Of course the minute I bought a new Mac Mini Server for the office (about three weeks ago), Apple introduced the newest model and the price for the direct-from-Apple refurbs has gotten even lower. Whatevah. It was still a good deal when I paid $830 on eBay, and one Free Shipping experience later, I had a brand new boxed Mac Mini Server -- the not-so-swanky 2009 edition.

To me, it was a Porsche compared to a Focus. The Mini is a replacement for a G4/400 that had been our creaky fileserver for YEARS, and hadn't quite grown along with us. On press days the server has to support between 15-20 simultaneous connections, with InDesign files, print-quality photos and PDFs all being worked on while stored on the server in real time.

With the G4, we were literally using built-in file sharing and a basic username/password scheme; now, everyone has their own account, and they're tracked by the system -- if you close your laptop and walk about without logging out of the server, it notices that and puts your account in a deep sleep mode.

Rumor is that our one PC guy is even able to access the Mini server now, although I can't guarantee that.