> The compact size of the Mac mini, which packs a powerful System on a Chip (SoC) into a tiny footprint.The energy efficiency of Apple silicon (M-series) chips, which allows high density without overheating or excessive power draw.
This really adds nothing to the article, and looks like AI fluff to me.
Combine that with there being a bold section in like every single paragraph, I'm going to assume yes
not sure why the attach rpi for every mac mini, wouldn't it be cheaper to have one rpi and 9 mac minis connectd to 10 port switch? I also wished one day to make cluster out of Apple TVs - they are very cheap (~150usd for version with ethernet) and most likely the new upcoming version will have more powerful A-series apple sillicon. I guess tvOS is just very restricted.
> not sure why the attach rpi for every mac mini, wouldn't it be cheaper to have one rpi and 9 mac minis connectd to 10 port switch?
Simple... they're (likely) running something on the Raspberry Pi's that sets them up as USB gadgets, aka the Mac Mini "sees" a virtual keyboard and mouse. That's enough to manage remote provisioning.
To replicate that they'd need a KVM switch which doesn't have some weird edge case in how exactly it does USB-C switching, and it needs to be remotely controlled. A Pi is cheaper plus the failure modes of a Pi are more understood than the failure mode of some weird ass KVM switch someone cobbled together in China.
They’re connected to a single USB-C cable. For many technical reasons you can’t have a simple kvm which switches inputs. You’ll need to continuously power all 9 minis some way.
All nine USB-C cables will need a continuous, active connection.
To do this, you will need a smart controller that switches which port it’s talking to.
Or you can stick a relatively cheap device on every mini and and connect it to the network.
Having a “controller” for every mini means you can swap single units in both hardware and software very easily. There’s a one-to-one relationship and you don’t have to deal with pairing.
Simpler design... let alone constraints of the USB and/or other interfaces in use. Not to mention 1:1 of management port access to system access, where other solutions may be problematic.
Yeah, I was hoping for more detail as well. I'm guessing they did something similar to what I did to make my Pi control computers.[0]
The Raspberry Pi 4 can emulate a USB keyboard and mouse, and there are inexpensive adapters that allow it to capture display output. You can also hook it up to a relay to cycle power for an external device.
As others have pointed out, keyboard / mouse emulation is pretty useful, but it's also quite quirky.
We use MDM to automate configuration delivery as much as possible, I think it's been mentioned as well (although we're not zero touch yet).
You might want to look at Asahi Linux's Central Scrutinizer for some insights on the fancier stuff that can be done over the USB-C port.
It might be that they're limited by something else in their existing racks; say power or networking ports, so this is an easy hack to get into their existing rack scheme.
Unlike the old rack mount options for the trashcan Mac Pro units (eg https://photos.imgix.com/racking-mac-pros), it doesn't seem like much thought has been given here to a front-to-back airflow.
I'm also surprised they're touting the density of this solution— seems like the obvious thing would be to put the Minis on their sides. A 4U chassis has 17.5cm vertical space in it, and a Mac Mini is 17cm wide. With the Mini being 2in in height, that suggests 8-9 Minis in a 4U rack, vs 2 Minis in a 2U rack for Scaleway's trays.
EDIT: Here's a commercially-available solution that's 6/4U: https://www.mk1manufacturing.com/Rack-Mount-for-6-M4-mac-min..., you'd think it could basically be this but with the management plane behind or in front. And as others have said, making the management plane be more shared, so it's not 1:1.
Yep! I would have thought about doing a 3d printed "tray" that goes under the mini and routes front/cold and back/hot air to the exterior of the rack...
Sounds like 2 per 1U to me. I think it's power efficiency that limits filling a rack with typical 1U servers in most plans. The power efficiency here is probably not really impressive enough given so many power units, etc.
I was interested in provisioning one of these a few months back through Scaleway, but couldn't navigate their sign-up process without it dumping me back to the start everytime. Nor did I receive a reply when I e-mailed their support e-mail.
I don't know if that's changed (they had odd pricing too, like Startup vs. Business, of which the difference wasn't clear), but aware. I hope someone has more success than I did.
Scaleway's site and support is horrible, as you've found. But their pricing and offerings are solid and their network is... OK. For the price, they're better than Hetzner... if you can get signed up!
Grim environment in the rodeo. The /home/directory, which the Rasberry-Pi doesn't align or distill as a symbolic markup language in .async or transport layer protocol and refers to /dev/ spinlock rolling release kernel version recursion or discursiveness.
Scaleway has some of the best prices for cloud Mac Minis and has better deals than the scam that is AWS's overpriced cloud Mac Minis.
Going with AWS for cloud Mac Minis is the quickest way to lose a lot of money if you don't know what to do with it and to flush as much cash down the drain as quickly as possible.
running macOS, which runs Xcode, which is required for making and signing iOS and macOS apps, Witcher, then sold on the App Store for money dust justifying spending money on their, or a similar service.
20 years ago the company I worked for used a Mac-Mini for video transcoding, because there was some DRM issue we had to deal with, I don't remember the specifics.
You'd think that from an environmental point of view, Apple would be able to sell packs of Mac Mini boards without the case and packaging for people doing this; with no physical board or electronic change, it would be easy.
I guess the Mac Pro Rack Edition technically exists, but that's needlessly huge (5U!) for a single node, ungodly expensive, and doesn't have server amenities like a BMC, so it's not exactly flying off the shelves.
Continuing to act like these ugly hacks are a normal way of doing business, is a continual signal to Apple that they don't need to build a rack-mount PC or server ever again.
If their developer community grew a pair and made themselves heard, then maybe the billion dollar company would do their effing job and provide a proper rackable development platform.
Which they had many years ago, before they morphed into a company that builds telephones and furniture that occasionally functions as a computer.
Instead we pretend like extension cords and gluing Raspberry Pi's together is totally ok for professional purposes.
Hah so, I have a couple of old Mac Minis in my homelab that I use very occassionally but would like to access over the Internet (say, via Tailscale etc.) Ideally they'd be sleeping most of the time to conserve power, and only be kicked awake when needed, e.g. by a Wake-on-Lan packet.
Unfortunately I would need another device active at all times to listen for commands and send that packet on demand. I was toying with the idea of using a Raspberry Pi connected to the router to perform that specific function, but I never got around to it.
Funny to see that idea scaled up to a server rack!
Identifying MAC spoofing in client network interfaces, which allow DNS poisoning or encrypted layer credential from a client address. Whether there is pragmatic use to spoof, or a secondary drive with no identifier.
43 comments
[ 3.7 ms ] story [ 59.2 ms ] thread> The compact size of the Mac mini, which packs a powerful System on a Chip (SoC) into a tiny footprint.The energy efficiency of Apple silicon (M-series) chips, which allows high density without overheating or excessive power draw.
This really adds nothing to the article, and looks like AI fluff to me.
Combine that with there being a bold section in like every single paragraph, I'm going to assume yes
Simple... they're (likely) running something on the Raspberry Pi's that sets them up as USB gadgets, aka the Mac Mini "sees" a virtual keyboard and mouse. That's enough to manage remote provisioning.
To replicate that they'd need a KVM switch which doesn't have some weird edge case in how exactly it does USB-C switching, and it needs to be remotely controlled. A Pi is cheaper plus the failure modes of a Pi are more understood than the failure mode of some weird ass KVM switch someone cobbled together in China.
To do this, you will need a smart controller that switches which port it’s talking to.
Or you can stick a relatively cheap device on every mini and and connect it to the network.
Having a “controller” for every mini means you can swap single units in both hardware and software very easily. There’s a one-to-one relationship and you don’t have to deal with pairing.
The Raspberry Pi 4 can emulate a USB keyboard and mouse, and there are inexpensive adapters that allow it to capture display output. You can also hook it up to a relay to cycle power for an external device.
[0] https://mtlynch.io/tinypilot/
You might want to look at Asahi Linux's Central Scrutinizer for some insights on the fancier stuff that can be done over the USB-C port.
This is not the image I expected to encounter under the title, “high density”.
Make those sleds taller and do three, maybe four per sled with a pair of large diameter fans. That’ll would be high density. This is medium at best.
e.g. https://servermall.com/fr/sets/serveurs-blade-dell/?srsltid=...
Also keep in mind that these SLEDs are compatible both with the M2 & the M4. M2 require more surface area & cover the whole free space on the SLED
I'm also surprised they're touting the density of this solution— seems like the obvious thing would be to put the Minis on their sides. A 4U chassis has 17.5cm vertical space in it, and a Mac Mini is 17cm wide. With the Mini being 2in in height, that suggests 8-9 Minis in a 4U rack, vs 2 Minis in a 2U rack for Scaleway's trays.
EDIT: Here's a commercially-available solution that's 6/4U: https://www.mk1manufacturing.com/Rack-Mount-for-6-M4-mac-min..., you'd think it could basically be this but with the management plane behind or in front. And as others have said, making the management plane be more shared, so it's not 1:1.
https://cdn.prod.website-files.com/687e650a56916806eaaf8f62/...
You can find a bunch more detail in their related patent filings:
https://patents.google.com/patent/US20240397658A1/en?q=(%22m...
Sounds like 2 per 1U to me. I think it's power efficiency that limits filling a rack with typical 1U servers in most plans. The power efficiency here is probably not really impressive enough given so many power units, etc.
I don't know if that's changed (they had odd pricing too, like Startup vs. Business, of which the difference wasn't clear), but aware. I hope someone has more success than I did.
With 60 minis per rack, and custom sled cases.
Going with AWS for cloud Mac Minis is the quickest way to lose a lot of money if you don't know what to do with it and to flush as much cash down the drain as quickly as possible.
20 years ago the company I worked for used a Mac-Mini for video transcoding, because there was some DRM issue we had to deal with, I don't remember the specifics.
https://www.apple.com/newsroom/in-the-loop/2025/10/shipping-...
I guess the Mac Pro Rack Edition technically exists, but that's needlessly huge (5U!) for a single node, ungodly expensive, and doesn't have server amenities like a BMC, so it's not exactly flying off the shelves.
If their developer community grew a pair and made themselves heard, then maybe the billion dollar company would do their effing job and provide a proper rackable development platform.
Which they had many years ago, before they morphed into a company that builds telephones and furniture that occasionally functions as a computer.
Instead we pretend like extension cords and gluing Raspberry Pi's together is totally ok for professional purposes.
Unfortunately I would need another device active at all times to listen for commands and send that packet on demand. I was toying with the idea of using a Raspberry Pi connected to the router to perform that specific function, but I never got around to it.
Funny to see that idea scaled up to a server rack!