Originally Posted by fusionx

I would run one main installation of the message board on a powerful server (quad xeon, or similiar). Serve all languages from that same install.

Put your database on another similar server connected through a second nic card.

If you will offer search, split the indexing onto yet a third server.

Be ready to do hardware load balancing or to setup clusters if you need more servers.

Geographical location is trivial compared to just about everything else.