SideMini

Keep your Mac awake 24/7

Left alone, a Mac goes to sleep, and after a power cut it stays off until someone presses the button. Useless for a machine running a model, a build or a media server. SideMini keeps any Mac awake, reachable and able to recover on its own. It needs no iPad.

What you get

  • The Mac stays awake instead of sleeping the moment nobody touches it.
  • After a power cut it starts up again on its own, with nobody in the room.
  • Screen Sharing shows a normal desktop at 1080p, 1440p or 4K instead of a blank or tiny one, with nothing in the HDMI port. It replaces the dummy plug most people buy for this.
  • One click puts your old energy settings back, exactly as they were.
SideMini Settings on the Always On tab, showing the keep-awake switch, the sleep and power-failure state of the Mac, and Server mode
The switch holds the Mac awake. Server mode makes it survive a power cut.

Setting it up

  1. Install Ollama or LM Studio if that is the point, and confirm a model answers from another device.
  2. Settings → Always On → turn on “Keep this Mac awake 24/7”, then Server mode. It asks for your administrator password once.
  3. Pick a Screen Sharing size (1080p is plenty) and turn on Screen Sharing in macOS.
  4. Pull the power for a minute and confirm the Mac comes back by itself.

Questions

Do I need an iPad for this?

No. It works on a Mac with nothing attached. Add an iPad later and it becomes the screen.

Can I undo Server mode?

Yes. SideMini stores your previous energy settings and restores them in one click.

Does it stop the display sleeping too?

Only if you ask. Display sleep is separate and off by default, because a server does not need to burn a screen.

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