Hello,

I must say I didn't, and what you explain sounds quite interesting. Just
two questions :

- I am not (already) a Linux user, despite all the good things I think of
it. But as none of my friends uses it (and could help me), I've always been
waiting for a "quieter" moment to try it... and it never came... Do you
think a simple SW-Raid5 shoud be a good solution too under Windows ? And if
not, is it possible for a Linux newbie to build such a server ?
===
Possible yes, but I would definitely not recommend it. If your run into
trouble with ill-supported hardware, the debugging will be very
difficult to handle for a newbie.
Windows NT4,2k[and 3] server contain sofware raid0/1/5 software
(actually a thinned down version of veritas' VxVM). Windows however
cannot boot on a raid5 (this would require windows to load the raid
driver before the OS), but should be able to boot from Raid1 (or at
least boot from one of the mirrors).
My best bet in this case would be to setup two small disks (I think you
mentioned some) to act as a mirrored boot driver, with 2+GB each. Mirror
or duplex them (the latter is a mirror using two separet controllers,
which would survive the loss of one controller) and include 3 or more
disks as a software raid5.
As you can see it can be done, but it would require the server variant
of windows.

- what minimum CPU should be enough for what you suggest... I've some "half
old" mainboards (such as with Athlon 1800 +) that could be used if they
match the minimum requirements...
===
I'd spec the minimum requirements for a windows based solution on
something like 600-800Mhz and 192+MB RAM. So, yes such an Athlon would
be more than sufficient.

HTH,

Jochen