Today my new hardware for a server arrived. This will replace in part a bunch of Mac OS Server tasks in order to create a better and faster network.

So far it’s faster and works better than Mac OS Server ever did. After some research and asking around on the Ubuntu Forum someone there pointed me in the direction of Zentyal Linux, a prebuilt server OS based on Ubuntu 10.04 and comes with a administration panel via the browser and allows for a bunch of services to be configured, added or disabled. Similar to how Apple handles things.

Aside from a bit clumsy dashboard it seems to work very well. The DNS server even resolves DHCP hostnames now which Mac OS Server never was capable off. Great!
It’s terribly fast too, which is great! Especially considering I use relatively weak hardware and little ram. But that’s only a good thing I guess.

I have set it up with DHCP, DNS, VPN and wanted to use LDAP too.

However I ran into an issue that Mac OS Server’s Open Directory apparently is not a standard version and  thus would not hook up with the Zentyal version of it. So there’s a bit of fragmentation going on in terms of user management but nothing too uncomfortable.

There are a bunch of other things active ofcourse. Like a webserver for the administration. I haven’t quite figured out how to configure my own sites but I’m considering moving my development stuff over to Zentyal too. Additionally there is a Firewall and Antivirus thing active. I’m nto sure what what the antivirus daemon does exactly since I use no Mail or file storage. But it kinda insisted on being active. Same for the firewall. I don’t really need it but when it was off it kept telling me I should enable it. I guess because i choose the “gateway” profile when installing it assumes the server works as an actual router or firewall. I’ll read up on that later.

The hardware itself is neat and nice too. It’s the prettiest, cutest mainboard I ever saw in this size Almost a shame that it had to go inside a casing. The case is really small too. Came with a built in power supply of 150watts, which is less than the average Mac Mini (180+ watts). I strapped in some old ram from my Macbook Pro and found a unused 320GB Western Digital disk. Way too large in capacity. But hey, better than buying one.

I use 2GB of space for the system

Because the mainboard is fanless and the case has 2 silent 80mm fans it runs virtually silent. I’m sitting maybe 1 meter away from it and I can’t hear it at all. Just like a Mac Mini.

Now let’s see if this is the actual answer to my problems and will improve things!