Recommend the best OS for my needs please

[Monkey muppet]

I have to organise a LAN party in the next month and was thinking of the best way forward.

The equipment I have so far is:

Gaming machine (A64, 1gb, 6600GT, etc)
File/game server (AMD 1.7, 512mb, 400GB HDD)
24 Port 3com switch.

I havn't got a confirmed number of people yet, but will 9 100% confirmed with another 6-8 at 50/50 - they will all be bringing their own machines with either W2K or XP.

Would it be best to get a trial period edition of 2003 server and setup a domain from the game server (my thinking is that XP is sh1t at automatic IP assigning). This way I can easily set up shares for the MP3's, films, game patches, etc. (I have two copies of the games being played so I can run the game server)

Before anyone jumps in and mentions stuff and piracy with sharing music and films my thinking is that all my friends borrow and lend Albums and DVD's so doing so digitaly is no different - I always buy if I like stuff, just like to try out first.

Anyway - back on topic. I know very little about how to set this up as it's my first attempt.

I would like to ask you all for some pointers, advice, reading material, etc on how to organise a successfull LAN party. (I have the beer & food sorted - just need help on the networking side)

 

[Schadenfroh]

XP

 

[drag]

I'd say Linux.

It has a good DHCP server and for file trading you can setup a simple SAMBA (for Windows file a print) server.

If you don't need to have people to share (upload) it's very simple to setup a anonymous FTP server so people can download stuff quickly using their webbrowser.

Most games have Linux server versions and depending on the game you don't need to have a license for the dedicated server software. It depends on your games you want served, though.

But if your not familar with Linux it may be difficult to find enough time to become familar with it enough to set it up and make sure everything works perfectly before you start your party.

 

[warcrow]

Hrm, you didnt really list the game you are going to play. Remember, not all game servers run in a unix/linux environment (EX: NFSU2). Just throw up XP and give everyone "full control" and share the HDDs. Instant file sharing

 

[Nothinman]

Would it be best to get a trial period edition of 2003 server and setup a domain from the game server

That would be way overkill, I doubt any of them would want to join an AD just for games anyway.

(my thinking is that XP is sh1t at automatic IP assigning).

DHCP is a very simple protocol, even MS got it right with little effort.

Before anyone jumps in and mentions stuff and piracy with sharing music and films my thinking is that all my friends borrow and lend Albums and DVD's so doing so digitaly is no different -

What you think is not always the same as what the rest of the world or even just the government thinks.

Just throw up XP and give everyone "full control" and share the HDDs.

And hope noone accidentally (or on purpose) deletes everything.

Unless you already know Linux, in which case you wouldn't be asking this question, I would say go with XP. I don't think you can install a DHCP server on XP without setting up ICS so that might be a problem, but for only ~20 people static IPs wouldn't suck too bad unless you don't think they're all competent enough to input the information. To work around that you could even attach one of those SOHO routers, if you have one, and set it up to do DHCP. It won't do anything cool like dynamic DNS but they'll all have network connectivity.