Xserve power consumption OK for home?

Hey John,

Most definitly. I run 2 xserves, 3 g5s and 5 xserve raids out of my house with no problem at all. Keep in mind that the xserves are louder than a g5 (although fairly good noise level for a server) and i recommend keeping them in another room.

From a UPS standpoint, I have a 1500VA running my 2 xserves and a 1500VA running the 3 xserve raids, and they all hold up for a good 10 min or so.

It depends largely on the wiring in your apartment.

In my experience, apartments tend to have the bare minimum in terms of power, so you need to be careful. You shouldn't any any issues running them on a circuit on their own, but if they're on the same circuit as other high-load items you may have problems.

The XServes are rated at 8 amps @ 120V. This means two XServes could consume 16 amps - the typical 'safe' limit for a 20 amp circuit.
Now, that is fully-loaded, with 3 drives, with both 3GHz processors running at full tilt, and 'normal' usage should be significantly less than that, but it's something to be aware of.

The issue, of course, is knowing which outlets are on each circuit. If you put them on the same circuit as your microwave oven, expect to be taking frequent trips to the breaker panel.