If you could choose, which one would you prefer?? Redhat or FreeBSD. And why, what are the (dis)advantages.

Thanks for the feedback

I personally use RedHat, simply because it's what I am most familiar with. My servers run 6.2, though I've installed the Roswell beta on two of my home systems and have been very impressed so far.

For me, RedHat is best for an all-purpose server (HTTP, mail, DNS), but if I were to split the tasks up among separate boxen, I'd use:

RedHat:
HTTP, FTP, MySQL/PostgreSQL

FreeBSD:
DNS, possibly Mail

And of course I'd use Qmail and TinyDNS (instead of Sendmail and Bind).

For an all-purpose server, go with what you are most comfortable with. Also keep in mind, RedHat will probably attract more customers simply because more people are familiar with RedHat than they are BSD (if you are going for the developer community), unless you're looking for a niche...

Originally posted by Jm4n
For an all-purpose server, go with what you are most comfortable with. Also keep in mind, RedHat will probably attract more customers simply because more people are familiar with RedHat than they are BSD (if you are going for the developer community), unless you're looking for a niche...

I agree with that. If you want to cater to the developer's market, Linux (I wouldn't say Red Hat, though, maybe Slack) would be the wise choice. However, if you are just running your regular ol' run-of-the-mill websites (especially dynamic ones like forums), I would (and did) definitely choose FreeBSD.

There is another thread about this that is probably 1 or 2 months old, it has a lot of good information in it -- try searching for it.

The main beef: FreeBSD can handle loads a heck of a lot better than Linux can. It also handles I/O operations better. FreeBSD, IMO, is also a heck of a lot easier to administer (and I have a Linux background) than Linux is.

In short: I vote FreeBSD for all applications except maybe for a box catering to developers.

Definitely do a search on this. There have been numerous threads discussing in detail the advantages and disadvantages of both (mainly the advantages of BSD and the disadvantages of RedHat :D)

Found it, great info -> http://www.webhostingtalk.com/showthread.php?threadid=19705