In April of 2009,
Apple brought over Intel's Nehalem Xeon CPU to the
Xserve rack-mount system. Not even two years after that, the company has
decided to lay the Xserve to rest. That system is officially no more,
as the prior Xserve link now redirects to an Xserve Support page. The
Xserve managed to last nearly a full decade. 9.5 years to be exact.
Apple hasn't been forthcoming when it comes to exact sales figures with
the Xserve, but we doubt that they managed to sell an awful lot of them.
It was always a niche product, and apparently the time has come for
Apple to move on.
Reports have found that many IT professionals who rely on Xserves plan
to keep their existing systems for at least two years, but there won't
be any upgrades on the horizon. A few years from now, most people will
have forgotten that this system even existed, but it's always a
bittersweet moment when even an infrequently used product hits the grave
after nearly a decade on Earth.
Did you ever buy an Xserve? Did your business rely on them?