There are two primary hosting platforms, Linux and Windows. The determination of which one you should use depends upon the applications you wish to use. Below is a small table that might assist you in your choice.
Supported |
Windows 2003 |
Windows Server 2007 |
Linux/Unix |
PHP |
No |
No |
Yes |
MySQL/MsSQL |
Yes |
Yes |
Yes |
Microsoft Front Page |
Yes |
Yes |
Yes |
CGI/Perl |
Yes |
Yes |
Yes |
ASP |
Yes |
Yes |
Yes |
Cold Fusion |
Yes |
Yes |
Yes |
License Cost |
Yes |
Yes |
No |
It's hard to get global statistics on which platforms are used, but only 4% of our users have requested a Windows hosting application. These users have selected Windows because they wish to use Microsoft Access over the internet, providing Active Server Pages, which generally load very slowly. The Microsoft license is a heavy price to pay for this benefit, when a well constructed MySQL database can produce identical results. Often the cost of having us design a database in MySQL is less than you will have to pay for your Microsoft Server and SQL Licenses.
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