Language and other support

IIS and Apache both support CGI, SSI and PERL (ActivePerl on IIS is excellent). IIS natively supports ASP and I'm sure you could find PHP if you looked (I have not). Apache tends towards PHP, although you can install something like Chilisoft ASP if you want.

CGI, SSI and PERL are performance hogs and security nightmares in both web platforms.

Stability

Both web platforms are rock solid stable. I have run apache servers which have stayed up for longer than a year without a reboot, and my IIS servers have run for years with only rebooting required is occasional service pack and security patch. Neither web platform (or OS for that matter) has even once crashed due to a bug.

Operating System Integration

IIS and Windows 2000 is a more "integrated" environment than Apache, since IIS is targeted specifically for operating system. This has advantage that GUI and controls of IIS look and feel same as every other tool on Windows.

On other hand, you can find Apache for just about any platform, including Lunix, Unix, BSD, and even such things as OpenVMS. If you need to be able to move between platforms, then Apache is a great choice.

Email

SMTP on IIS is primitive but functional. This is because it is only provided to allow scripts and such to send email from server. If you need additional email support, you are expected to use Exchange or some other email system.

Apache does not support SMTP (sendmail), although a version is usually provided on target system. The provided email solution is full featured - but you must be very sure to check configuration to be sure your system is not an open relay.

The IIS SMTP module is configured through standard Windows 2000 entry system, while Sendmail requires configuration file editing. IIS SMTP is absolutely trivial to maintain; Sendmail can be a challenge.

DNS

DNS on Windows 2000 is far, far superior to anything available on Unix or Linux. Bind (he DNS for Unix and similar systems) has traditionally suffered from a huge number of security vulnerabilities) and is very involved to maintain.

My own experience with DNS servers indicates best solution is a dedicated DNS application box. These are inexpensive (for a business), easy-to-configure and much more secure than either Windows 2000 version or Unix version.

Search Engines

There is NO difference as far as search engines are concerned between Apache and IIS (or any other web server, for that matter).

Conclusions

I'm sure I could write for hours and hours about this subject (and perhaps I will in an article on my own web site). Basically, IIS and Apache do same thing. They have a vastly different design philosophy, however, and underlying operating systems have even wider differences.

My experience is that Linux and Unix people prefer apache, and windows people prefer IIS.

To me, choice of webserver really comes down to "what are you and your group comfortable with?" If your experience is with apache, linux or unix, then you probably want to stick with Apache. If your experience is with Windows, then you will probably be uncomfortable with Apache.

I've used both (and several others) and quite frankly, to me, it does not matter. Drop me on a server running apache or IIS, and I will feel at home.

5. If you are working on a shoestring budget , You need at least a ten fold return on each advertising cent invested. Thus you need to know which ezines, newsletters etc you are getting your most responses from.

One way to do this is to use ad tracking services that range from low cost to free – but here your own web address or url does not get exposed and you miss out on branding that goes along with it;

Another way is to use different auto-responders for each advertising campaign – here some prospects may be scared stiff to respond considering amount of junk mail we are all being bombarded with. Yet another way is to install site statistics on your website and for each advertising campaign use a different `campaign number` say if you choose campaign codes ezine1, ezine2, ezine3 etc then your URL's for each ad will be `http://www.snzeport.com?ezine1` or `http://www.snzeport.com?ezine2` and so on (Use your own website address!). Here you simply log in to your site tracking services and check `visit entry page` – you will know immediately where your maximum responses are coming from. A good site meter for this is http://www.sitemeter.com