pop is back in the mood for a company website and i would like to host it. i can build the website, but i don't know that much about setting up a server to host it. what would i need to do this? how would i set this up?

depends.

If you use *nix to host, you would need less system resources, but a LOT more knowledge.

If you set up apache on a winbox, it won't be all that difficult. Its just a simple installation and then fiddling around with it a bit.

The faster a server, the better. All this depends on the load, of course. If you have 10 visitors a day, don't worry about a fast PC. If you're Stangnet however, you want to get a dual processor machine with lots of RAM. I think for a small website (nothing fancy like databases/php), a 166mhz is a minimum, with 256Mb of ram or so. The most important part is a fast line to connect to. You don't want to host a website off some dsl link. No matter how fast the PC, it's not gonna be top performance.

I haven't hosted a website myself, but have hosted just about anything else there is to host ;)

Don't go overboard on the hardware until you have an idea of the load, usage, etc etc. Put the effort into getting it to run secure and stable first.

Before anything cna be answered there are two main considerations.

1. How much traffic do you forsee in the first few months...

2. How much traffic do you forsee in the next 6-12 months...

It honestly may not be worth setting up your own server if you're going to outgrow its capabilities (or hope to) within the next 6-12 months.

If you imagine you're going to be a small volume site (10ish visitors a day) then just use any standard windows Nt, 2000, XP machine and run IIS.

It may not be the most secure web service to run, but it is VERY easy to setup.

i am expecting no more than 10 hits a day (we'd be thrilled to have 20 a week) for a year or two. our buisness builds controls for industry that not everybody is willing to spend money for.

i have a 200 mHz dell just sitting around... but i'd have to upgrade from Win98. and what's "IIS?" and would a regular cable connection handle the kind of volume that i am expecting? as for security, can't a good firewall program handle that?

IIS = Internet Information Server I think. I don't have experience with it myself, so I lean towards Apache. But i'm not the right guy to ask this stuff to really.

a cable might be enough, sure, but it's gonna be kinda slow for clients, unless it's really basic (html and pics). Something to 'worry' about with cable is that if you have a domain-name, you have to get it linked to your ip, and with cable it may be dynamic ip's, so that won't work.

Doug-

That should be fine...

But you need a static IP otherwise your site will be up and down.

IIS is the 'wizard based' internet solution. I dunno how apache runs on a 2K box...never done it.