I love a good desktop fight. PCMAG.com has posted an interesting read about Ubunut vs. WindowsXP vs. Windows Vista vs. Mac. Read and take note.
I am a Mac & Ubuntu fan. I have a distain for Windows that is more than just the normal “Hate the biggest company”.
This review is using 7.10 of Ubuntu and 8.04 is right around the corner. I think it would do much better in some areas if they were to place the full 8.04 vs. the others. Will have to wait for that one.
Summery:
Price: Ubuntu
Installation: MacOSX
Interface: MacOSX
Bundled Software: MacOSX
Third Party Softwar: WindowsXP
Drivers & Hardware: WindowsXP
Networking: WindowsXP (WTF - MacOSX Networking is seemless?)
Security: Ubuntu & MacOSX
Winner: MaxOSX
“In our First Looks review of Leopard, we gave it a great score (4.5), and despite some disagreement —you expected complete unanimity?—we again found it worthy (with a final score of 4). 
My opinion if anyone cares:
I know PCMAG.com is a Microsoft leaning MAG. I have read them for years and they always lean to Microsoft when they have the chance. The only reason you leave in WindowsXP is so that you don’t leave Windows out in the cold. Hell for that matter let’s include BeOS and MacOS9 as well. It’s just as old? I would take issue with the decision to leave in what is now n 8 year old and tired, flawed, and patched OS. Why not just deal with new OSes?
Next is the networking, I don’t agree at all with then completely leaving out the justification for why MacOSX 10.5.1 losses out to WindowsXP in the networking area. My MacOSX 10.5.1 is a networking beast. I don’t have to think about it, it just works. WindowsXP networking didn’t get decent until that SP2 came out some 5 years into it’s life. WiFi on Mac just works and so easy my wife can do it over the phone without much problem. WindowsXP would have driven and did drive her crazy. Shame on PCMAG for not being fair.
I do agree with the winner and would like to see this done again in 6 months with WindowsXP out of it, let Windows Vista stand on it own (LOL), and put Ubuntu 8.04.1 in the mix and we wont see Windows winning much at all.
MacOSX as I have said for years is my favorite OS by far. Ubunut is getting there.
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March 11th, 2008 at 8:45 am
And they picked Vista on… NOTHING! Heheheheh.
Agree about Mac networking. I can do networking stunts on Mac OS in five seconds I’d never even think of attempting on anything else.
March 11th, 2008 at 9:28 am
If they had some of the same issues we have had with installs of OSX I can see where they would give it to xp. We have 50-60 macs, and every now and then on set up a network issue will drop one of them in their tracks. when that happens the error codes are not very helpful and the mac would respond with a stone face. No reasons, no where to poke (outside of the command line that is) , just won’t work. if they ran into one of those I could see the grade.
That or maybe they were giving xp points for active directory over open directory?
March 11th, 2008 at 1:50 pm
MacOSX is good for Macs, well it’s the best OS for Macs.
For standard Intel PC’s Ubuntu 7.10 x32 is the best OS.
The interesting question however is, whether companies should start to buy Macs instead of Intel PCs.
I could see that a Mac not replace a Intel PC in all situation, sometimes developers need to test different graphics cards or other hardware for their products which their clients use.
Macs are standardized computers, like the Amiga. The problem is just that everyone could use a Mac is everyone would have a Mac, vendors and clients. The same goes for Amiga also.
The unstandard PC computers however create a more open scenario for hardware and software vendors, and it creates also a faster development of new technology, as there is competion.
Macs and Amigas are just monopoly driven markets, so the whole technological progress is solely under the responsibility of Apple and CBM (Samsung, or whoever owns them today).
Apple has done quite a good job though in technological progress, I’m very impressed of the iPhone 2.1 and I think I will get one too, as Nokia kinda slacks behind technology again. Amiga did the technological progress 20 years ago, which other computer manufacturers may reach somewhere around 2050 (when Ubuntu, MacOSX, or Windows comes even close to the features of AmigaOS).
March 11th, 2008 at 6:38 pm
@Mika : I am not sure how the Amiga got tossed in the mix. I don’t know how considering 15 year old OS helps anything. While Amiga had a nice set of features I don’t know where to place it.
I also don’t know how you can say that apple has made a monopoly of things. They give you a developer client and help you write code and if you don’t want to use just use some of the others out there. The simplicity of the Mac is that it is all integrated. The key to any OS is integration.
I don’t think Macs are 100% ready for big IT but they are getting there. They are going in the right direction.
I would leave Amigas out of this fight. It’s a dead OS, like BeOS, OS/2 and the likes. I hate to break it to you but I love OS/2 but I have to admit it’s dead.