Apple’s rack-mounted, often-forgotten server offering - the Xserve – got updated today with some serious new hardware. Here’s Macworld on what is probably the most interesting option*:
For the first time, Apple has included a solid state drive in the Xserve. The 128GB SSD boot drive option is faster than regular hard disks and it doesn’t take up one of the three available drive bays. The drive bays support 7200 rpm SATA and 15,000 rpm SAS drives and can be configured with up to 3TB of internal storage.
Having the boot the drive separate from the 3 drive bays frees up those three drives for more interesting and beneficial configurations – like RAID 5, giving users the best setup for speed and redundancy.
*From Macworld’s article, you’d think that the SSD is on all models, but according to Apple’s tech spec page and the “Configure your Xserve” page on the online Apple Store, it is indeed optional.
