Using Linux or 2000 for Storage?

I'm trying to decide what to do with my old machine once I have my new one built. (hopefully in another month or two.)

I want to us my old machine for storage, to backup images, videos and lots of junk that I download . I tried Linux once a couple years ago but I didn't spend enough time in it and my machine at the time was running like crap. Anyway, I'm wondering what OS to put on it Linux, Win 2000 maybe or maybe even 2003 server.

I'm also wondering what would be the best way to share files over the network? Would Linux be able to do this easily? Could I develop a webpage that would run on the machine in 2000 that would allow for transferring files easier. I really don't like how windows does networking and it would be neat if I could do something that would make it easy for my wife to transfer files over the network.

Which leads to another question what would be the fastest way? Is Ftping locally faster then transferring through folders?

Sorry for the long post, I'm just trying to find something that would make life easier. Plus I would like to learn some cool things that I know you guys know. I'm sure I could just get some software that would do automatic backups to my old box.

 

Setting up you old laptop as a file server is a definite possibility.

I'd recommend a distribution like CentOS. It's free -- it's the free part (which is most of it) of Redhat Enterprise. That means it isn't bleeding edge, but you also don't spend much time dealing with OS updates.

Configure the system as a Samba server. There are several books. You don't need to run a GUI most of the time. That means all the CPU cycles and megabytes of RAM consumed by the GUI are available to make file processing faster.

As far as speed is concerned, the performance of you network and then the performance of you hard drive are the limiting factors.

 

I've done this with Linux and Samba a time or two before. I'm not a guru, but I didn't have too much trouble with it (used swat -- a browser-based frontend to samba). Once you've got a samba share set up, you can mount it in windows under a drive letter. Then it acts just like a local drive. (You can do the same with file sharing under Windows) I have no problems watching video across the network on wireless, assuming the signal is good.

edit: vacuous babble snipped, because I really ought to stop talking out of my ass.