SoloRackSoloRack vs MacDuty: the same M6, less by the week or month
SoloRack and MacDuty both rent a dedicated Mac mini M6 in the EU. Compare prices for a day, a week and a month, renewals, your data and support.
MacDuty and SoloRack both rent you a whole Mac mini in the EU, with no virtual machine and nobody else on it. The differences show up in the price, in what happens when a payment fails, and in who answers when you write. This comparison puts the same machine side by side, a Mac mini M6 with 16 GB of memory and a 256 GB SSD, using MacDuty’s own pages and terms.
The short version
- Less to pay by the week and the month. $49 for 7 days and $112 a month, with VAT included where it applies. MacDuty lists €9.99 a day when billed by the week and €128 a month on monthly billing, both plus VAT. For a single day we charge $19, also with VAT included where it applies, and MacDuty lists €14.99 plus VAT, which is about $17 if no VAT applies to you and more than $19 once EU VAT is added.
- Reminders on every plan. We email you 3 days and 1 day before each monthly renewal, and 2 hours and again 30 minutes before a pass ends. MacDuty sends one reminder 7 days before monthly and yearly renewals; its daily and weekly terms renew without one.
- Access stays open when a payment fails. You have 24 hours to fix it or save your work with your Mac reachable; if it isn’t fixed, your files are deleted. At MacDuty, access is blocked straight away, with your data preserved, and if the payment still hasn’t gone through, the Mac is erased for good 3 days later on a monthly or yearly term, or 24 hours later on a daily or weekly one.
- No copies when the rental ends. Your data is deleted within minutes and we keep no backup, after reminders that tell you to save your work. MacDuty also erases the Mac when the paid period ends, and doesn’t include backups yet.
Side by side
SoloRack and MacDuty on a Mac mini M6 with 16 GB and 256 GB. SoloRack prices are in US dollars and include VAT where it applies. MacDuty prices are shown in euros before VAT, which is added at checkout where it applies; MacDuty also bills in US dollars. On the day we checked, MacDuty listed the M6 as a pre-order.
| SoloRack | MacDuty | |
|---|---|---|
| Price for a day | $19 (24-hour pass) | €14.99 + VAT |
| Price for a week | $49 (7-day pass) | €69.93 + VAT (€9.99 a day, billed by the week) |
| Price for a month | $112 | €128 + VAT on monthly billing; €102 a month + VAT paid yearly |
| Machine | Mac mini M6: Apple M6, 12-core CPU, 16 GB, 256 GB SSD | Mac mini M6: 12-core CPU, 16 GB, 256 GB SSD (24 GB, 32 GB and up to 2 TB available) |
| Dedicated or shared | Dedicated: one physical Mac, one customer at a time | Dedicated: one Mac mini, one customer, no virtualisation |
| Access | Remote desktop from Windows, macOS or Linux, plus SSH | SSH, macOS Screen Sharing, VNC from Windows or Linux, a remote desktop app |
| Admin rights | Full admin rights | Admin access; restart, password reset and macOS reinstall from the client area |
| Where it runs | An EU datacenter | Constanța, Romania (EU) |
| Minimum rental | 24 hours | 24 hours on daily billing; one month on monthly plans |
| Renewal reminders and grace period | Emails 3 days and 1 day before each monthly renewal; 2 hours and again 30 minutes before a pass ends. 24 hours to fix a failed payment, with access open and the Mac untouched | Email 7 days before monthly and yearly renewals, none for daily and weekly. Access blocked when a payment fails; Mac erased after 3 days (monthly, yearly) or 24 hours (daily, weekly) |
| Data at the end | Deleted within minutes of the end, no backup or copy kept. You’re warned first, and the whole Mac is erased before the next customer | Mac erased when the paid period ends. Backups not included yet; a paid backup service is planned |
| Support languages | English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, Turkish, Arabic, by email from people | Not listed; contact form answered by the team that runs the racks. Website in English |
Price: a day, a week or a month
Plenty of Mac jobs are short: archiving a Flutter build and uploading it to App Store Connect, or a test pass before a release. For those, a SoloRack 24-hour pass costs $19 and a 7-day pass costs $49, on the same Mac mini M6 as the monthly plan.
MacDuty bills the M6 with 16 GB by the day, the week, the month or the year. A day is €14.99 and a day billed by the week is €9.99, so a week comes to €69.93. A month on monthly billing is €128, with a one-month minimum. Paying a year at once takes a fifth off, which brings the month down to €102. All of these are before VAT. At the European Central Bank’s reference rate of 1.1193 dollars per euro, that is about $17 for a day, $78 for a week, $143 for a month on monthly billing and $114 a month on yearly billing, each before VAT. With us, businesses can add their VAT number at checkout.
Renewals, failed payments and your data
Renewals are where a rental can go wrong, so we spell out what happens around them. On the monthly plan we email you 3 days and 1 day before each renewal. On a pass, you get a reminder 2 hours before it ends and another 30 minutes before. If a payment fails, you get an email with a link to update your card, and 24 hours to fix it, with your Mac untouched and still reachable. If it isn’t fixed by then, the rental ends and we cancel the subscription, so you aren’t charged again. Our reminders tell you that everything on the Mac is deleted when the rental ends, so you can download your files and export your signing certificates first. Within minutes of the end, your macOS account and all your files are deleted. We keep no backup or copy, so we cannot get them back, and the whole Mac is erased before the next customer. We never wipe a Mac without warning.
MacDuty’s terms are clear about how it works. It emails a reminder 7 days before monthly and yearly renewals, while daily and weekly terms renew automatically without one. If a renewal payment fails, access is blocked straight away, though the Mac keeps running, your data is preserved and paying restores access within minutes. If the payment still hasn’t arrived 3 days later on a monthly or yearly term, or 24 hours later on a daily or weekly term, the service ends and the Mac is erased. When you cancel, the Mac runs to the end of the period you paid for and is erased at that moment. Backups aren’t included; MacDuty says backup storage will come as a separate service with its own price.
MacDuty’s terms add that erasure cannot be undone, and the same goes for us: with no copy kept, deleted data can’t be brought back. With either service, copy your files off before a rental ends.
Support in six languages
Every SoloRack support email is read and answered by people from the team, in English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, Turkish or Arabic. Explaining a provisioning profile error is easier in the language you think in.
MacDuty’s contact form says messages are answered by the people who run the racks. Its website is in English and doesn’t list the languages its support speaks.
Getting started from Windows
Both services work from a Windows PC. With SoloRack you pay on a checkout page hosted by Stripe, and cards that ask for 3D Secure work. A few minutes after payment, your access details are ready in My account. Open the remote-desktop app on Windows (macOS and Linux work too), or connect over SSH from the terminal already built into Windows. You have full admin rights, so you install Homebrew and the rest of your toolchain yourself. You install Xcode from the App Store with your own Apple Account, so its licence is yours.
MacDuty points Windows users to a VNC client such as TightVNC or TigerVNC, or to a remote desktop app that it runs as a server on your Mac. SSH is on from the start, and you can add your SSH key in its client area.
Who MacDuty suits
MacDuty is a good fit if you want a particular generation, from M1 to M6 and the M5 Pro, or more room on the M6: up to 32 GB of memory and 2 TB of storage. Its yearly billing takes a fifth off, Macs marked in stock are handed over within minutes, and the client area lets you restart, reset the password or reinstall macOS without opening a ticket. It also offers colocation from €30 a month if you already own a Mac mini.
Switching to SoloRack
- Pick a plan. A 24-hour pass for $19, a 7-day pass for $49, or the monthly plan at $112, which you can cancel any time in the Stripe customer portal.
- Get your Mac in minutes. A few minutes after payment, your access details are ready in My account.
- Connect. Open the remote desktop or SSH in, install Xcode with your own Apple Account and pull your code from Git. If you’re leaving MacDuty, copy your files off before your paid period ends: its terms say the Mac is erased at that moment.