Best distro for a game server?

[schnikies79]

I'm looking at putting together a dedicated server for hl - opposing force (an oldie!) out of a 1.2ghz athlon system I have.

Anyway, OF's dedicated server is linux only, so I'm wondering what distro I might use? I really have no use for a GUI and I'm not a complete linux noob, just mostly. So I'm wondering, would something like Damn Small Linux work, or one of the other low system requirements work? Do they have the features I need to do this?

I know enough about the major players. ubuntu, rh, suse, etc. but all these seem like full distros will everything else that I don't need. This box is going to do nothing but host this game.

 

[TimP]

I would recommend Ubuntu Server or Debian.

 

[Misfit138]

Arch Linux, definitely.

Installs as a ~100mb simple base system. No GUI. Can be expanded to complete desktop environment, kept as-is, or whatever you wish.
http://www.archlinux.org/
http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Beginners_Guide

 

[Enablingwolf]

For servers. I seem to think of Redhat over Debian distros. Don't get me wrong. I tried my hand at RPM hell.

Get a nice config in Redhat and you got gold and a nice server. That or CentOS.

Side note: If anyone recalls the fiasco of the city blaming the disto for a hack. +1 for you. He replied very cool like too. Geek humor very well played.

 

[schnikies79]

After checking out all of these, I'm thinking arch linux.

Not that other ones are bad, but they are overkill. I really don't need server functionality in the normal sense. This will just a headless PC running a game server, nothing else what-so-ever.

Thanks for the help.

 

[asusradeon]

yeh go for something thats cut down so to speak, no need for excessive bloat.. Especially at this time of year !!!

 

[Zerix01]

yeh go for something thats cut down so to speak, no need for excessive bloat.. Especially at this time of year !!!

Exactly, no need for extras. Hell if you can get Damn Small Linux running then that could be your best option, very very little overhead. Although I think they may be based on the 2.4 kernel, there could be a 2.6 option as well. 2.4 isn't that bad though, faster on older hardware but I'm unsure of any security issues there may still be in it where the fixes were never back ported.

 

[Shelnutt2]

I'd use gentoo.

Only compile what you need, and its compiled exactly for the hardware. Will not get much faster than gentoo.