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I'm thinking of buying a Mac-Mini.
I'm trying to decide between the less expensive one (has regular snow leopard) and the more expensive one (has snow leopard server).
One of the things I wanted to do is have this mac mini act like a server. I.e., I want it to be on all the time and possibly host web, file server, or do other jobs in the background, etc. What I wanted to know is couldn't I just install apache and other 3rd party server software onto the regular snow leopard.... what would be the benefit of buying the actual snow leopard SERVER??
Thanks
p.s the cheaper mac mini also has a DVD drive (the more expensive one doesn't) so that's another reason why I'm leaning on the cheaper one
+1. Snow Leopard client's personal web sharing server is actually a full install of Apache 2. The AFP file server binary is the same as server, so is the NFS server and so is the SMB server (which is Samba). The mail server is Postfix. etc. etc. The part I don't know in depth is the Open Directory/Password Server/Kerberos part, perhaps because I've never tried to set those services up manually on the client OS before. – Spiff – 2011-04-04T02:44:32.620