You might find more information at
Webmonkey by reading their
Server-Side Scripting Shootout. In this article, they try to compare the following:
- ASP
- ColdFusion
- JSP
- Perl
- PHP
While you may find the articles to be interesting, they suffer in that each is written by a professional who favors the products that he/she is writing about. Unfortunately, this means that the article is filled with subjective opinions and generalizations. However, it may still give you some insight into this area.
Here's a great example: the Micro$oft guy favors ASP. His defense of its stability and security is less than impressive.
The most frequent criticisms focus on the stability and security of IIS, Microsoft's Web server. Personally, I've had no stability problems with IIS or ASP, and seeing that such high-volume Web sites as HotBot, Buy.com, and Dell use ASP, it's apparent that IIS and ASP scale nicely.
Note that the author pointed out the security issue, but didn't address it, and later mentioned that he "personally" (!) did not have stability problems with ASP (the other sites were mentioned as examples that ASP scales well, which is not the same as being stable).
I doubt this article will really answer your questions, but it can help fill in the gaps.
Cheers,
Ovid