Can multiple windows users connect to a Mac Mini OS X Server and run applications in parallel?

Question

I want to validate the current situation :-

I have multiple users who have to use designing applications like Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator etc and maybe some Mac specific applications like iWork and they need to be working on the applications in parallel.

Can I setup a Mac Mini OS X Server and create separate user accounts and give to these users so that they can remote login to the OS X Server simultaneously from their Windows machines and use any application they want?

In crux, can they share the server resources and applications from their windows machines?

Answer 1

No; OS X Server does not provide anything like Windows terminal services. OS X's screen sharing feature (part of the regular OS, not a Server add-on) does allow connecting to a virtual display, but only supports one virtual session, and I don't know of a Windows client that can use it.

You might want to take a look at Aqua Connect Terminal Server -- I don't have any experience with it, but it claims to provide essentially what you're looking for.

p.s. Design applications tend to be rather resource-heavy; if you do use something like Aqua Connect, and have a bunch of users using the server at once, you may find that a Mini doesn't perform well under the load. At the very least you'll need to fill it up with RAM, but you might want to go with a Mac Pro instead.