Printable View
I'd just download Apache for Winblowz and run that... IIS has too many vulnerabilities out of the box and, just for sanity/security and ease-of-configuration/administration I'd tell you to use Apache. If you are up for patching your server after every bug (read: you go look for bugs on a daily basis), then you might think about IIS.
I think you need to consider how involved you want to be with the OS and the configuration. I myself am a fan of FreeBSD, though I like some aspects of tidious configuration. If you want to roll with easy, 2k or Xp would suffice as decent servers. As was mentioned earlier in the post, most any windows system can be configured to run as a server, so the flavor of windoze needn't be too important if you are just looking to do this as a hobby. If you get into major hosting, or process intensive serving, I would be inclined to recommend 2k Adv server, or the FreeBSD if you are so inclined
Regards.
One word for you: APACHE