Tracking enterprise technology transformation
Mac Minis are the next blade
http://www.networkjack.info/blog/archives/35
Intel MacMinis – The OS X Blade Server
A really good client of ours has been colocating with us since late 2003. They’ve grown their web application from running on a Xserve 1.0Ghz DP G4 to an Xserve 2.0Ghz DP G5, then moving their database off to a separate big hardware RAIDed Dell server.
They came to us about a year ago (May 2006) and said they were getting a big new client who wanted to run their entire site on their system and they were going to need a load balanced system with plenty of power and scalability. Earlier in the year (Feb 2006), Apple had introduced their second generation MacMini that now sported the new Intel Core Duo chips along with Gigabit Ethernet. At that time, we were also concerned about increased power usage in our cage, so we picked up an Intel Mac Mini 1.66Ghz Core Duo, had it upgraded to 2GB of RAM (the G4’s could only handle 1GB) and started to really put it through it’s paces.
It turned out to be a real winner.
In terms of power consumption, no matter how hard I tried I could not make that Mini use more than 0.37A of power. I blasted that thing with multiple concurrent CPU and disk bound processes, getting really heavy loads and disk read/writes.
How cool is this? I’m glad to see someone’s tested it!
Mac Mini, the grid engine of the future? I’ve been thinking recently that Mac Mini’s or the tranquil pc would be more effective grid engines, they’re low maintenance, low initial cost and disposable, when the drive fails/memory fails etc a year or two down the road, home pc anyone? The solution for your development/uat grid?
Oh dear Mr MACcleod we’ll never hear the end of this now!
To be honest though, I actually lean towards Tranquil pcs for blades, buy them in volume, install windows xp/linux/windows server and use them as disposable computers, much better as they work natively with windows/linux.
Oh dear Mr MACcleod we'll never hear the end of this now!