Can someone take a shot at advising me ......

I currently run a several small-hit sites on shared hosting at a competitor, which I am not happy with, for three reasons:
1. Their tech support is slow and sloppy.
2. The effective speed of my sites is slow (duh)
3. The email, which is on a separate farm, shared among all their customers, is very slow.
I am now looking at starting a more database-intensive site, so it's time to move.

The existing sites are mostly HTML and Flash, and don't have too much ASP in them, so I am flexible as to which direction I take from here (Linux/PHP/MySQL or Window/ASP/SQL). I am willing to rewrite the ASP to PHP, if I go in that direction.

The anticipated load on the server might be about 50 domains, 2100 page hits total per day, at a total of about 1.4 GB total per day, mostly against a 100 MB database, evenly distributed over business hours. In addition to that traffic, there would be about 60 email boxes, with associated traffic. Maybe that's about .6 GB transfer per day. So a total of 2 GB per day.

That might equate to a hit (website or email) about every 8 seconds @ .7 MB, or almost 1 Mbs.

Although I learn quick, I am rusty, at best, at maintaining a unix system, and have limited experience with MS Server. I have never administrated a mail system or DNS server before.

I love the idea of the speed of a dedicated server, and the assurance of that speed (non-shared).

So my questions are:

1. Does it matter what Planet plan I go for (mangement-wise)?
2. With this light-weight application, would something like the "Server Matrix, 2.4 GHz P4 / 1GB RAM be sufficient for this?
3. What can I expect do have managed by The Planet? What will I have to manage? Or am I probably getting over my head here?
4. Not sure if I should steer toward Linux or Windows, except that, the more I get toward self-managed, the more (I think) I want to be open-source (read: less-expensive / less beholden to Billy)

All commments welcome!

Are you planning on using a control panel or a base BSD/Linux install? If you are going with a base install, you may want to consider a larger Managed Services plan. I say this because you stated that you have never managed a mail or DNS service. If you have a Managed Services plan, you could use your included Administrative hours to have the Professional Services department setup some of your services (such as mail or DNS).

A P4 sounds suitable for now.

You are basically going to be in charge of your server. Any administrative tasks are your responsibility. Server management will fall under the aegis of Administrative time (this returns to my original comments about Managed Services plans).

This is merely personal preference.

First off, you have already an ASP site, I would leave it like that. MySQL, PHP (with some tweaking), DNS and Email can all be run on Windows 2003 which don't let anyone tell you any different, it's extremely robust operating system.

Unless you want to go through the trouble of Cpanel system which is not all the pretty easy as pie and nothing ever goes wrong which is what most people would tell you, I would not touch linux considering your extremely limited server knowledge.

Thank you both for your comments.

I appologize in advance for all the newbe questions. I've been on shared hosting forever, and want to make sure I'm doing the right thing here.

So lets say I go:
Windows Server 2003/Classic ASP/MySQL on the Super Server 2.4 GHz P4, 1MB RAM, 80 GB HDD @ 10mbs

1. I recalculated - will be about 1 hit every 3.5 seconds @ 2.8 mbit/hit, or less than 1 mb/s avg. Does this server/bandwidth still seem ok (I want very good speed)?

2. Does all this come with the server:
* The above software (serv/asp/MySQL)
* DNS server (on the server itself?)
* Email (on the server itself?)

3. Do I have straight forward means of administrating the server (above ftp), like a remote PCAnywhere-like screen?

4. I'm funding this myself to start (need to balance speed with cost), so probably can't afford increased service levels. Any idea what cost am I looking at to have the Planet staff get email and dns setup to start, in a way I can administrate from there?

5. Would you suggest a cPanel, and can that be used along with the access in #3 (above). If so, which one is best (plesk?) I will never have clients access the cpanel.

6. I have security concerns - not sure how to address if I'm not to sharp on Windows Server admin.

1) Should be but many things can be a hit or miss.

2) Web server is IIS 6 which is included. ASP is included as well. MySQL is not but it's a free download and install. IIS comes with Email server but it's crap in my opinion. Your best either buying Merak Mail server or going with FREE Hmailserver.

3) Your better off having someone else do it. Maybe contact Kyle from these forums. He's know to be decent at it. Having TP set it up is like having your car worked on by the dealer. It's decent work but it's going to cost you arm and leg.

3) you have Remote Desktop Connection

4) Not without paying.

5) I wouldn't suggest CPanel or Plesk.

6) Default Windows 2003 is decently secure. Again, another admin can help you out in this department.

Thanks Rabbit

I appreciate the advise!

I do have a total control server im looking to share. I can admin the server and give you access to the server. If your interested please contact me my number is 386 586 0312

To be honest it sounds like you would be better off with some decent shared hosting or a Virtual Dedicated Server (less cost, same management needs as a full dedicated server) - I would save upgrading to a full dedicated server until your sites have grown a bit and you have someone to help with the server-side stuff (unless opting for a Total Control box with Gold managed services (free) or even the next level up is an option (you may need quite a bit of admin time))

We've always found TP's management to be very good so if you do go this route I don't think you'll have any problems

Thanks for the offer, but I have moved ahead with the server.