[hooande]

Slicehost is great. My advice is to start off learning how to use the package manager for whatever OS you choose. apt-get, yum, rpmfind, etc. They usually make things easier and if you start off learning to compile from source (like I did) it can be hard to unlearn old habits.

Something to think about when using slicehost...when they give you a fresh OS install, there is very litte on it. There is only the bare minimum to bring the server up. The 'man' command isn't even installed! It might be a bit tougher for people without much commandline admin experience.