Dreamhost is a wild and woolly webhost that doesn't follow with the big guys. They lead the field in creating a really usable custom administration panel, and they realy have worked hard to make it intuitive and fast.
That being said, the availability of Drupal, Version 5, is a really important step. I've been running Drupal on their servers for years, and I still have a number of clients who use Dreamhost for their Drupal hosting because of the low price of the overall package.
I'll be following up with Dreamhost to find out more about what modifications they have made to their hosting environment to optimize for Drupal, modifications they allude to in the email they sent to announce the new offering. Here's the text of that email:
Drupal is pretty much the most popular open source Content Management
System (CMS) out there, except for POSSIBLY Joomla (which we also have
as a difficult, er advanced, one-click install)! What a CMS is and how
it works has always escaped me, but if you're the kind of person who
knows you need one, than you needn't know nothing more now!Why an easy one-click? Because Drupal has been notoriously hard to get
performing well, and as a centralized "easy" one-click we can do our
best to handle that BORING side of things for you! Thus allowing you to
focus more on the exciting side of figuring out what the heck a CMS is
and how, like Rajon Rondo, to dunk a basketball on Jason Maxiell.
If you are new to Drupal, you can take a look at my notes about what Drupal is, who it serves best, and what to consider as you investigate Drupal as a solution for your web property.
Dreamhost providing Drupal through their easy-to-use install system is yet another sign that Drupal has reached a level of maturity and differentiation in the market place, and that a compelling need exists to make the CMS more accessible and easier to use. A lot of people are working on this together, and Dreamhost is definitely doing their part.