Need help deciding on a server

[tactic]

I run a site where we get about about 15,000 page views on the main page which does use php/mysql..

and we get about 60,000 views on the forum.. we usually have over 120 users online and during peak there are over 200 this is when we start getting too many connections errors

we have no way of changing server config and i have been told that our current server is a celeron 2ghz with 256mb ram and its on a shared enviroment..

our site is due to expand significantly.. we estimate by the end of the year we may have about 600-800 people online at any one time..

our site is also very bandwidth intensive for the month of october we used 250gb this was mainly due to the content on our main site..

now i am considering getting a
P4 2.66
1gb ram
80gb hard drive

this machine would be dedicated and be running apache/php/mysql/mail/ftp

would this cope? if not do you have any recomendations for specs? and possibly know of a company i can go with :) hopefully in australia? :)

Thanks!!

[kontrabass]

I run a site where we get about about 15,000 page views on the main page which does use php/mysql..

and we get about 60,000 views on the forum.. we usually have over 120 users online and during peak there are over 200 this is when we start getting too many connections errors

we have no way of changing server config and i have been told that our current server is a celeron 2ghz with 256mb ram and its on a shared enviroment..

our site is due to expand significantly.. we estimate by the end of the year we may have about 600-800 people online at any one time..

our site is also very bandwidth intensive for the month of october we used 250gb this was mainly due to the content on our main site..

now i am considering getting a
P4 2.66
1gb ram
80gb hard drive

this machine would be dedicated and be running apache/php/mysql/mail/ftp

would this cope? if not do you have any recomendations for specs? and possibly know of a company i can go with :) hopefully in australia? :)

Thanks!!
On the RAM, suggest at LEAST 2 gigs for the amount of traffic you anticipate. We have around 240 forum users online at peak, upping the RAM to 2 gigs from 1 really made a huge difference... If you go with 1 gig, make sure and get a big stick, to leave as many slots open as possible.

[Odysseus]

our site is due to expand significantly.. we estimate by the end of the year we may have about 600-800 people online at any one time..

now i am considering getting a
P4 2.66
1gb ram
80gb hard drive
Absolutely NO WAY. This server will by no means be able to handle 600 people (considering a 15 Minute Timeout and 50%/50% guesta and registered users).

You will need at least the following hardware:

Dual Xeon / Athlon MP / Opteron
2.0 / 2000+ / 1.6 GHz
1.5 GB RAM
Two harddisks:
One SCSI drive (10.000 RPM) dedicated to store your MySQL database
One fast IDE (e.g. WD Raptor 10.000 RPM, 36 GB) for everything else (and daily MySQL backups)

The server you are considering atm would be a proper soultion for you website now, but not for your future demans (if they really come true!).

[eva2000]

definitely need a dual cpu server with 1 - 2GB of memory for 600+ users constantly