Xserve is a line of

rack unit A rack unit (abbreviated U or RU) is a unit of measure defined as . It is most frequently used as a measurement of the overall height of 19-inch and 23-inch rack frames, as well as the height of equipment that mounts in these frames, whereby th ...

computers designed by

Apple Inc. Apple Inc. is an American multinational technology company headquartered in Cupertino, California, United States. Apple is the largest technology company by revenue (totaling in 2021) and, as of June 2022, is the world's biggest company ...

for use as

server Server may refer to: Computing *Server (computing), a computer program or a device that provides functionality for other programs or devices, called clients Role * Waiting staff, those who work at a restaurant or a bar attending customers and su ...

s. Introduced in 2002, it was Apple's first designated server hardware design since the

Apple Network Server The Apple Network Server (ANS) was a line of PowerPC-based server computers designed, manufactured and sold by Apple Computer, Inc. from February 1996 to April 1997. It was codenamed "Shiner" and originally consisted of two models, the Network S ...

in 1996. In the meantime, ordinary Power Macintosh G3 and G4 models were rebranded as Macintosh Server G3 and Macintosh Server G4 with some alterations to the hardware, such as added Gigabit Ethernet cards, UltraWide SCSI cards, extra large and fast hard drives etc. and shipped with Mac OS X Server software. The Xserve initially featured one or two processors, but later switched over to the then-new transitioned to Intel with the Core 2-based Xeon offerings and subsequently switched again to two quad-core microprocessors. The Xserve could be used for a variety of applications, including

file server In computing, a file server (or fileserver) is a computer attached to a network that provides a location for shared disk access, i.e. storage of computer files (such as text, image, sound, video) that can be accessed by the workstations that are ab ...

web server A web server is computer software and underlying hardware that accepts requests via HTTP (the network protocol created to distribute web content) or its secure variant HTTPS. A user agent, commonly a web browser or web crawler, initiate ...

or even

high-performance computing High-performance computing (HPC) uses supercomputers and computer clusters to solve advanced computation problems. Overview HPC integrates systems administration (including network and security knowledge) and parallel programming into a mult ...

applications using clustering – a dedicated cluster Xserve, the Xserve Cluster Node, without a video card and optical drives was also available. On November 5, 2010, Apple announced that the Xserve line would be discontinued on January 31, 2011 and replaced with the Mac Pro Server and the Mac Mini Server.

Supported OS versions releases

Xserve G4

Apple introduced the Xserve on May 14, 2002 (released in June). Initially, two configuration options were available: a single-processor Xserve at US$2999 and a dual-processor Xserve at US$3999. Xserves sold before August 24, 2002 shipped with

Mac OS X v10.1 Mac OS X 10.1 ( code named Puma) is the second major release of macOS, Apple's desktop and server operating system. It superseded Mac OS X 10.0 and preceded Mac OS X Jaguar. Mac OS X 10.1 was released on September 25, 2001, as a free update ...

"Puma" Server, while those sold after shipped with

Mac OS X v10.2 Mac OS X Jaguar (version 10.2) is the third major release of macOS, Apple's desktop and server operating system. It superseded Mac OS X 10.1 and preceded Mac OS X Panther. The operating system was released on August 23, 2002 either for sin ...

"Jaguar" Server. On February 10, 2003, Apple released an improved and expanded Xserve lineup. Improvements included one or two 1.33 GHz PowerPC G4 processors, faster memory, and higher capacity Ultra ATA/133 hard disk drives. The front plate was redesigned for a slot-loading optical drive. A new model, the Xserve Cluster node was announced at the same price as the single-processor Xserve, featuring two 1.33 GHz processors, no optical drive, a single hard

drive bay A drive bay is a standard-sized area for adding hardware to a computer. Most drive bays are fixed to the inside of a case, but some can be removed. Over the years since the introduction of the IBM PC, it and its compatibles have had many form f ...

, no video or Ethernet cards, and a 10-client version of "Jaguar" server. On April 2, 2003 the

Xserve RAID Xserve is a line of rack unit computers designed by Apple Inc. for use as servers. Introduced in 2002, it was Apple's first designated server hardware design since the Apple Network Server in 1996. In the meantime, ordinary Power Macintosh G3 ...

was introduced, providing a much higher capacity and higher throughput disk subsystem for the Xserve.

Xserve G5

On January 6, 2004 Apple introduced the Xserve G5, a redesigned higher-performance Xserve. The 32-bit PowerPC G4s were replaced with one or two 64-bit

PowerPC 970 The PowerPC 970, PowerPC 970FX, and PowerPC 970MP are 64-bit PowerPC processors from IBM introduced in 2002. When used in PowerPC-based Macintosh computers, Apple referred to them as the PowerPC G5. The 970 family was created through a collab ...

processors running at 2 GHz. Ventilation issues restricted it to three

SATA SATA (Serial AT Attachment) is a computer bus interface that connects host bus adapters to mass storage devices such as hard disk drives, optical drives, and solid-state drives. Serial ATA succeeded the earlier Parallel ATA (PATA) standard to ...

hot-swap drive bays, with the original space for the fourth drive bay used for air vents. The front plate and slot-loading optical drive were retained from the last Xserve G4. The higher memory capacity and bandwidth as well as the stronger floating-point performance of the PowerPC 970 made it more suitable for

(HPC) applications. System X is one such cluster computer built with Xserves. Three configuration options were available: a single-processor model at US$2,999, a dual-processor model at $3,999, and a dual-processor cluster node model (with an unchanged appearance from the G4 cluster node) at US$2,999. On January 3, 2005, Apple updated the Xserve G5 with faster processors in the dual-processor configurations. 400 GB hard disks were made available for up to 1.2 TB of internal storage. The slot-loading optical drive was upgraded to a combination DVD-ROM/CD-RW standard, DVD-/+RW optional. Soon after, Apple updated the Xserve and Xserve RAID to allow the use of 500 GB Hard Drives. Xserve G5 models before April 2005 shipped with

Mac OS X v10.3 Mac OS X Panther (version 10.3) is the fourth major release of macOS, Apple's desktop and server operating system. It followed Mac OS X Jaguar and preceded Mac OS X Tiger. It was released on October 24, 2003. System requirements Panther's sy ...

"Panther", after April 2005 shipped with

Mac OS X v10.4 Mac OS X Tiger (version 10.4) is the 5th major release of macOS, Apple's desktop and server operating system for Mac computers. Tiger was released to the public on April 29, 2005 for US$129.95 as the successor to Mac OS X 10.3 Panther. Som ...

"Tiger".

Intel Xserve

The Intel-based Xserves were announced at the

Worldwide Developers Conference The Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) is an information technology conference held annually by Apple Inc. The conference is usually held at Apple Park in California. The event is usually used to showcase new software and technologies in t ...

on August 7, 2006, and are significantly faster compared to the Xserve G5. They use Intel Xeon (' Woodcrest') processors, DDR2 ECC FB-DIMMs, ATI Radeon graphics, a maximum storage capacity of 2.25 TB when used with three 750 GB drives, optional redundant power supplies and a 1U rack form factor. The Intel Xserves now had on board video, freeing up an expansion slot. On January 8, 2008 Xserve was updated with Intel Xeon (' Harpertown') processors, faster memory, and a maximum storage capacity of 3 TB when used with three 1 TB drives. The front-mounted FireWire 400 port featured in previous models was also replaced with a USB 2.0 port. The Xserve RAID was discontinued on February 19, 2008. On April 7, 2009 Xserve was updated to use Intel Xeon (' Gainestown') processors,

DDR3 Double Data Rate 3 Synchronous Dynamic Random-Access Memory (DDR3 SDRAM) is a type of synchronous dynamic random-access memory (SDRAM) with a high bandwidth (" double data rate") interface, and has been in use since 2007. It is the higher-spee ...

memory, and NVIDIA graphics with Mini DisplayPort output. The update also saw an increase to the maximum storage capacity, bringing it to 6 TB when used with three 2 TB drives. An option to add a SSD boot-drive that does not occupy a drive bay was also implemented. The addition of the SSD boot drive allows all drives to be swapped whilst the server remains online. It is also Apple's first Xserve to use PVC-free internal cables and components and contain no brominated flame retardants. On August 28, 2009 Xserve was updated to ship standard with Mac OS X Server 10.6 Unlimited Client Server. In addition to improved functionality Mac OS X 10.6 Server added support for up to 96 GB of RAM.https://everymac.com/systems/apple/xserve/specs/xserve-intel-nehalem-xeon-2.93-2009-eight-core-specs.html On November 5, 2010, Apple announced that it would not be developing a future version of Xserve. While accepting orders for the current model until January 31, 2011, and "honoring" all Xserve warranties and extended support programs, the company suggested users switch to Mac Pro Server or Mac Mini Server.

References

External links

Apple Xserve G5 Developer Note
{{Apple Inc. hardware Apple Inc. hardware Macintosh servers Macintosh computers by case type PowerPC Macintosh computers X86 Macintosh computers Computer-related introductions in 2002