The Apple Xserve G5/2.0, along with the Xserve G5/2.0 DP and Xserve G5/2.0 DP (Cluster Node), is a member of the first rackmount Mac series to use the 64-bit PowerPC 970fx (G5) processor. In addition to higher clock speeds, the PowerPC 970fx (G5) has a "new execution core that features massively parallel computation for an unprecedented 215 in-flight instructions", and the Xserve G5 uses a new system architecture as well. Together this combination results in major speed gains compared to earlier Apple systems.

The Apple Xserve G5/2.0 features a 2.0 GHz PowerPC 970fx (G5) processor with the AltiVec "Velocity Engine" vector processing unit and 512k "on chip" level 2 cache, 512 MB or 1 GB of PC3200 EEC SDRAM, an 80 GB (7200 RPM) Serial ATA hard drive, a 24X CD-ROM drive or DVD-ROM/CD-RW "Combo" drive (with an optional DVD-R/CD-RW SuperDrive available after January 4, 2005), and dual Gigabit Ethernet in a 1U case that fits in an industry-standard 19" rack. It shipped without a video card.

Connectivity includes USB 2.0, Firewire "800", and dual PCI-X slots. Due to the cooling requirements of the processor, the Xserve G5 models only support three "hot swappable" Apple Drive Modules compared to four in the Xserve G4 models replaced.

There are two versions of this model (ML/9216A), which shipped from January 6, 2004 to January 4, 2005 with 512 MB of RAM and a CD-ROM drive, and M9743LL/A, which shipped from January 4, 2005 to August 7, 2006 with 1 GB of RAM, a DVD-ROM/CD-RW "Combo" drive, and a maximum RAM capacity of 16 GB (up from 8 GB in the first configuration).

The Xserve G5/2.0 shipped with an unlimited user version of MacOS X Server 10.3 upon release and MacOS X Server 10.4 "Tiger" after September 13, 2005. Custom configurations also were available.

Despite the age of this system, site sponsor Other World Computing has RAM, hard drives, SSDs, and other upgrades available for this specific Mac while supplies last.