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c't has tested the accessibility of webservers. The result: PCs' with Windows NT are "down" more often than servers using UNIX.

The computer-magazine c't reports in its August 2000-issue that webservers using UNIX have a five times better accessibility than servers running with Windows NT.

c't checked the accessibility of 100 of the most frequented German webservers and counted the quantity and length of the deficit. This every ten minutes for a total duration of 32 days. All UNIX-systems used the server "Apache", the NT-servers used Internet Information Server by Microsoft (IIS).

The evaluation confirmed that the NT-servers did collapse much more often than the servers using the UNIX-system. On the average they could not be reached for close to 15 hours, i.e. for approximately 1,9% of the total time. NT-servers did much more often collapse on weekends. Apparently webservers running with a NT-system do need a very intense care and control by their administrators. Systems using the (free) software of Linux could not be reached for ­ on the average ­ four hours, i.e. 0,5% of the total time. Servers using UNIX Solaris by Sun were even better, being offline for only 2,5 hours or 0,3% of the total time.

One of the most important criterions as to webservers is their stability, since the accessibility relates directly with the preference of an offer. Customers move instantly to another, better accessible offer. As Jürgen Schmidt, editor of c't summarizes the results of their study: "The one who wants to make money on the internet does have to have very good reasons to use something else than a UNIX-/Apache-server".

Because of these reasons and to provide the best for our customers we are not using Windows-PCs', but only UNIX-devices and MacOS-servers.