Hi... I'm a newbie and not very computer literate. Shopping for cheap hosting I notice the Linux servers are always cheaper, sometimes by a great deal. My home computer is winXP. I'm currently using a Linux server (on Intersabre) and I find nothing wrong with it. But I'm going to move for a better deal and just thought I'd enquire of the knowledgeable guys before I do so. Regards,
Well, I believe its up to you to decide what’s better but I can tell you what really stands out about Windows, and I'm sure someone here could fill in on the Linux side.
Windows is mainly for users which want ASP/ASP.Net support or a MS SQL Database. Windows hosting is more expensive, because the host must pay for licenses unlike Linux. One prime advantage with Windows is it allows each site to run in its own process, so if one site crashes or has major problems it can't affect other sites hosted on the same server.
Windows also supports every language and technology which Linux supports, but many PHP developers still prefer Linux. The security issues that were once highly talked about in Windows are no more since the release of Windows 2003 Server.
I agree there, I am a registered MS partner, and their licensing is NOT as expensive as everybody would believe. Granted, there is a cost involved, but it is not outrageous.
Also, I have not seen drastic price differences between comparable Linux/MS hosting plans, maybe a few dollars, but nothing more.
Unless you need to have ASP or ASP.NET there is no real reason to choose windows over a Linux solution, however you should see no real difference in performance either. At that point it just becomes a $ decision.
I'm of the mind that it truly boils down to what matters most from an application standpoint. There are inherent costs to either choice, but the Total Cost of Ownership debate has been beaten to death.
PHP is admittedly (by Zend) inefficient and lacks performance on Windows... which is something that they aim to remedy by way of their recent partnership with Microsoft. ASP support via Apache modules on UNIX leaves me wanting.
If you're new to the industry and are just looking for a place to host your static HTML pages, stick with what you know works... if you're still uncertain, ask on various hosting forums what people are paying for their Windows & UNIX hosting and that will allow you to form some sort of baseline to compare your current hosting fees to.