Hi, I am trying to start a server because our local car forum just got out o
f bussiness and there is about 2000 people who need's a new local forum. So 
I have a lot of questions, some of them are going to sound stupid but still 
answer them please.
1) Should I ran Win2000pro or Win2000server?
2) Will 900Mhz P3 with 700+MB of ram and 160gig hardrive be enough to run a 
beninners forum?
3) Is there a good website or a book on how to start a server? if there is p
lease post a link.
4) I am thinking of useing phpBB as my forum, are there any other free progr
ams that are better?
5) If I want www.somename.com do I need to pay for that or can I get it some
how for free.
Thank you very much!!! 

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Hi NiskySpy,

Answer 1:
      If your looking at using older style hardware I would recomend using l
inux or freeBSD as an OS.  All the software you need to run a site or forum 
are usually included with most distros.  Well except phpbb and that can be d
l'd and setup easily enough.  

Answer 2:
Linux or FreeBSD will take give you more bang for your buck on a PIII as you
 mentioned.    A server like that should hand a single site with average loa
d well.

Answer 3:
for a good book on setting up a server I would check out the O'Reily line or alternativ
ely checkout The Linux Documentation Project for a large library of HOWTO's to handle j
ust about everything one would need from a Web/Fourm server (www.tldp.org)

Answer 4:
phpBB is a very decent fourm and its free.  Others I would look at would be 
IkonBoard, Invision Power Board, YaBB  
 
Or alternatively you may want to look into using php-nuke or e107 content ma
nagement systems where you can get your entire site and fourms up and runnin
g in no time.

Answer 5:
You can most likely find a free domain registration coupled the purchase of 
a hosting package but I would recommend getting your domain on your own.  Th
is way your in 100% control and will have no worries if  you decide to switc
h hosts at a later date


Cheers
Steve
Mendax Microsystems
High preformace servers at a great price
http://www.mendax.com

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