Ubuntu server setup help and advice please

[PerlMountain]

I have a pretty busy production environment server and I'm not happy with the CP that it has now and I also want to switch to Ubuntu, I think.

Why? Because this forum is so active and helpful and I'm not a world class admin buy a long shot + I just believe in this product.

Now, keep in mind this is a real production server and that runs our whole business, at least, the part of it that's on that server. I need to find the most stable CP I can use to go on there. I don't know exactly what I'm looking for, but right now we use hSphere and I also like cPanel a lot.

Well, I can't use either of those, so what CP should I be using with Ubuntu?

I need a lot of normal packages like GD Lib 2, ImageMagick, etc + some odd things like:

FFmpeg
Mplayer + Mencoder
flv2tool
Libogg + Libvorbis
LAME MP3 Encoder

This is all Ok? I just want to make sure I'm on the right track before I do something stupid.

Is there anything we should first know about running an Ubuntu OS vs. (for example) freeBSD?

I already work on my server some, I'm not a 'real' admin yet, but I'll be a little better off if we switch over I think, as long as it *just works* without having to know any tricks or pull off any workarounds please.

Thank you,

PME

[PerlMountain]

Or maybe there's a good admin out there who knows all this, and we can hire that person to help our admins out.

I also need one server with a hosting script/CP installed so we can put virtual accounts over there. It'll be fairly high traffic, not huge, 300 - 400 GB/day transfer.

:)

PME