Linux distro for local server

[emogoch]

So I'm thinking that when I get soem time, I'm going to blow away my Win2K3 server box and replace it with a linux box (current Windows box has it's network conenction go down about once a month requiring a reset to fix up). The server will run a combination of Apache with PHP, MySQL, and a BT client, either Azureus or uTorrent, and remote access required. System hardware specs are a Pentium III 866MHz, 512MB RAM, and a ATI Rage Pro AGP 2x gfx card. for the distro, I'm basically looking for 1) ease of installation, and 2) performance, 3) with stability a concern too, in that order.

Fedora seems like the easier install, but I'm not sure how well it'll run as it seems to have become quite bloated over the past few years. any other suggestions?

 

[linux_0]

So I'm thinking that when I get soem time, I'm going to blow away my Win2K3 server box and replace it with a linux box (current Windows box has it's network conenction go down about once a month requiring a reset to fix up). The server will run a combination of Apache with PHP, MySQL, and a BT client, either Azureus or uTorrent, and remote access required. System hardware specs are a Pentium III 866MHz, 512MB RAM, and a ATI Rage Pro AGP 2x gfx card. for the distro, I'm basically looking for 1) ease of installation, and 2) performance, 3) with stability a concern too, in that order.

Fedora seems like the easier install, but I'm not sure how well it'll run as it seems to have become quite bloated over the past few years. any other suggestions?

I run Fedora on servers all the time and it works fine.

If you opt for fedora I would recommend FC5.

CentOS 4.3 or better is great too.

Both of them are easy to install and easy to maintain... Linux machines can usually stay up for years as long as they are not brought down by unstable hardware or human error.

Yum is super easy to work with.

The only downside to Fedora is that it is too bleeding edge sometimes.

Check out:

http://mirrors.kernel.org/

Good luck :-D

PS PM me if you have any other questions or need help.

PPS Debian is great but not as user friendly. RHE is great but too expensive. SuSE is cool. ubuntu is for home users.

 

[choknuti]

I’ve heard some good stuff about PC-BSD. You might want to try it out.

 

[linux_0]

BSD is great too :-D

But it's not for the uninitiated.

 

[QBiN]

How about headless servers?

It's been a while since I've built a server, but what are your thoughts about not running an x-server on the box? That way the server only runs the virtual terms, saving some memory and CPU. Basically, the box will only host various network daemons (e.g. ftpd,httpd,itunes,game servers where no GUI is needed).

I've done this before by changing the default run-level and leave everything else as is. That way I can change into the new run-level if I need X as an admin, run xfree locally and manually as needed, or just run an x-server remotely.

With that in mind, Any thoughts on which distros run the leanest and meanest on a text-only, headless server?

 

[linux_0]

How about headless servers?

It's been a while since I've built a server, but what are your thoughts about not running an x-server on the box? That way the server only runs the virtual terms, saving some memory and CPU. Basically, the box will only host various network daemons (e.g. ftpd,httpd,itunes,game servers where no GUI is needed).

I've done this before by changing the default run-level and leave everything else as is. That way I can change into the new run-level if I need X as an admin, run xfree locally and manually as needed, or just run an x-server remotely.

With that in mind, Any thoughts on which distros run the leanest and meanest on a text-only, headless server?

:-D

You do not need a special distro. Any version of Linux, BSD or Unix can run without X and do so very well.

 

[emogoch]

Running in a command-line only mode would be fine (init 3 if I remember correctly...), but is there a BT client out there that provides the same funtionality as Azureus / uTorrent that works in a command-line only environment. Conversely, one that runs as a deamon? I would love it if I could have the client start up automatically with the server without me having to manually start it up as a user.

As you may be able to tell, I'm not a complete Linux-virgin, I just don't want to go overly complicated for something that doesn't need optimal performance, just something that I can be happy with.

 

[linux_0]

Yes you could run a text-only torrent client but running X would work too.

There is nothing wrong with running X.

Here's some torrent stuff

http://freshmeat.net/search/?q=torrent&section=projects&Go.x=0&Go.y=0

I'd say shoot for FC5 or SuSE.