LinuxQuestions.org - Building a Linux server... Difficult?

Hello again;

Here's my (hopefully simple) question:

I have a secondary computer here that is currently running Mandrake 9.1, and works pretty good. So far, I've learned alot, and I'm happy.

I currently buy a paltry 250 MB of space from CQhost.com that I pay $80 every 3 months for. It occured to me that I might be able to make a server out of this secondary system.

So, here I sit, with WinXP right beside me, pondering wiping the 40 gig drive and installing WinXP on that as well and setting up a Windows based server. However, in the month or so since I've installed Mandrake, I haven't had to reboot the box once, (in that time my Windows system has been rebooted many times) and the performance doesn't seem any slower now than the day of install. So I'm thinking maybe the server should go on the Linux platform.

So, I'm wondering, how difficult is it to set up a server on this thing and then just leave it somewhere, and not bother it?

All I'd use it for (as a server) is to host my personal website, 2 forums (phpbb) and hosting images and smaller videos. That's it. Maybe some file sharing, but I don't know.

Can anyone give me some good pointers on where to start, maybe a website or two that has a "server for beginners" or something? If it's going to be too difficult for a newbie such as myself to do with Linux, perhaps Windows XP would be better?

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks much,

Robb

BTW, here's the hardware config, since I'm always asked to be more specific:

350W PS
AMD Athlon 1800+ CPU (Palamino) 266 mHZ FSB
ASRock K7VT2 MotherBoard, USBx4, FSB 200/266
512 MB PC 2100 DDR Ram
1 Maxtor 40 Gb 7200 RPM Harddrive
ATI RADEON 7000 4X AGP 32 MB DDR
Bestek HSP56 PCI Soundcard
LG CD-Rom (52x)
1.44 Mb Floppy Drive

-R