OS X Server install on Mac Mini.

Question

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!

Answer 1

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