Intel xserve + OS10.5

Question

I'm about to set up a small office network based around an xserve but with the advent of Intelised Mac and the prospect of OS 10.5, I'm now in a quandary as to whether to wait. We will soon start replacing the older office iMacs with new Intelised ones and my concern is that I'm setting myself up for problems if I buy a current G5 xserve.
Does anyone know whether buying a current xserve will lead me up a blind alley in terms of hardware and software compatibility, system performance and cost.
Ta

Answer 1

Unlike the desktop and portable markets, where dual booting or running apps in virtualization are attractive, I can't believe that anyone will be doing the same with servers unless they are just playing around. Apple XServes are strong for AFP file services or SAN (XSAN) deployments, and Open Directory... but if you need a PDC, for example, you'll likely buy an Opteron or alternate Conroe platform w/o OS X as it will likely be faster at the same price or cheaper at the same performance level than Apple's hardware. Hardware performance of Apple gear, of course, has always been somewhat of a myth and effective marketing. However, not to say that the dependable hardware combined with the value of OS X isn't the more important issue.
A maxed out G5 XServe moves like a snail compared to the current maxed out Opteron systems, but they are CHEAP and they run OS X, which for some is a value, for others it is not. In the server market, Apple ends up being the budget solution, who would have thought?
To answer your question, I would buy now, because you are buying OS X, I presume. In the future, when the processing power jumps up 10 times, you can evaluate your system architecture and maybe then you can decide that you only need to buy 3 servers instead of 10... or something like that, but if the OS X server is going to meet your needs now, for the services you need to run now, you may not even get any appreciable value from a faster machine, especially if you have to wait for several months to a year. If your really scared about the hardware investment, buy a used G4 or G5 machine (like was mentioned), and install OS X server on it... maybe you only need the power of a G mini or something to tide you over for the Intel XServe? Or buy a G5 cluster unit... no one really needs the optical drive in most environments anyways.
The one thing no one has mentioned so far is that (at
least currently), we would not be switching from Mac
to Win without a restart. That's got to be a huge
PITA for a server on a routine basis.
I just got a single G4 xserve on ebay and max'ed the
ram (2GB) and 4x 180 GB drives for a mixed Mac and
PeeC network.
For what it's worth, there is still a lot of fight in
the old gal left for a small fraction of the cost of
the latest and greatest. 2 or 3 generations ago Macs
still offer a great value NOW.