I have a few pi's running, one I use to run several programs 24/7, and then another I run as a media center hooked up to the living room television.
I would recommend you to get a pi, very nifty little computer (or you can look at any one of several alternative SBC's)
Wikipedia has a list https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Single-board_computers
though the pi is a decent pick.