help needed for server

[Jayson]

I am going into my student house next year! we are going to be getting a 2mb internet line. we have an 8port 100mb switch and enough cabling, i have a old spare computer which will be turned into a router/web and ftp server. i was thinking of win2003 server but having had no experience setting one up dont know of how good idea this is. suggestion please as what to do. thanks

It has to be able to connect to most OS (xp 98 linux)

[leon]

Win2k3 will do all the things you want as far as I can see. It'd just be a matter of installing IIS onto the server. This would add the http & ftp server capabilities you'd want.

You do however then have the problems of insecurity, but pretty much any OS you put on has some issues.

I'm running 2k3 at the moment and am very happy. It seems to have taken all the good points of 2kserver and added some of the useful bits from XP Pro.

[Jayson]

on another forum they said it was a bit of an over kill which it prolly is, i was thinking of this of smoothwall

[leon]

It depends if you want to do anything else with it. I personally se my server to browse and that sorta thing most of the time to save having to turn on another machine.

[Jayson]

this comp will be going in the living room, with out tv out it is an old comp spec is 300mhz cpu 192mb ram and 4 gig hdd, so runs win2k3 but not amazingly fast.

[Butuz]

Don't forget Win2k3 server retails at around £600-800 + vat wich could be a bit costly for a router/web and ftp server.

Its hardware requirements are also higher than win2k server which means youll need more than 256mb of ram more than a 4gig HDD and more than a 200mhz cpu.

Butuz

[Jiff Lemon]

ClarkConnect would do the job I suspect.

/Jeff recommends a *nix product as Moby on holiday, and therefore unable to do so.......

[DaBeeeenster]

Originally posted by Jayson
this comp will be going in the living room, with out tv out it is an old comp spec is 300mhz cpu 192mb ram and 4 gig hdd, so runs win2k3 but not amazingly fast.

Aside from the software costs, that Windows2003 is going to bring that machine to its knees.

You NEED to install linux on it Smoothwall would be ideal...

[Jayson]

well i have 2k3 installed on it now, just the eval version and it is really slow. i wanted an ftp and web server which i dont think smooth wall has, not built in so you can remote access it. but clarkconnect (i think) has it but i dont want to pay that much for it.

[Moby-Dick]

Originally posted by Jiff Lemon
ClarkConnect would do the job I suspect.

/Jeff recommends a *nix product as Moby on holiday, and therefore unable to do so.......

thx for Pimping by proxy for me

clarkconnect will do what smoothwall does + it has an ftp/web server built in and is pretty easy to configure

and its free

[Wolf Man]

linux id say, as it runs on any system quite literally

[Jayson]

i think i will get clarkconnect to give it a go. ill let you know how it goes

[Jonny M]

I agree with the general direction of this thread, and that is to basically give up thinking of running 2003 server on it, and use something like ClarkConect. It has built in web/ftp servers and also shares the internet and protects you with a built in firewall.

[Jayson]

well i have installed clarkconnect, the network install, with just a boot floppy and the image on my ftp server! works amazingly! havent finnished setting it up, but so far its been easy!

[ingouk]

have a look at www.clarkconnect.org for some addon modules like banbdwidth limiter, so noone can use all the bandwidth for himself on the network, or the addon for email aliases, etc.
used it at home for nearly a year till i updated my server to redhat 9.

[Jayson]

does the home version not have bandwidth limiter on, i thought i saw it there. havent started using it yet, just set it up.