We seem to be mentioning both Parallels and Kerio pretty frequently, and they keep coming up with cool stuff. Kerio announced today that it will be offering its mail and collaboration platform, Kerio Mailserver, as a Virtual Appliance for Parallels on the Mac, news that will be of interest to a lot of folks looking for an even easier way to get away from Exchange.

The Virtual Appliance comes with a preconfigured version of CentOS 5.3 Linux, optimized for Kerio Mailserver. It looks like an ideal solution for businesses that need to run more than one OS, allowing hardware to be shared and making efficient use of server power.

I'm guessing you'd want an XServe or high-end Mac Pro if you're planning to deploy multiple Virtual Appliances, but I would think that the KMS Virtual Appliance should run on any Intel Mac which can do a decent job of running Parallels to begin with. If you missed it, check out the WWDC video of a tricked-out Mac Pro running Leopard and two installs of Vista with Parallels.

The Kerio Mailserver Virtual Appliance comes ready-to-run (if you have Parallels Desktop or Server) as a 30-day trial. Pricing starts at $499US for ten users, with an option to add integrated McAfee Anti-Virus for an extra $100US ($599).

As Mike mentioned in the news roundup yesterday, word is going around that the corporate overlords at Apple are planning to build a massive server farm in the state of North Carolina within the next decade or so. How do we know? Because the company is working on getting a few nice tax breaks to go along with the deal, eventually worth about $46 million if Apple fulfills their end of the agreement. Their end of the agreement being a huge investment of a whopping $1 billion (that's over 333,000 Xserves, if that is indeed what they're installing -- and we bet not) into an economy that could probably use it. What exactly will go in there? We aren't sure -- lawmakers say the investment is worth it, and obviously Apple isn't showing their cards.

[Note: the $1B investment figure is not an upfront number, but rather a total investment over the first 9 years of operation. –Ed.]

But the facility, once up and running, will start by employing at least 100 people, so that's a nice start. Google has apparently gone through the same deal with North Carolina recently, though their deal was a little smaller: $600 million investment for a server farm that opened last year.

More backend for Mobile Me? More power for the App Store or a project like it? A giant building full of Cubes running 24 hours a day? Or something we haven't even dreamt of yet?

Astute readers noticed some Apple store downtime earlier this morning. While I was hoping for something soaked in Unicorn tears, I guess I'll settle for a drool-worthy Xserve update.

The rumors were right on target, and the new Xserve sports Intel's "Nehalem" Xeon processor (just like the recent Mac Pro refresh), which Apple is touting as offering "twice the performance" when compared to last year's model.*

* There is always an asterisk in these types of comparison so please read the fine print before taking any marketing slogans as gospel.

The new Xserve systems look really hot. Check out these specs for the $2999US base model:

• a single 2.26 GHz Quad-Core Xeon 5500 series processor with 8MB of fully shared L3 cache
• 3GB of 1066 MHz DDR3 ECC RAM
• a single 160GB 7200 rpm SATA Apple Drive Module
• dual Gigabit Ethernet on-board
• two PCI Express 2.0 x16 expansion slots
• NVIDIA GeForce GT 120 256 MB with Mini DisplayPort output
• two FireWire® 800 and three USB 2.0 ports

And of course, the requisite unlimited client license for Mac OS X Server version 10.5 Leopard.

If the standard offerings aren't powerful enough, the Xserve can be customized to include two Quad-Core Xeon's running at 2.26, 2.66 or 2.93 GHz. An 8-core 2.26 Xserve configure like the base system runs $3599US.

The new Xserve also offers an optional 128-GB SSD boot drive, as well as options for RAID cards, and dual or quad channel 4Gb Fibre channel cards.

This generation of chipsets is more energy efficient and Apple is touting the newest Xserve as the "greenest ever."

The new Xserve is available now at Apple.com and at your local Apple store or authorized dealer.

MacRumors is calling attention to a PC World report: new Nehalem-based Xserve models are expected soon, based on a slipup on Apple's Hong Kong site (gotta watch those ALT tags, folks!). The replacement units for Apple's Harpertown and Penryn Xeon-based rackmount gear should be able to leverage the new chip architecture and power management features to supercharge parallel operations in the Snow Leopard version of Mac OS X Server.

If you're in the market for Xserves, would you buy now for a known quantity or wait for the latest and greatest? Let us know below.

Attention Xserve administrators: Apple has created an Xserve Field Guide web app that can you can use to jog your memory when you're standing in front of a server and can't remember how to perform some manual task.

The web app is designed to be viewed on a Mac, iPhone, or iPod touch, and requires Safari as the browser. If you need to identify what model of XServe you're working on, want to know how to install spare parts, would like to decode what blinking lights on the Xserve mean, or even determine how to choose a startup drive using the system identifier button, it's all in this web app.

You can visit the web app from your favorite browser here:

http://help.apple.com/server/guide/desktop.html

or from your iPhone at this URL:

http://help.apple.com/server/guide/main.html

Thanks to TwitterMail tipster mvcoile!

Keeping up with the Leopard-centric changes to managed preferences and mobile accounts is crucial if you're responsible for a labful or campus-ful of Macs, and you want to gracefully control what permissions or resources your wanton users have when they log in. One great resource for Mac admins diving into MCX (managed clients for OS X) for the first (or hundredth) time is Apple engineer John DeTroye's Tips & Tricks documentation.

We mentioned John's Tiger edition of the T&T docs last year, and now that he's updated the handbook for Mac OS X 10.5 and Server 10.5, you'll want to bring your library up to date. Gone is most of the material specific to machine imaging techniques (I strongly recommend NetInstall [PDF], which is working better under Leopard than it ever did before), making room for more discussion of MCX settings and portable home directories. Download your free copy of the T&T file today and it'll make your life easier tomorrow.

With Mac OS X 10.5.5 on the update list for the day, Apple has also decided to release a number of shiny, happy updates for the Mac OS X Server geeks among us. At the top are two versions of Mac OS X 10.5.5:

• Mac OS X Server 10.5.5 (341 MBs)
• Mac OS X Server 10.5.5 Combo Updater (729 MBs)

If you don't wish to update to 10.5 yet, don't worry about it, you can still apply the Security Update 2008-006 that is included in the OS X 10.5.5 server update. This update, available for PPC & Intel Servers running Mac OS X 10.4, weighs in at 118 MBs.

Once you are done with those wonderful happy not so fun system updates and reboots, why not give the "WebObjects Update 5.4.3 for Mac OS X 10.5 " update a whirl?

And there you have it, all the Enterprise updates from Apple today! We know what all the IT people around the country will be doing tomorrow. Rebooting at least once.


Thanks to everyone who sent this in!

One area that the Mac has long lagged behind its PC counterparts is in custom tuning, particularly overclocking. With the Intel Macs this has naturally started to change, though the toolset for overclocking in OS X has been rather barebones. So it's interesting to see that the German division of ZDNet has released the ZDNet Clock tool for OS X.

Using the ZDNet Clock tool Mac Pro and Xserve owners (and those only) can boost the processor, front side bus, and memory frequency resulting in a not insignificant "free" performance gain. It should be noted that overclocking puts a strain on the hardware and should be used with caution as it's certainly possible to damage your Mac. Furthermore, there are several side effects in OS X including distorted system time and problems when waking from sleep (the overclocking is disabled on wake). Nonetheless, for those of you out there lucky enough to have a Mac Pro (or Xserve) and crazy enough to push your hardware to the edge may want to have a look.

The ZDNet Clock tool is a free download from ZDNet (the link is in German, click the Jetzt herunterladen button to start the download) and requires a Mac Pro or Xserve running Leopard.

[via AppleInsider]

Amazingly, the commercial hackintosh maker Psystar (whose efforts in building non-Apple machines running OS X we've covered at some length) still hasn't been beat down by Apple Legal and now they're back for more. They are releasing the OpenServ series of rackmount servers which they offer with a variety of OSes including OS X Leopard Server.

There are two models: the 1U OpenServ 1100 (starting $1599) and the 2U OpenServ 2400 (starting $1999) either of which can be purchased with OS X Leopard Server pre-installed for an extra $155 (no clients), $525 (10 clients), or $1025 (unlimited clients). This machines are obviously in direct competition with Apple's Xserve. Frankly, I'm amazed that Psystar is still in business, and they keep pressing their luck. I wonder if this will be enough to push Apple over the edge.

[via Gizmodo]

In October, when Apple introduced a change in policy allowing Leopard Server to run in a virtual environment on Apple hardware, Mac IT geeks everywhere looked forward to the day that they could run Windows Server, Linux and OS X Server all off their pretty Xserves. That day is today, because Parallels Server for Mac is now out of beta!

According to Parallels, this is the "...first server virtualization software to run on Intel-based Xserves...and to power VMs running on the Mac OS X platform." Similar the the Parallels Desktop product, Parallels Server lets you run virtual instances of different operating systems on top of OS X Leopard Server, including Leopard Server. The next beta of VMWare's Fusion, which like Parallels Desktop is a consumer product, will support Leopard virtualization as well, but Parallels Server is a little different and aimed at a different market.

The difference is that the hypervisor used in Parallels Server is hardware optimized and takes advantage of Intel's VT-x acceleration (which new XServe and Mac Pros have) to provide a more robust experience with better allocation of resources and memory. This makes the experience much more akin to running a completely separate machine, as opposed to running one OS on top of another.

Yesterday, we reported on Media Temple's new (xv) project, which is the first official service that will be run on Xserves running Parallels Server for Mac. The (xv) will be running multiple VMs of Leopard Server, but Parallels Server can also support Linux (Debian, SUSE, Red Hat and Ubuntu), Windows (Server 2008, Vista, XP and Server 2003 and Windows 2000) and FreeBSD 6 and 7 as guest OSes. So if you run your website off of CentOS (which is based off of Red Hat Enterprise) but your company network runs off of Leopard Server, you can do both off of one Xserve.

Make no mistake, this is an enterprise product, and as such, it is pricey. Parallels Server for Mac is $1248.75 for the software and one-year of support and maintenance and that's before you add in the cost of any software licenses you might need, but that's still a lot less expensive than another Xserve.

For enterprise users who are interested in virtualization, definitely check out the free trial.

Thanks Russ!

Teaming with Parallels, Media Temple has just announced the start of private-beta period for its latest (mt) Labs offering, the (xv) Xserve-Virtual -- which they are dubbing "the world's first VPS Leopard Server." Although virtual servers running Linux or Windows are pretty standard hosting options, this is one of the first Mac hosting opportunities I have seen period (outside of a co-lo), virtualized or not.

Now that Apple has sanctioned the virtualization of OS X Leopard Sever on Apple hardware, both Parallels and VMWare have announced plans to integrate Leopard Server virtualization into their product lines. While VMWare is integrating Leopard Server in its upcoming version of Fusion, Parallels is taking a decidedly more enterprise approach and working Leopard Server virtualization into its Parallels Server product. Parallels Server uses Parallels' bare-metal hypervisor architecture and as such, each virtual machine runs its own kernel and operating system.

Media Temple, which already partners with Parallels in its (dv) and (dpv) Nitro products, is going to be the first official hosting launch partner for Parallels Server for Mac, offering Leopard VPS hosting on Xserve hardware. The Xserves used by (mt) are running 2 x 2.8 Ghz Quad-Core Intel Xeon 5400s with 32GB 800MHz DDR2 RAM and 3x300GB 15,000-rpm SAS with 16MB disk cache drives on a Xserve RAID Card. In the private beta (apply here), the Xserves will be split into 8 virtual machines, with each VM guaranteed 2 GB of RAM and two cores of CPU resources. The advantage of using a virtual machine as opposed to a physical Xserve, aside from cost, is that hardware maintainance is taken care of by the host. Plus, if something goes completely haywire, the virtual machine can just be reinstalled to its starting point.

The (xv) can be used to host websites, run iChat and iCal server, use Podcast Producer and for anything else a regular Xserve running on a LAN can do. Anything you can install on a regular Mac, you can install on the (xv), and you can control the (xv) using both Screen Sharing and Remote Desktop. Media Temple is still working on the scalability plans for the (xv) but are planning on offering a scale-on-demand package similar to its (dv) product.

Although pricing is currently undetermined, Media Temple will be using the beta testing to find out which configurations are most efficient to help set the ultimate price.

If you have experience running a Mac server, you can apply for the (xv) beta here. It's really exciting to see OS X virtualization, both for enterprise and for home/small business use take off. I can't wait to see the final product!

Thanks Jen and Jorge!

Apple just released an update for the Xserve. This EFI firmware update helps "improve the stability of Xserve computers," so if your Xserver has had stability issues, maybe this is just the update you've been praying for.

If you use Xsan, then you might want to take note of the new update that Apple dropped yesterday. Apple updated Xsan Admin, Xsan Filesystem and the Xsan Uninstaller to version 2.1. According to the update note, the Xsan Filesystem update fixes:

• Metadata controller reliability
• Using and validating file system Access Control Lists
• Upgrading from Xsan 1.4

The Xsan Admin update provides fixes for:

• Using SAN Setup Assistant to configure volumes, LUNs and affinities
• Changing a computer between client and metadata controller roles
• Listing computers connected to the SAN
• Visually displaying when LUNs have been truncated

You can download these updates by opening Software Update on the Mac running Xsan or by downloading the installer packages from Apple's Support Downloads website. For detailed information about this Xsan update, refer to the support note on Xsan 2.1.

Tuesday's launch of Xsan 2 coincided with the discontinuation of Apple's Xserve RAID Enterprise storage system. For shopper's at the Apple Store for Education, it appears that the Xserve in general has been completely removed as well. Although refurbished Xserve servers still come up under a search (as do Xserve parts and accessories), the product page for Xserve is conspicuously missing.

Take a look at these screen shots, one is from the regular Apple Store, the other is from Apple Store for Education:

In addition to dropping the price on the Shuffle (and introducing the 2 GB version), today's big Apple store update appears to be the launch of Xsan 2. Xsan is Apple's Storage Area Network (SAN) file system, and while this update isn't as sexy as a new consumer laptop update, it's still pretty cool.

Xsan 2 has been received some significant updates; not only is it now fully compatible with both OS X Leopard and OS X Server Leopard (in fact, Leopard is required to run Xsan 2), it is also now qualified to work with third-party RAID storage.

Even more exciting (at least for anyone who has been holding out for some kind of Final Cut server solution) is the introduction of what Apple is calling, MultiSAN. MultiSAN, according to Apple, "[allows] users on a single workstation to access multiple SANs at the same time." Using the video editing example, this means that a segment producer could access both a broadcast and b-roll volume from the same machine. Additionally, the administration tools have been redesigned. Administrators can now create pre-set volume workload settings for different file types/purposes.

To be clear, this is an enterprise product. Xsan 2 is available now for $999 US. Xsan 2 is qualified to work with the Xserve, Mac® Pro and Apple Fibre Channel PCI-X cards, as well as qualified Fibre Channel switches and RAID storage hardware from third-party vendors.

Update: As Tim in the comments pointed out, it appears that Apple's Xserve RAID device is no more. The page now re-directs here, with a link to Promise's RAID solution.