How many xml http requests is too much for a pc to handle?

Question

I'm running mediawiki on an apache on a regular pc running vista (don't know the specific specs, but a regular pc, one year old, nothing special).

Edit: I'm guessing something like duo core 2 2 giga hertz processor, broadband connection (500 kb/s at least) and most of the time the requests will be sent through LAN (but sometimes through the internet)

I want to use the mediawiki api to send a lot of requests to this server. I'm talking thousands of requests every few seconds at worst case. (A lot of these requests may repeat themselves, I guess some sort of cache would help)

Will the server handle this, or do I need a stronger/dedicated computer?

Edit: I'm not looking for specific yes/no, but what configuration of computer will support how many request per second.

Thanks

Answer 1

This is entirely Dependant on the Server, PC hardware, software, and Internet connection.

If you want to find out, run some tests, when your machine stops working, you have reached the limit.

Answer 2

Where are the requests coming from - LAN, internet? What connection speed?

You might be able to use Apache Bench to run some tests against your API and see for yourself.