How many sites on one server?

how many websites should be hosted on the same web server

[digitalJE5U5]

We have about 30+ sites that we operate. Most of these sites link to one another in one form or another.

What I am wondering is:

1-Will the Search Engines penalize us for having all these sites hosted from the same box/ip address?

2-Are they smart enough to recognize that there are 30+ sites in a link network and that they "could" all be owned by the same person/group? And then not give as much weight to the links?

Thanks for your input,

[edited by: martinibuster at 6:20 pm (utc) on Aug. 2, 2004]
[edit reason] Self promotion or urls etc. in sig violate the tos. Please read the tos. Thanks. [/edit]

[hdpt00]

A lot of talk has been on this subject and I think most people agree it is best host sites that link ot each other on seperate class c ips. Google up a search on class c and you'll find lots of debates.