Thanks, that helps a lot. I actually compute most of the time with a big box fan on full next to me, so I don't think the sound will be that much of an issue. :) On a side note, the admin's office at my college is also the server room, and he's in there quite a bit of the time. His hobby? Building and rebuilding speakers!
Right now, I'm in the midst of a project for my college newspaper— we're wanting to expand our storage and give ourselves more local control over it, since the lone Mac admin works on another campus and is overworked as it is. I figured I would buy an Xserve for myself, bring it to campus to test it, and the newspaper staff and IT and I would discuss our options from there. Then I'd use my Xserve for VPN and backups and whatnot. And yes, it's probably going to go somewhere out of sight and out of earshot, to be remotely managed by my iPad. The G5 sounds best. So, is that 3 one terabyte drives, or three drives to achieve one terabyte? On Jun 2, 3:13 pm, Bruce Ryan <bruce.r...@mac.com> wrote: > Hi Austin > > I'm using an XServe G5 2·0 GHz single processor as a desktop machine, > running Leopard client. (It came with 10.3 server but I wanted Leopard > for TimeMachine and didn't need server capabilities. To be honest I > just wanted the coolness of having my own XServe/shiny Apple joy, > although learning how to set up server stuff would have been a bonus.) > > It's a bit slow but it does the job - mostly. It does need a decent > video card (yet to be purchased) - without it games just lead to black > screens of death. Also, even though I've built a cage to hold it on > the side of my desk which diverts some of the fan noise away from me, > it's still distractingly noisy. > > IIRC, G4 takes 4 PATA disks, while I know the G5 takes 3 SATA disks. > Mine came with a CD-reader but I've swapped that for a laptop CD/DVD > reader. There may be limits on the total drive capacity: > - G4, everymac.com says 'up to four 180 GB ATA/100 hard drives' > - G5, everymac.com says 'up to 750 GB of storage with three 250 GB > SATA hard drives'. However, XServe dealers who serviced my XServe say > up to 3 by 1TB is feasible. > > Overall, if you can find a way of dealing with noise (maybe put a wall > between you and the XServe, then look for long keyboard, pointer, > monitor cables and a big masonry drill - or just put an ethernet > connection to your switch/hub and control it via your normal quiet > desktop machine), want a high capacity machine that can support > several drives and looks pretty cool, I'd go for the G5. > > However, you may find a Mac Pro quieter - and it has capacity for up > to 4 drives, already will have a working video card. > > Finally, as I'm sure you've realised, G5s are limited to Leopard. > > Hope this helps > > Bruce -- You received this message because you are a member of G-Group, a group for those using G3, G4, and G5 desktop Macs - with a particular focus on Power Macs. The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtml and our netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml To post to this group, send email to g3-5-list@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/g3-5-list
