
96 MacBook Pro’s in one server rack - johnsho
https://simbimbo.wordpress.com/2015/07/24/well-im-at-it-again-this-time-with-macbook-pros/
======
jsingleton
Only just realised from this that MacBook Pro's no longer have an Ethernet
port! When did that happen?

You need to buy an expensive thunderbolt adapter. I can understand removing it
from the ultra portable super-thin models but not from the top end
professional model.

~~~
bane
My desktop is basically filled with an octopus of dongles these days. It's
ugly and annoying, and increases the footprint of my laptop 2x.

I guess USB-C is supposed to help with this?

~~~
onion2k
_an octopus of dongles_

Who do we need to talk to for that to be the official collective noun?

~~~
indrax
Consistently talk to many people in publicly available texts over a period of
a few years. That should do it.

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sudhirj
How on earth do you test retina displays when inside a server a rack? What are
they doing here that can't be done with Mac minis?

~~~
JosephRedfern
"We require Mac OS X because the products we make run on OS X and we believe
in testing on the same hardware our customers use, this helps produce a better
product".

If the software they're testing is used mainly on Macbook Pro's, then they're
wanting to test on Macbook Pro's. Things like GPU and CPU differences may make
a difference to how their software performs.

~~~
austenallred
"We have data centers with thousands of machines configured with all 3 OS’s
running constant build and test operations 24 hours a day 365 days a year.
This is just a small look at the Mac side of things."

Seems safe to say this is not a small company

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fla
Racking portable devices. The circle is complete

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yuvadam
Why are you keeping the lids partially open and drawing excessive power for
the displays + backlight, instead of just using InsomniaX [1] ?

[1] -
[http://www.macupdate.com/app/mac/22211/insomniax](http://www.macupdate.com/app/mac/22211/insomniax)

~~~
shazow
"They are actually being held open 7mm by a custom 3D printed wedge. This
opening allows for the screen to be used for testing as well as ample air
circulation. You can’t see the temperature sensors tucked into each notebook’s
keyboard area."

Air circulation makes sense. There is a vent in between the screen pivot and
the base, and also the gaps in the keys allow for some heat to escape.

Agreed that the screens should be turned off, though. Could just turn the
brightness down to 0.

~~~
Artemis2
What's brilliant is that when the screen is closed, the same vent opens on the
back of the computer. That's extremely elegant.

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kevinbowman
I wonder why all of the display backlights are on? I understand having the
laptops open to stop them going to sleep without an external display, but
I'd've thought you could turn the backlight all the way to "off".

~~~
jabbernotty
Perhaps the light is on so that they can spot dead devices at a glance?

~~~
kevinbowman
Yeah perhaps, but I'd've thought some software mechanism (regular pings etc)
would be easy enough to offset the power / heat of having the backlight on.
Although I guess backlights are just a few LEDs these days, so probably
actually not too bad to keep on.

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titzer
This is pretty neat, but I wonder how much more dense this configuration could
be made if one took away the display, keyboard, battery, and chassis of the
laptops and just had the motherboard, which (presumably) is fully integrated
with a DIMM connector.

~~~
bgaid
If you switch to Mac Mini's and assemble mutiple mini's in a private cloud
running VMware, you can have a much more efficient setup. You can do it with
xServe's and the latest Mac Pro's as well.

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thraxil
Is it really simpler and more efficient to have 96 individual power bricks
with custom mounting hardware rather than one (or a few) larger, high-
efficiency AC to DC converters and just distributing DC within the rack?

~~~
konradb
You would have to terminate in magsafe connectors. You'd either have to
butcher the wiring on all the power bricks or come up with some frankenstein
thing with airline adapters, which I believe are now discontinued for some
reason.

~~~
zwily
I'm guessing it's because airlines are moving toward just having standard
power jacks. In fact, I can't remember the last plane I flew on that actually
had the power jack the airline adapter needed.

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adriancooney
That's an expense rack. If the average MBP cost $1500, that's a total of
$144,000 in the one rack. They must have some serious reasons to create
something like this.

~~~
taspeotis
It would make sense to try the refurbished ones. I doubt you'd get 96 of the
same model, though.

[http://www.apple.com/shop/browse/home/specialdeals/mac/macbo...](http://www.apple.com/shop/browse/home/specialdeals/mac/macbook_pro)

    
    
        Refurbished 13.3-inch MacBook Pro 2.7GHz Dual-core Intel i5 with Retina Display
        $1,099.00
        Save $200.00
        15% off

~~~
jeeva
Though in a business environment, if this is going to be used for any
significant length of time, the (presumably) shorter warranty might be an
issue.

~~~
UntitledNo4
Refurbished Macs have the same warranty as non-refurbished.

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rhaps0dy
What kind of testing do you do with this?

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Matheus28
How much money the VC is willing to waste

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Ianvdl
96(!) macbooks, 3D printing and thermal imaging. I think you're spot on.

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helb
Also, Mac Minis and Pros in a rack: [http://photos.imgix.com/racking-mac-
pros](http://photos.imgix.com/racking-mac-pros) (still seems weird to me, but
makes a bit more sense than racking laptops…)

~~~
skuhn
(I wrote the imgix post you linked to)

I think Steve has done a great job on his MacBook Pro rack design, but I do
wonder about the advantage the MBP has over the Mac Pro for their workload.

It may be that the GPUs of the Mac Pro don't matter to them, which would
reduce the value proposition of those systems by a fair amount. The MBP also
has an advantage in that it was just updated, and the current Mac Pro is a bit
older. That advantage is hopefully just temporary, but it is pretty likely
that the MBP will continue to receive more frequent updates in the future.

You can definitely squeeze more systems into a rack with the MBP, but my
preference would still be to go with the Mac Pro:

    
    
      No batteries on your datacenter floor
      No power bricks
      Better airflow
      No screen burning electricity (although this is minimal)
    

The batteries particularly worry me. They're a potential fire hazard, and over
time you'll need to replace them (even though they don't matter) before they
expand and deform the system chassis. They also make power outlet control over
a system annoying, since you'll have to wait for hours after the outlet is
cycled off and the battery has discharged to cycle the outlet back on.

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ins0
Here is a QA where he answers some of the main questions we all have in mind.

[https://simbimbo.wordpress.com/2012/12/11/102/](https://simbimbo.wordpress.com/2012/12/11/102/)

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artsandsci
At first I thought the headline meant he was using MacBook Pro's from 1996.

~~~
ta223
That would be "'96 MacBook Pros..." or I guess, since it was written by a Mac
user, "’96 MacBook Pros..."

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rvalue
This is ridiculous! Is there no other way to test features on OSX ? or like a
cloud environment?

Not only is this waste of money but also non eco friendly buying all that
hardware

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sudioStudio64
That's pretty amazing. It would be interesting to hear more about the testing
they are doing.

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jchomali
why creating something like this?

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jacquesm
Test farm.

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jkot
There was similar post with ARM Chromebooks. A few years ago it was impossible
to find stable ARMs which could sustain decent load without crashing. Company
had to buy bunch of Chromebooks, strip batteries and put them into rack.

~~~
akhilcacharya
Do you have a link? This sounds like an interesting problem.

~~~
jkot
It is a few years, no link, sorry.

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shoover
I've have the distinct pleasure of opening an Apple package twice in my life.
Looking at that cart full of boxes, 96 in one day/week/whatever... I don't
know what to say about that.

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golergka
Any idea who's that Steve and what he's testing? Parallels?

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k8tte
> I know some of you will reply with the standard “Why didn’t you just use
> Linux?”

No, i ask myself why dont you just use the Mac Pro (ie the one which isnt a
laptop?????)

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jbverschoor
How much power does this draw?

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pdpi
I think those are 15" MBPs, their stock power supplies are rated for 85W, so
we're looking at a maximum draw of just over 8kW for the laptops alone.

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chatman
Why all this stupidity?

