Clean Install on Mac Mini Server

I just purchased a Mac Mini Snow Leopard Server and used Target Mode from my MacBook Pro to repartition the disks. I first thought I would set up the 2 disks in the Mac Mini as RAID Mirrored. I tried to perform a clean install of Snow Leopard with the install DVD in my MacBook Pro. But the OS Install program would not let me past the restart stage because the computer with the Optical Drive was a laptop. I left the Firewire connection in tack and the DVD in the MacBook Pro's optical drive.
I then tried the Remote Install procedure, with a monitor & keyboard, while holding down the C key, but all I got was a folder with a "?" on my monitor. I also tried a startup using the "option" key and the "shift" key. I tried this again with the Firewire connection removed. I then tried to use Server Assistant on my MacBook Pro and complete a Remote Install. Still no luck, folder with "?" on the monitor, and Server Assistant could not find the Mac Mini Ethernet address.
I concluded that the RAID configuration was causing me the problem and used Target Mode to remove the RAID configuration and repartitioned the 2 disks into 2 partitions each, for various purposes. I then repeated all of the attempts above to reinstall Snow Leapord Server Software with the same results as above.
Can anyone give me some guidance?

Page 38 of the manual http://manuals.info.apple.com/enUS/Mac_mini_Late2009_SL_ServerUG.pdf has worked like a charm. Follow the steps here.
Hope this helps

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Mavericks won't install on Mac Mini Server

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Any help with a Time Capsule install and Mac Mini server screen share?

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Try removing the TC and see if the problem disappears.
Screen Sharing has a checkered histroy looking back through the posts..
https://discussions.apple.com/message/16026896#16026896
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It could be the BTMM associated with the TC.
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/4160415?start=0&tstart=0

If I clean-install my mac mini that is currently running at 10.5.8, will i be able to install mountain lion?

Please help, because I have searched everywhere, and apparently, 10.6 (Snow Leopard), is not sold in the Apple Store anymore. If i were to buy it at Amazon, it would cost me about $105~$200, which is an absolute rip-off

Upgrading to Mountain Lion
You can upgrade to Mountain Lion from Lion or directly from Snow Leopard. Mountain Lion can be downloaded from the Mac App Store for $19.99. To access the App Store you must have Snow Leopard 10.6.6 or later installed.
If you need to purchase Snow Leopard you can still purchase a copy from Apple's online store's telesales agents.[1-800-MY-APPLE (1-800-692-7753) or Customer Service and Sales Support at 1-800-676-2775.] Ask for a Sales Representative.
Third-party sources for Snow Leopard are:
Snow Leopard from Amazon.com
Snow Leopard from eBay
After you install Snow Leopard you will have to download and install the Mac OS X 10.6.8 Update Combo v1.1 to update Snow Leopard to 10.6.8 and give you access to the App Store.
If you need to purchase Lion call 1-800-692-7753 or 1-800-676-2775. Ask for a Sales Representative. They will check your Apple ID, and email you a code and instructions. The cost is $29.99 (as it was before) plus tax. It's a download.
Be sure your computer meets the minimum requirements:
Apple - OS X Mountain Lion - Read the technical specifications.
Macs that can be upgraded to OS X Mountain Lion
iMac (Mid 2007 or newer)
MacBook (Late 2008 Aluminum, or Early 2009 or newer)
MacBook Pro (Mid/Late 2007 or newer)
MacBook Air (Late 2008 or newer)
Mac mini (Early 2009 or newer)
Mac Pro (Early 2008 or newer)
Xserve (Early 2009)
Are my applications compatible?
See App Compatibility Table - RoaringApps - App compatibility and feature support for OS X & iOS.
Am I eligible for the free upgrade?
See Apple - Free OS X Mountain Lion upgrade Program.
For a complete How-To introduction from Apple see Apple - Upgrade your Mac to OS X Mountain Lion.

Is it possible to install Lion client on to a Mac mini server?

After seeing benchmark tests on the new Mac mini, the Mac mini server with the i7 processor is obviously much faster. But would there be any issue prohibiting the Lion client from installing on the Mac mini server instead of Lion server?

I'm afraid it's not possible. Or at least not easily. I've spent the last few days trying to do exactly that, as Lion Server doesn't seem to be able to sleep automatically unlike the client. I've followed all the Apple advice on how to 'remove' the Server components, but it's clear looking at a process list that there's still a huge amount of server stuff still there.
If you try to install a retail copy of Lion on the new hardware including 2011 Mini, it will refuse to boot from it - this is a deliberate and in my book completely unnecessary and unreasonable restriction by Apple.
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DVD Problems on Mac Mini Server

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Help...

raynewman wrote:
Help...
maybe this support article will: [_*Reinstalling software using Remote Install Mac OS X*_|http://support.apple.com/kb/HT2129].
more information in this support article.
JGG
edited by the Jolly Green Giant (where Green stands for environmentally friendly)

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And that is how phone support works unless you purchase AppleCare for your Mac. Without AppleCare, you get 90 days of free phone support (starting from the date of purchase of the Mac); after that, you get charged unless the problem turns out to one that is covered under the Mac's warranty.
Message was edited by: Dave Sawyer

Mac Mini Server works fine but one folder!

Hi all!
It's my first time on the forums so let me introduce myself first. I'm Dylan de Heer, currently working at Today, a communication and design studio in the center of Holland (Utrecht ftw.).
About a year ago we had someone install a mac mini server for us with daily backups and what not. Now since a week or two it happens that one folder became corrupted. Anyone that enters it, has his whole finder freeze up. Now would it be a small product or unimportant folder we would've deleted it and copied it from a local machine again. This time though we're talking about a full client's folder.
When anyone tries to enter the folder we just see a black space, no icons, no files, anything. My guess is that nothing is deleted. I think we're just unable to access the folder properly. Now I'm not much of a tech guy and the person that installed the server is unreachable. Would anyone have an idea of what could be the cause I'll manage to fix it. If it's terminal related Please provide a detailed description as of what I'm supposed to run.
I'm sure I'm missing some important information as to what kind of server we're running but frankly I don't really know the specs. So I'm very open to suggestions as to what I should do, haha.
Anyway, thanks in advance and I really hope that we can find a way to fetch that folder back. In the meanwhile I'm gonna take a look if I can access the backup disk somehow. Thanks!
Dylan

Good suggestion, let's see if we can. I'll come back to you!

Mac Mini Server on my university network?

Hello,
I am a university professor and I would like to install a Mac Mini server in my laboratory to connect all my Macs (I have 4 so far). Obviously, my Macs are already connected to the Internet through the campus network (fixed IP), but since my university is an anti-Mac institution, I cannot have access to network drives and other networking goodies (we are on Novell). Anyway, that's why I want to buy a Mac Mini server to connect all my Mac and be able to share files, allowed different permissions to my undergraduate, grad, Ph.D. students, etc. plan and call meeting with iCal Server, communicate with my lab users with iChat, etc. However, I don't need email services; we use the one provided by the university.
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Thanks!

The real answer to this depends on two things:
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2) whether each device in your schools' network have real-world IP addresses, or whether the network uses NAT.
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Clean install Mountain Lion on Mac mini Server (Mid 2011)

Hi.
I am trying to do a clean install of ML on a Mac Mini Server. This is just a test machine, so not interested in any backups, etc.
The machine is a Mid 2011 Mac Mini, and had Lion Server on it to start with (has been re-installed, reimaged, etc multiple times in it's short life with me so far ..)
I would like to set the internal disks up as a Software Raid 1 config.
I have a successfully created and tested USB stick with OS X ML install on it. I boot the mini with the USB stick, and once the installer options are available, I use the disk utility to create my software raid 1 config. Once this is completed, I proceed with the rest of the install.
Before I can go any further, I am warned that the installer will NOT be able to create a recovery partition, and use time machine backups on this drive.
If I break the raid and install on either one of the drives, the install proceeds without any problems.
Is there a method I can use to do a clean install on this machine with the drives configured as RAID 1?

This is the message that would happen with Lion, see this: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4649
Basically when you setup a Raid 0/1, the Lion and Mt. Lion installer won't/can't create a recovery partition.
When you boot from a recovery partition you have access to certain tools, e.g. Disk Utility to restore a Time Machine back up, redownload the OS, etc.
The recovery partition provides a certain bit of convenience but isn't absolutely necessary to run the OS. When you see the message, doesn't it let you go ahead with the install, accepting that no recovery partition will be created?
If you need some of the recovery partition tools, you have a bootable USB stick as well as a backup of the Mt. Lion installer, no?

Mac Mini Server freezing in install when choosing PPPoE

I have a Mac Mini Server and when I go through the installation procedure and choose the connect PPPoE from the Network settings, the installation hangs every time.
I have already tried several clean installs from the Mac Mini Server disc to no avail.
Suggestions?
Thank You.

What part of the install process do you have trouble with? I'm assuming, and I think Tony did as well, you're talking about the server setup assistant that launches once the OS is installed. Naming your server/domain is a critical part of setup, as is DNS. If you put faulty configs in during setup, or try to setup services before DNS is working, you'll run into trouble - so please include whatever you're trying to do - if you're new to servers, most everybody around here will be helpful or at least understanding.
In any event there's a great tutorial at
http://www.wazmac.com/serversnetwork/fileservers/osxserversetup/index.htm
While I agree with Tony that PPPoE isn't the best bet, you ought to be able to make it work - but you will need a static IP for your server. Best bet is probably to make it a static IP on your LAN using NAT and let your router/firewall have the live IP. But more info is always better - what are you trying to setup and what other equipment/network stuff is already going on? There are a lot of ways to setup a server and to setup a network, and there is certainly no one correct solution. Somebody smart (like Tony) may be able to give you a lot more options with more details. I'll try too, but I'm far from the most knowledgeable person around these parts.
Another thought - if you're not using the advanced server, I believe you need DNS set up beforehand somewhere - if you just enter your ISP's DNS server info, it won;t have any records for your server. The Wazmac setup notes will walk you through setting up your own DNS for your LAN and using your ISP's DNS for everything on the WAN side.
Message was edited by: Jeff Kelleher

How to install OSX 10.6 client in Mac Mini Server 10.7 Lion Server

I am ordering a Mac Mini Server with Lion Server 10.7, with 256GB SSD and 750GB HD. I want to use Snow Leopard (client/workstation) instead. Previously I have already purchased retailed version of 10.5 clients and 10.6 client upgrade. Please advise the best approach from the followings (or more suggestions from you guys...).
(A) The boot disk (likely to be the SSD) will be re-formatted and re-installed by "clean" installation of 10.6 client. But I am not sure whether all hardware drivers for the new Mac Mini (2011) are available in the 10.6 client disk. Also, it seems to me that installation disk of 10.7 server will not be provided. So I shall not be able to re-install server version again if I want to change this Mac to a server sometimes afterwards. Of course I would like to keep this server software for investment protection, no matter I use it or not. If 10.6 client can be installed, I shall use bootcamp to install Windows 7 also. So there will be 2 partitions to be usable aparently.
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Do you guys have other ideas or suggestions?
[Background]
In fact I want to make use of its strongest computing power (amongst available Mac Mini computers in store), quad-core CPU & dual disks, to run music applications (DAWs). Operating systems are put at SSD, and data is put at traditional harddisk. As some music applications (e.g. Calkwalk Dimension) only support 10.6 currently, I need to down-grade from Lion server to Snow Leopard workstation. Also I think applications can run faster in a hardware with workstation OS (rather than server version). Please correct me if this belief is wrong.
Thanks / Howard.

If you completely wipe the original Mac mini boot drive you will wipe the Server.app software an dlose it. You should make a backup first, perhaps by saving the entire boot drive as a Disk Image file on to another drive.
In terms of install 10.6, the 10.6 DVD will not boot on the new Mac mini even if you connect a DVD drive. You need to put the Mac mini in to FireWire Target Disk Mode and connect it to an older Mac that will allow booting from that DVD, then install on to the Mac mini (over FireWire), you then need to upgrade it using the 10.6.8 Combo Updater this will add the drivers needed for the new Mac mini.

OS X Server install on Mac Mini.

Hi,
I"m looking to do a clean install of OS X Server on my Mac Mini. Wanted to get some input on how to best partition and setup my hard drives. For now server will be mostly used as a fileserver, music/video streaming. I may eventually start playing around with ical server, etc.
Mac Mini ,2.53 Ghz Intel Core 2 Duo,dual 500 GB drives, 4 Gb memory
1.5 Tb external Firewire drive.
1.5 Tb external USB drive - data backup using Time Machine
I was thinking about the following:
Setup 100 Gb partition on each drive and turn on RAID mirroring, install OS X on that partition. Remaining space on those drives will be used as individual partitions for data.
Install OS X on firewire drive and backup OS partition once installed. Can I get away with using Disk Utility or should I use other software?
Thanks!

I use Carbon Copy Cloner, Synchronize! Pro X, and Time Machine. I no longer use any of the myriad of other backup schemes that have not worked as well for me over the years.
When I first get a machine, the first thing I do is assign a new large capacity backup for that machine.
So :
( 1 ) I buy something like a 1 TB backup drive, select it at the finder level (hit return to put its name in the edit mode) and rename it something like NewBackupDrive.
( 2 ) use CCC to make a bootable backup from Macintosh HD ---> NewBackupDrive
( 3 ) boot from the NewBackupDrive to make sure it is working
( 4 ) Now we can partition the main internal drive Macintosh HD
My last iMac came with a 640 GB drive, so when I used Disk Utility, and selected 6 partitions, it neatly worked out that the size of each partition was 106.69 GB, which for my needs was perfect. This gave me plenty of expansion capacity. You can adjust to fewer partitions if you need more capacity for each partition. Once you partition, write down the size of each partition, so you can partition the backup drive similarly.
Using Disk Utility I select six and name them as follows. I dont use spaces on any directories that I might need to use the Terminal with, since it makes it easier using unix without dealing with spaces in paths.
Drive_1
Drive_2
Drive_3
Drive_4
Drive_5
Drive_6
( 5 ) use CCC to make a bootable backup of NewBackupDrive ---> Drive_1
( 6 ) use CCC to make a bootable backup of NewBackupDrive ---> Drive_6 (redundant, but good),
this way over the coming days, or weeks, as I begin rotating backups from
Drive_1 ---> Drive_2
Drive_1 ---> Drive_3
Drive_1 ---> Drive_4
Drive_1 ---> Drive_5
it will be last one over-written. Once you get to (Drive_1 ---> Drive_6), you can choose to use it, or skip over it and leave it pristine if you wish. Anyway for now, I would protect myself by doing steps ( 5 ) and ( 6 )
( 7 ) Boot from Drive_1, set your preferences, install any applications you will need,copy whatever you need and get the primary drive for the most part fully loaded with your data, so that it is fully functional.
( 8 ) Armed with the sizes of the partitions (should be one size if you made all partitions the same size), we can run Disk Utility, and partition to the same number of partitions as the main drive plus one. In my case that makes the number of partitions seven. The last one will be much larger and used for Time Machine.
In my case the first six partitons will be 106.69 GB, leaving 358.86 GB tor TM_1 which is the Time Machine partition.
Max_1
Max_2
Max_3
Max_4
Max_5
Max_6
TM_1
In my case I use a Guardian Maximus (raid level 0) with dual 1 Terabyte disks that do hardware level redundant backups. If one disk dies, the other one will continue working, the diagnostic lights will warn you to replace the faulty disk, and when you place the new disk in the slot, it will automatically be backed up by the good disk. I will become a mirror image of the good disk...
I have used many schemes over the years, including databases, spreadsheets, etc. What I use now is a simple notebook that I keep with each of the workstations, and servers that basically show the following :
CCC 2010.09.08 Drive_1 ---> TM_4 Upgraded to OS X Server 10.7.4
CCC 2010.09.08 Drive_1 ---> Drive_4 Upgraded to OS X Server 10.7.4
CCC 2010.09.15 Drive_1 ---> TM_5 Completely Rearranged the Web Server Structure
CCC 2010.09.15 Drive_1 ---> Drive_5 Upgraded to OS X Server 10.7.43
SyncProX 2010.09.15 Drive_1/Server ---> TM_1/Server
Best of Luck...
Bill Hernandez
Plano, Texas
Message was edited by: Bill_Hernandez

Installing Snow Leopard on Mac Mini Server

I recently purchased a 1Tb 4Gb Mac Mini Server, running Snow Leopard Server. I want to use it as a central repository for my other macs: storing music, movies, backup, screen sharing (it's hooked up to my 32-inch TV) but I also want to be able to run Logic Pro, Ableton Live, etc. I also have a Macbook Pro running Snow Leopard Client, which contains all of my programs, plugins, data, etc. I realize that Snow Leopard Server does not have migration assistant, so I have tried to install a retail copy of Snow Leopard onto the secondary drive, but when it gets to the restart stage it crashes every time. I think this is a firmware issue, because the Mac Mini has a different hardware configuration to other macs. I do not have access to the mid-2010 Snow Leopard Client for Mac Mini which would allow me to install Client and use migration assistant from there. What I would like to know is:
1/ Can I manually migrate my plugins/settings/programs to the server? If so, how? What is most crucial (and what I don't understand) is copying my audio units and audio programs (e.g. Logic Pro, Pro Tools). Because of the firmware issue, it seems more difficult than cloning my MacBook Pro to a time machine HDD and running from there... I would really like to purely clone my MacBook Pro, because I am very happy with the way it is set up.
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3/ Is there another method I can use? Something I am overlooking?
Thanks in Advance.

Thanks for your reply. I talked to the Apple Support again and they told me the server edition could only be used on that OS and if I wanted to use it as something else I could chose not to use the server applications, or buy a regular Mac mini. And that was all they said. Interesting since it was one of their sales persons who told me I could install Snow Leopard.
Anyway, I got hold of a client disc and it all worked like a charm.

Mac mini server install DVD - install on a different computer

I bought a Mac mini server (= a Mac mini with a Mac OS X Snow Leopard Server pre-installed) a while ago. I am planning to install Lion Server on the same Mac Mini and get rid of the Snow Leopard installation DVD. My question is, can the DVD that came with the Mac mini be used to install the server OS on a different computer (another Mac mini or iMac etc.)? or is it somehow tied to the original Mac mini?
Thanks!

Install discs included with a Mac are only able to install on the same model Mac. However historically Mac OS X Server install discs are not limited in the same way. (Remember there is no such thing as a Lion install disc.)
The server install disc is more typically limited in being an older version of Mac OS X e.g. 10.6.3 and thus not able to boot and install on the latest model Macs. It is however possible to boot and install on an older Mac e.g. an older Mac mini but install on to an external hard disk which might even be the internal hard disk of another Mac connected via FireWire Target Disk Mode. You can then run the Mac OS X 10.6.8 Server Combo update to update it to the latest Snow Leopard Server version which will then boot successfully on all the current Macs including those that have only ever shipped with Lion.
Since a DVD disk takes very little space I would suggest you don't throw it away.

Clean Install on Mac Mini Server

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