<i>'... Great hackers also generally insist on using open source software. Not just because it's better, but because it gives them more control. Good hackers insist on control ...'</i> ~ <a href="http://www.paulgraham.com/gh.html" rel="nofollow">http://www.paulgraham.com/gh.html</a><p>you might run into problems ( '7. Choosing the Wrong Platform' ~ <a href="http://www.paulgraham.com/startupmistakes.html)" rel="nofollow">http://www.paulgraham.com/startupmistakes.html)</a> and here (find people to work on it ~ Great Hackers, Ibid.). <p>Is this the server platform or client? The thing I don't get is also the extra cost in dollars. MS is not cheap.
Windows server software changed since and its now can be just the right platform as well as Linux/Apache.<p>Though Windows costs more, its not thousands and even not hundreds of dollars difference, its only 25-30 USD for the Windows Sever 2003 license per server. Client software doesn't matter at all.<p>For that price you get complete set of all required for web app technologies and tools: Windows Server 2003, IIS 6, Asp.Net 2.0, SQL Server developer edition.<p>In addition there is a free version of MemCached for Windows.
Where did you get the $25-$30 USD figure for Windows Server? Pricing a server at dell.com shows $799 for Standard and $3,295 for Enterprise (useful if you want more than 4GB RAM or 4 CPUs) But the OS isn't so expensive compared to SQL Server which is $5,799.00 for a Standard single processor license, or $25,009.00 for Enterprise (useful if you want all of the high-availability features).<p>