Home Hosting Server - Newbie Help?

[Bad Boy]

I am new to hosting a server but I have done some reading.
I want to set up a website without the use of any third party servers (I don't want to pay monthly for my website to be on the internet).

I heard you could do it with a desktop/computer tower and Windows Home Server 2008.
Is this true and although a desktop/computer tower isn't designed to be running all day and all night for the rest of it's operating career is it possible?

Is it legal and would I need to pay monthly, would someone else be hosting my website or is it purely me?

 

[allnamesaretaken12]

You CAN do it, though there are complications.

1) Your home IP is typically not static. This will cause your website to become unreachable )until you update your records with your domain name registrar) every time your IP changes.
2) There's trickery to be done with internal port usage. People attempting to contact your site will be communicating over port 80. If you just tell your NAT router to send port 80 to the server, web browsing will get very difficult for the rest of your house.
3) hosting a website draws extra attention to your home IP. You'll want to be sure your network and the server are very secure.

 

[David C]

With cheap hosting available you will probably cost yourself more in electricity
than you will save with not paying the cost of website hosting.
Go with the commercial hosting.