That's 2.59 million hits per day, on a K6-2, 400 mHz machine with 128 MB of RAM. Presumably, it's also a desktop machine.

I think you'll probably have more hardware to throw at the problem if you're consistently generating that kind of traffic.

I would rather spend my time learning how to write an Apache handler in Perl than trying to reinvent everything CGI.pm does. Of course, there's also CGI-Lite from the CPAN, in a pinch.

It is a question of what you prefer, spending time rewriting something that is already implemented (though not the fastest performer on the planet, it's been tested on millions in different programs by thousands of programmers), or figuring out the best way to configure your particular program, which will have to be written anyway.

I know which one I'll choose.