The different servers are NOT alike for the lowbie experience. I haven't tried all of them but on the ones I've tried there are definate differences.
So far Freeport is without a doubt my favorite for the lowbie experience. Miles ahead of some of the old servers, probably because it's got a high population which to a degree is younger then the other servers (it was the ONLY F2P server for a year and was established explicitly for that). The population on Freeport is high enough that, for example, Dungeon Finder sort of actually works if people have mercenaries and are willing to use them. I was in several DF groups this weekend for a level 20 something toon of mine. Unfortunately, for levels 26 through 30 there aren't a lot of choices so I was in Cove of Decay three times today. Got a little old. Hopefully there will be more level 30-40 dungeons.
Anotnia Bayle might be worth considering as it's also got a high population. However, I only played on it a little so can't say much. It's nominally a roleplay server which might make a difference. Some people have said things aren't as open as on Freeport, but I never had any problem for the small amount of playing I did on it.
As for guilds which actually do things together on a regular basis, that's my big gripe too. If you find a guild where they really DO things together and which isn't hard core please let us know. I'm looking for one too but so far not finding. A LOT of them will SAY they do stuff together, except it turns out they don't.
Something else I was just noticing over the last few days is that there seem to be a lot more unguilded people then there used to be. It used to be you'd NEVER see someone who was unguilded unless the toon was no more then a few hours old. I was running around Qeynos today and saw tons of people with no guild tags. I don't know if that's a sad commentary on the state of guilds nowadays, or just has some innocent explanation I don't know. Anyway, I never saw as many people without guilds as lately.