Can Windows Web Server 2008 be used to host games?

Before giving any opinion, I'll start by answering your basic questions:

• Yes, you can run dedicated game servers on Windows Server web server.

• Differences between network and standard:

  • The web only supports 2 gigabytes. Standard in 64-bit mode can support 32gigs (and more?).
  • The standard contains more things that are better suited for local server environments (for example: active directory). If you want LDAP to control Exchange email, you'll need Standard. Most web servers don't need them.
  • The web will (apparently) not support full-featured versions of SQL Server. Express should work though.

Time of confinement.

Dedicated and virtual dedicated cash overheads on Windows servers are a lot ... How much more are you paying for software than hardware costs for at least the first year.

Renting the software (as part of a Managed Dedicated Server or VPS) is a lot cheaper initially, but will cost you about the same over the course of a few years, and if you run it longer it will end up costing you more.

Windows Shared Hosts can be good. I was with a company called Hostek (Florida) and they bent back to make hosting a pretty busy site (about 6,000 unique per day) very cheap for me. It can also be violent. I've had bad hosting companies as well. Shop around.

About a year ago, I ditched Windows at home in favor of Linux. I'm not going to list the many advantages and disadvantages; I'll just tell you that when I stopped doing .NET in favor of a more open framework. I am not using Django (Python based web framework). While you may not like it (or other frameworks like Ruby on Rails), I ask that you find out what is going on in the open source world before you use anything related to Windows , since you already have there is a framework available to host Django / Rails / et al.

If you need your own Linux server, VPSs will start at around $ 20pcm. As I said, it is significantly cheaper than Windows. I am now using Linode to host everything new that I do. Very affordable and they will easily launch special games like your current setup.

Mono is not an option for you. Not yet. It is indeed suitable for helping people migrate their applications, but it is still rather sketchy on the ASPNET front. And as the comment on another answer says: the controls you want to use are strictly Windows at the moment.

Linux will consume fewer basic resources than Windows. On an old server (Windows 2000, IIRC) I had to manage, the Windows kernel would consume anywhere from 100 to 200 megabytes of RAM. My current Ubuntu server is eating 40megs. I'm not sure how much RAM you should be playing on your server, but if it is less you will understand a lot more on a Linux host. (Remember, if you have more than 2 gigs, you have no choice of web server version)

It's clear from this that I'm a complete super-Linux enthusiast, but I know my needs are different from yours. ASP.NET is a great platform , but it costs a lot of money, even if you share it among friends. You could choose Windows ... Or you could go Linux, donate a little to the projects you use, and buy a new plasma or something shiny for the lady.