Welcome to the MacNN Forums.

Mark Edwards · Mar 1, 2006, 02:37 PM

Everyone is arguing back and forth about the video on these things -- I'm excited by the final arrival of these machines for a purpose that I haven't seen discussed much, as a low-cost unobtrusive living-room internet server.

Right now I am using a -- get this -- Gateway Pentium Pro 180Mhz machine running FreeBSD. It basically does mail and web. Although it is actually amazing how well it performs, to say that it is showing its age would be a serious understatement.

The Intel Mini seems like the perfect low-budget server. Fast as hell, plenty of RAM for most server needs, gigabit ethernet, and before too long it will be able to run pretty much any OS on the planet, presumably. And, its tiny and dead quiet, perfect for a living room where it has to remain out of the way of a girlfriend.

So, what I'm thinking about now is the possible configuration of an Intel Mini in this line of service...

First and foremost, what OS? OS X Client can certainly be used, but that means a fair amount of customization and continued maintanence, since any customized server apps would have to be kept up to date manually. OS X Server solves those problems largely, but destroys the budget nature of this scheme. Presumably Windows will be a possibility before too long -- pass. That leaves two other obvious possibilities. Linux and BSD. Right now I am leaning towards Debian or Ubuntu, mainly because they are so heavily used and developed, and the package management system should make maintanence a bit easier than with FreeBSD. I am a little tired of always compiling updates.

As far as I know, none of these really runs in any stable way on the Intel Macs yet. Does anyone see an obvious choice for open-source server OS on the horizon for the Intel Macs?

The other things running through my brain at the moment are a backup system and a second ethernet port. Clearly, these are both USB (or Firewire) propositions. Does anyone know of a reliable way to add a second ethernet port to a Mini, for use in setting up a LAN? For backup right now, I do nightly and weekly backups to a second HD, which is easily automated and has saved my bacon more than once. The obvious translation of this to the Mini is a Firewire/USB HD hooked up to it. But maybe someone has a more brilliant concept?

Thanks for any thoughts. Looking forward to the day when this is in my hands! Goodbye Gateway!

bluedog · Mar 1, 2006, 02:54 PM

If physical proximity to the computer is possible. You can do TCPIP over firewire (get a long cable), or for a slower access internet use a TCPIP/wireless USB dongle. You can get more ports by using one of those stacking HD expansions that give you a larger drivespace AND more ports too.

For backups if you have the TCPIP over firewire you can do fast backups but will need the wire.

It sounds like a GREAT server type machine and if you prefer the gui for administration then OSX would perform its function great. I might try and get one into our home for its lower power consumption. I've got an athlon box running my web server right now and I'm sure its drawing a lot more power than a mini would.

Great idea. I didn't think this was as great an idea with the PPC machines because I didn't think the performance/cost was worth it. Now's a good time to rethink that.

tooki · Mar 1, 2006, 02:58 PM

I don't think that it'd make sense to use IP over FireWire when it has gigabit. What exactly do you need the second port for?

Note that Mac OS X Server does not yet exist for Intel. You can only run it on PPC Macs.

Anyhow, people have been very successfully running PPC Mac minis as servers since they were released. This is only going to be better!

tooki

Mark Edwards · Mar 1, 2006, 03:33 PM

Originally Posted by tooki

I don't think that it'd make sense to use IP over FireWire when it has gigabit. What exactly do you need the second port for?

For running a LAN with NAT. In other words, the gigabit port is probably the LAN, and then a USB ethernet adapter does the WAN. This is probably the weakest link in this chain right now, because I'm not sure how reliable a USB ethernet adapter would be.

Another obvious option is to get a seperate router, but that starts killing the elegance and cheapness of this solution, and I would want to run the WAN firewall off of the server ideally. Cheap routers have terrible firewalls from what I've used.

tooki · Mar 1, 2006, 08:19 PM

As far as I know, USB ethernet interfaces are reliable, but since they are dependent on drivers from a third party, may not work with future OS releases (and right now, in all likelihood, there are no Intel drivers yet).

I'd just use a separate "dumb" router. You can always get one running Linux in order to have a better firewall.

tooki

Mark Edwards · Mar 1, 2006, 08:24 PM

Originally Posted by tooki

As far as I know, USB ethernet interfaces are reliable, but since they are dependent on drivers from a third party, may not work with future OS releases (and right now, in all likelihood, there are no Intel drivers yet).

I'd just use a separate "dumb" router. You can always get one running Linux in order to have a better firewall.

tooki

That's probably what I will do for now. The DSL its on now has a router built in, so this isn't an immediate issue. Would be nice to have the capacity down the line.

I imagine it won't be a serious issue once the Linux's and BSD's support the Intel Macs. There will probably be some generic USB ethernet device that just works with the standard kernel. That's really going to be a nice thing about this Intel switch, not having to wait for OSS to support odd hardware combinations.

Tuishimi · Mar 1, 2006, 11:53 PM

I run 4 websites on my iMac, had them on my G4 mini before that, and Kerio Mail server.... of course nobody ever VISITS my web sites... but I like to think that if they did, the mac would hold up well.

mduell · Mar 2, 2006, 03:52 AM

Why do you want to use the Mac mini as a NAT box? I'd just use a cheap Linksys or D-link box for that (they even do rudimentry QoS) and keep your Mac off the border.

Mark Edwards · Mar 2, 2006, 04:15 AM

Originally Posted by mduell

Why do you want to use the Mac mini as a NAT box? I'd just use a cheap Linksys or D-link box for that (they even do rudimentry QoS) and keep your Mac off the border.

Because the firewall and NAT capabilities of cheap Linksys and D-link boxes SUCK big time. My FreeBSD box has been "on the border" for years, as has an OS X Server box that I admin, and both have been doing NAT duties like champs. Once you get used to the capabilities of a real NAT/firewall combo, going back to a cheap Linksys box is painful.

Plus, the concept here is an elegant and cheap setup, and having a whole second box running just to provide a LAN is a step away from that.

mavherzog · Mar 2, 2006, 04:35 AM

Originally Posted by Mark Edwards

Because the firewall and NAT capabilities of cheap Linksys and D-link boxes SUCK big time

You just need the right firmware.

netsaint · Mar 2, 2006, 04:06 PM

I am looking to do the same with a mini, just watching the FreeBSD forums for any insight as to whether or not there are going to be any problems running on the mini.

BTW, if you still prefer to use FreeBSD as your firewall/gateway(pf) then you could always just use packages with the pkg_add -r command. Then just update with each new release.

Mark Edwards · Mar 2, 2006, 04:27 PM

Originally Posted by netsaint

I am looking to do the same with a mini, just watching the FreeBSD forums for any insight as to whether or not there are going to be any problems running on the mini.

BTW, if you still prefer to use FreeBSD as your firewall/gateway(pf) then you could always just use packages with the pkg_add -r command. Then just update with each new release.

I tried the package route, but found that it wasn't worth bothering with it, as many times the binary packages have dependency issues with other packages, as with packages that require apache complaining when apache+mod_ssl is installed. Ports don't have that problem. Also, packages often don't exist for a given port, and if they do they often severly lag behind in version.

I just resigned myself to building ports rather than dealing with the headache of managing both systems.

Maybe in reality Debian wouldn't be any easier to deal with, but I like the idea of being able to quickly do upgrades, and having security updates happen automatically.

Mark Edwards · Mar 31, 2006, 03:26 PM

Just want to update this thread with a link to a page with GPL drivers for USB ethernet adapters for OSX, which should provide a Mini-based server with one or more extra ports for use in setting up a LAN, etc.
http://www.sustworks.com/site/news_usb_ethernet.html

That should make a Mini work very well as a cheap, small, quiet server solution running OSX. Presumably, when the various Linux flavors are up and running on the Intel Macs, there will be drivers in the kernel which work with at least some USB ethernet adapters as well.