What is the difference between server and mainframe?

Answer 1

A server is just a computer set up to handle files (documents, pictures, songs, whatever) and make them available to individual computers on a network or the internet, which is called a "client." You are almost certainly reading this on a "client computer." Servers can be essentially an electronic file cabinet where users can just safely keep files so they (and/or others) can access from any connected "client" computer. Or, they can have more management software controlling how the files are made available, such as a "web server," which is the computer where this file is being stored and provided to you. Sometimes a server will be used to hold and run programs and just display them on the clients. These are called "Application servers." You get the gist.

(You may have heard about "the cloud." This is a shorthand way of describing how wireless networks and their servers are increasingly tied together so you can access applications, websites, and files wirelessly from computers and other devices using wi-fi and phone data networks... all seamlessly as though the computer universe was always surrounding you wherever you are.)

I know people who use really simple computers as servers. One friend takes old Windows computers and dedicates them to file server duty, and another friend has a tiny Mac Mini set up as a server for her website and other uses.

A Mainframe is actually a bit harder to define today. They are actually less common as the power of smaller computers running popular operating systems continues to grow. Yeas ago there was essentially three layers of computing power: the "personal" computer of any type with limited storage and power (think floppy disks), the big mainframe that ran only custom programs under obscure operating systems and took up dedicated computer rooms, and then the middle-ground minicomputers. For a while the minicomputers looked like they were taking over, but the capacity of personal ("micro") computers grew so fast they it was the minicomputer that has almost vanished. But there are still many places where the mainframe is still in use-- sometimes because the legacy programs are working ("if it ain't broke...") and sometimes because the big data pathways and custom, highly-efficient kernel level programming is needed. More and more, this kind of function is relegated to more modern, even more scaled up mainframes called "supercomputers."

Answer 2

Not much..more or less same.