Server Project Advice

[Bahnmor]

I am going into the planning stage of a project to put together a standalone machine to function partly as a fileserver, predominantly as something I can run a small whitelist minecraft server on for my friends and I. I'm wanting something I can set up so that it stays switched on pretty much the whole time, can be hardwired to my router and accessed/operated remotely from within my home network. Once set up I want to be able to pull all other peripherals and just leave the base unit running (barring resets and downtime).

I understand enough about the basics that I am able to put a desktop windows PC together to gaming or office specs, but I have never done anything regarding a server. There's a lot of information and many guides out there, but I wanted to ask the advice of a friendly community who likely has a lot of accumulated experience with what is needed for a minecraft server (which is really what I want it for. The rest is a helpful byproduct/excuse to persuade the wife to let me do it).

Is there any more info I need to provide? Any specific points I need to consider first? Any constructive advice is welcome and may be exchanged for good karma.

 

[LordDeTracy]

Its actually really easy to do all that and you dont even have to be "computer savy" to do it. Give me a day to write up a small tutorial for you.

 

[iceage32]

If you are going to setup fot this a computer I suggest installing a type of linux(recommend ubuntu server 12.04) and mcmyadmin 2 for controlling it from anywhere.Also for downtime you can make a startup script that runs mcmyadmin everytime you start the machine.If you want me to help pm me and ask

 

[Bahnmor]

Thanks for the help. It's greatly appreciated.

I consider myself moderately computer savvy. The easiest way to describe it is 'I know enough to know when I don't know enough'. I can generally stop myself before I do something monumentally stupid/damaging. I'm asking advice on both the hardware and software side of things if possible. Effectively starting from 'I want to build a server' and getting to the point of 'Here's the IP, please keep griefing to a minimum guys'.
I have done a little research myself and have a general idea of some of the things involved, but have precisely zero experience on setting up and running a server. So I figure I'll ask more experienced people, so's I can try and avoid more noobish mistakes, and get a better handle on it before I actually start purchasing components.

I've seen that the linux-based server environment is recommended by a few people, and I have a friend locally who can give me some help on that score. It's not an OS I have spent much time on, though I'm considering setting up a multi-boot partition and installing one so I can get more familiar. Any recommendations for which linux version to use for trying out as a regular OS (not server)?

 

[iceage32]

You can install WUBI to try out linux.You install it in windows and when you start your computer will ask you what to boot:http://www.ubuntu.com/download/desktop/windows-installer