter, of course, rackmount servers generally aren't made to be aesthetically pleasing. However, a cabinet of servers with brushed metal fronts and little Apple logos (and maybe some subtly pulsing white LEDs) is excellent "show row" material for impressing visitors to the data center. I know at my place of work all the cool looking hardware goes in the show row, because interesting boxes and lots of blinkenlights impress potential customers - the rest of the cabinets, the ones containing the switches and the anonymous plain black rackmount boxes don't even have glass doors on them.
As for whether they sell - when you get into the area of decent quality rackmount servers, the gap between Apple's pricing and those of the major PC manufacturers isn't that big. Yes, you can do a homebuilt 4U rackmount easily and cheaply enough, but when you get to the smaller form factors you're getting into a whole new area in terms of cooling and board layout and so forth. You're also getting into a whole new price range.
Example - Dell's entry-level 1U server, the PowerEdge 350. It's got 256MB of PC133, an 850MHz PIII, a 40GB IDE hard drive, dual NIC, a mouse, a set of rails for mounting it, no OS installed, and a decent 4hr onsite support contract. Price- $2483. This is way different from the "I can build an AthlonXP 2000+ system for $500" homebuilt market.
I can definitely see Apple being at least somewhat competitive with this sort of price range. As for resistance to the OS - UNIX is UNIX. As has already been stated, OS X can run most of the major applicatons you'd expect in, say, an ISP environment, straight out of the box. I imagine we'll also find quite a few of these boxes ending up running Linux PPC.
Finally, there's the pretty factor. A lot of the 1U servers out there are butt-ugly. This doesn't really matter, of course, rackmount servers generally aren't made to be aesthetically pleasing. However, a cabinet of servers with brushed metal fronts and little Apple logos (and maybe some subtly pulsing white LEDs) is excellent "show row" material for impressing visitors to the data center. I know at my place of work all the cool looking hardware goes in the show row, because interesting boxes and lots of blinkenlights impress potential customers - the rest of the cabinets, the ones containing the switches and the anonymous plain black rackmount boxes don't even have glass doors on them.
peterjhill
macrumors 65816
Re: Re: i wonder
I am psyched too by the annoucement, but have to disagree with you here. A rack mounted server is an entirely new product line for Apple. Very few people were probably planning on buying an Apple server in the next week, and those that are, few of them would be willing to pay $500-$1000 more for a rack-mounted server (good rack mount servers have lots of cool features that are not in the current server, hotswap drives for eg.)
The current G4s are pretty darn nice, I would imagine SJ lowering the price on the current Power Macs before preannouncing a G5 Power Mac. Steve needs to be able to do his, "Oh, just one more thing..." thing at MWE.
As I mentioned above, if they make it trivial to swap out your old processor for a new one, they could release the servers with G4's now and allow us to move up to G5's later.
I am psyched too by the annoucement, but have to disagree with you here. A rack mounted server is an entirely new product line for Apple. Very few people were probably planning on buying an Apple server in the next week, and those that are, few of them would be willing to pay $500-$1000 more for a rack-mounted server (good rack mount servers have lots of cool features that are not in the current server, hotswap drives for eg.)
The current G4s are pretty darn nice, I would imagine SJ lowering the price on the current Power Macs before preannouncing a G5 Power Mac. Steve needs to be able to do his, "Oh, just one more thing..." thing at MWE.
As I mentioned above, if they make it trivial to swap out your old processor for a new one, they could release the servers with G4's now and allow us to move up to G5's later.
peterjhill
macrumors 65816
You just need sexier switches! Maybe it is because it is my job to take care of the network gear, though, that I see them as being sexy. ;-) Is that a GSR you got there, yum...
Oh, the sexy switches are visible enough. They live in glass-fronted cabinets with all the Total Control gear (and a cabinet full of those is the ultimate in blinkenlights). Ditto the ATM gear, the Junipers (on account of the neat blue blinkenlights), etc. It's just the dull ones we lock away 😀
Unfortunately, the "pretty equipment in the show rack" rule means we have to have our Cacheflow box on display. Colorful, yes, but it's the expensive hardware equivalent of those novelty PC cases made to look like dogs, cats, etc.
I better stop now before I really start reminiscing and tell the story about the SGI Crimson and the big dog.
Unfortunately, the "pretty equipment in the show rack" rule means we have to have our Cacheflow box on display. Colorful, yes, but it's the expensive hardware equivalent of those novelty PC cases made to look like dogs, cats, etc.
I better stop now before I really start reminiscing and tell the story about the SGI Crimson and the big dog.
Kinda OT...
I know nothing about servers, however I do use a Mac in a recording environment where nearly everything else is rackmounted. So....
Could you use a rackmount server in the same manner as a normal Powermac?
I'd love one solely for aesthetics (sp?) and to clean up the desk area a bit more, but many others who have mobile rigs would love this. The idea of advanced cooling features (less fan noise?) is entertaining as well. What about PCI slots? I'm assuming no in a 1 rackspace unit, but maybe there are alternatives.
I'm just looking for some basic info on this.
Thanks
I know nothing about servers, however I do use a Mac in a recording environment where nearly everything else is rackmounted. So....
Could you use a rackmount server in the same manner as a normal Powermac?
I'd love one solely for aesthetics (sp?) and to clean up the desk area a bit more, but many others who have mobile rigs would love this. The idea of advanced cooling features (less fan noise?) is entertaining as well. What about PCI slots? I'm assuming no in a 1 rackspace unit, but maybe there are alternatives.
I'm just looking for some basic info on this.
Thanks
dongmin
macrumors 68000
G4 inside
As someone pointed out, servers don't necessarily use the fastest processors. Dell's low-end rack servers use PIIIs and Celerons in the low gigahertz, far cry from the 2.2 ghz P4s. I'm no techie so this is pure conjecture but it probably has something to do with heat and power issues.
So given that logic, I don't think Apple's gonna put in an untested, brand-spanking new processor that is more power-hungry and probably generates more heat.
My bet is for G4s in the 1ghz range. OR G5s in the sub-1ghz range, it that's even possible. Either way, no high-ghz G5s. The only way that's gonna happen is if they also introduced new PowerMacs with the same level of processors.
PS: there's also the possibility of 1 ghz G3s. Why not? Altivec has little use in servers.
As someone pointed out, servers don't necessarily use the fastest processors. Dell's low-end rack servers use PIIIs and Celerons in the low gigahertz, far cry from the 2.2 ghz P4s. I'm no techie so this is pure conjecture but it probably has something to do with heat and power issues.
So given that logic, I don't think Apple's gonna put in an untested, brand-spanking new processor that is more power-hungry and probably generates more heat.
My bet is for G4s in the 1ghz range. OR G5s in the sub-1ghz range, it that's even possible. Either way, no high-ghz G5s. The only way that's gonna happen is if they also introduced new PowerMacs with the same level of processors.
PS: there's also the possibility of 1 ghz G3s. Why not? Altivec has little use in servers.
Rocketman
macrumors 603
Re: i wonder
One theory is his hand was forced by the ebay issue.
My theory is he was going to make a pre-announcement anyway since WWDC is the target market for the product. It is the rare hardware announcement at WWDC and of course they have several very, very significant software announcements at WWDC. Some of those seemingly jargon features of Jaguar will deliver HUNDREDS of applications to the Mac.
Server farms are currently stacking Powermac G4's! Any Rackmount format server, even a single CPU G4 will be a huge improvement and anything above that will be grand. G5 not yet folks, unless miracles happen.
I'ts major.
Rocketman
One theory is his hand was forced by the ebay issue.
My theory is he was going to make a pre-announcement anyway since WWDC is the target market for the product. It is the rare hardware announcement at WWDC and of course they have several very, very significant software announcements at WWDC. Some of those seemingly jargon features of Jaguar will deliver HUNDREDS of applications to the Mac.
Server farms are currently stacking Powermac G4's! Any Rackmount format server, even a single CPU G4 will be a huge improvement and anything above that will be grand. G5 not yet folks, unless miracles happen.
I'ts major.
Rocketman
Rocketman
macrumors 603
Re: Kinda OT...
Yes. It's overkill, but very practical. It will have (my guess) dual 1000-baseT ethernet, dual firewire and USB but probably no analog audio. It will have a plug for a monitor but will be designed to be administered from elsewhere, typically a TiG4 over ethernet.
Rocketman
Yes. It's overkill, but very practical. It will have (my guess) dual 1000-baseT ethernet, dual firewire and USB but probably no analog audio. It will have a plug for a monitor but will be designed to be administered from elsewhere, typically a TiG4 over ethernet.
Rocketman
Nice rack o' macs, dude!
so you got a stack o' Rackmacs under your desk (or down the hall, in the basement under the stadium, or even in the walk in cooler, and run them all with that ARD thingy, and they are clustered etc, now I am thinking education was just a beta-test of the possibilities of this . . .
so you got a stack o' Rackmacs under your desk (or down the hall, in the basement under the stadium, or even in the walk in cooler, and run them all with that ARD thingy, and they are clustered etc, now I am thinking education was just a beta-test of the possibilities of this . . .
Re: G4 inside
See, this is where Apple made a great move in going with the PPC platform. The high end P4 and Athlons suck a lot of power and get HOT. The PPC processors, although they are getting warmer, run at a fraction of the power/heat that the other boys do. This means that Apple can stick the fastest G4 in a 1U box with very little concern for heat.
If I remember right, and I may not, the G5 is supposed to be even better. Less heat, smaller, and less power. But who cares? Personally I'm hoping that Apple dumps Mot. and goes with IBM for their next chip (not sure how that would affect Altivec though). The G4 has a lot more life in it, and I think it's a great server chip (I am running a 450 G4 w/ OS X server and it's killing my fastest Wintel servers).
Just my $0.02
See, this is where Apple made a great move in going with the PPC platform. The high end P4 and Athlons suck a lot of power and get HOT. The PPC processors, although they are getting warmer, run at a fraction of the power/heat that the other boys do. This means that Apple can stick the fastest G4 in a 1U box with very little concern for heat.
If I remember right, and I may not, the G5 is supposed to be even better. Less heat, smaller, and less power. But who cares? Personally I'm hoping that Apple dumps Mot. and goes with IBM for their next chip (not sure how that would affect Altivec though). The G4 has a lot more life in it, and I think it's a great server chip (I am running a 450 G4 w/ OS X server and it's killing my fastest Wintel servers).
Just my $0.02
Re: Re: Kinda OT...
Naw, it will have a plug for a moniter and it will be desigened to be admin'd from elsewhere, but not a TiG4 over ethernet, rather it will be over airport.
Can't you see it, you go up and sit on the roof with your Tibook getting a tan sipping a brew and doing admin tasks on your 50 Apple PowerRac server render farm 20 floors below you in the machine room.
🙂
Naw, it will have a plug for a moniter and it will be desigened to be admin'd from elsewhere, but not a TiG4 over ethernet, rather it will be over airport.
Can't you see it, you go up and sit on the roof with your Tibook getting a tan sipping a brew and doing admin tasks on your 50 Apple PowerRac server render farm 20 floors below you in the machine room.
🙂
or the return of the centris 610
a 1u Rackmac with a titanium frontplate and a clear polycarbonate box, on your desktop with a 19" LCD on top?
a 1u Rackmac with a titanium frontplate and a clear polycarbonate box, on your desktop with a 19" LCD on top?
mcrain
macrumors 68000
Re: Re: i wonder
Obviously, I don't know the answer to any of the questions we are asking, but I can possibly shed a little light on the issue. Maybe help you make some more of your educated guesses...
From a legal standpoint, the ebay disclosure causes a problem for Apple. SEC rules require that in the event something that is secret becomes public information, the company representatives may not deny the existence of the information.
An example is best seen in a merger context. Hypothetically, IBM wants to merge with Microsoft. Bill Gates has a few phone calls with some high level IBM people. No one knows anything, no one asks anything. Gates can pretty much say anything but trully misleading information.
Once a deal begins to take shape, or once people find out about a potential deal, if Bill Gates is asked about a merger, if he denies it and it happens, that is considered securities fraud. The only choices available are to say "no comment" or "yes, it is happening."
Most companies respond to all inquiries with "no comment" because to do anything else makes "no comment" a "yes."
Here, if Steve Jobs did a keynote without disclosing the server, and someone asked him about it, his only legally available reply is "no comment." From a headline standpoint, "Steve Jobs refuses to comment on rumors of a rackmount server" looks far worse than "Steve Jobs announces that Apple will be releasing a rackmount server next week."
So, while I doubt the e-bay disclosure was the sole "reason," it may have been a legitimate contributing factor.
Obviously, I don't know the answer to any of the questions we are asking, but I can possibly shed a little light on the issue. Maybe help you make some more of your educated guesses...
From a legal standpoint, the ebay disclosure causes a problem for Apple. SEC rules require that in the event something that is secret becomes public information, the company representatives may not deny the existence of the information.
An example is best seen in a merger context. Hypothetically, IBM wants to merge with Microsoft. Bill Gates has a few phone calls with some high level IBM people. No one knows anything, no one asks anything. Gates can pretty much say anything but trully misleading information.
Once a deal begins to take shape, or once people find out about a potential deal, if Bill Gates is asked about a merger, if he denies it and it happens, that is considered securities fraud. The only choices available are to say "no comment" or "yes, it is happening."
Most companies respond to all inquiries with "no comment" because to do anything else makes "no comment" a "yes."
Here, if Steve Jobs did a keynote without disclosing the server, and someone asked him about it, his only legally available reply is "no comment." From a headline standpoint, "Steve Jobs refuses to comment on rumors of a rackmount server" looks far worse than "Steve Jobs announces that Apple will be releasing a rackmount server next week."
So, while I doubt the e-bay disclosure was the sole "reason," it may have been a legitimate contributing factor.
pizza anyone?
that was the first mac I owned. 20mhz, C$2000. with monitor and 4mb ram, $350 for another 4mb!
that was the first mac I owned. 20mhz, C$2000. with monitor and 4mb ram, $350 for another 4mb!
Re: Re: Re: Kinda OT...
I also guess that ARD is the tool for headless server admin
That would be quite nice, if a powerbook would reach 20 stories...
I also guess that ARD is the tool for headless server admin
peterjhill
macrumors 65816
Re: G4 inside
There are lots of different uses for servers, so there are different requirements for different applications.
Database servers need lots of memory, a nice processor or two or four, and large hard disks. They could make great use of altivec I would guess.
Web servers need lots of memory, but could probably get buy with more, but slower cpu's (just a guess).
In the Intel world, they have XEON processors that do not go into desktops at all. There is nothing wrong with servers being beefier than the desktops.
Someone else asked if you could use the future servers as desktops, I will guess that you could, but you will pay a premium to do so. Rack-mounted servers are always alot more expensive than the a desktop with the same processor and harddrive size and ram. Usually they will have some form of SCSI, instead of ATA, they will have faster memory, not to mention all the hot swap capabilities you could add.
I am not convinced that Apple will release servers with G5s, but as I mentioned above, I hope they make it easy to swap out and upgrade the CPUs
There are lots of different uses for servers, so there are different requirements for different applications.
Database servers need lots of memory, a nice processor or two or four, and large hard disks. They could make great use of altivec I would guess.
Web servers need lots of memory, but could probably get buy with more, but slower cpu's (just a guess).
In the Intel world, they have XEON processors that do not go into desktops at all. There is nothing wrong with servers being beefier than the desktops.
Someone else asked if you could use the future servers as desktops, I will guess that you could, but you will pay a premium to do so. Rack-mounted servers are always alot more expensive than the a desktop with the same processor and harddrive size and ram. Usually they will have some form of SCSI, instead of ATA, they will have faster memory, not to mention all the hot swap capabilities you could add.
I am not convinced that Apple will release servers with G5s, but as I mentioned above, I hope they make it easy to swap out and upgrade the CPUs