“Everyone likes a good ‘I’m a Mac/I’m a PC’ commercial, but how do you really decide between today’s operating systems? All the major OSs run on Intel chips, so the playing field has leveled quite a bit. Running multiple operating systems on each computer you own, be it a Mac or a PC, is no big deal these days,” Eric Griffith reports for PC Magazine. “Why choose just one?”
Griffith reports,” The field may have leveled, but it’s not flat. The OSs still differ in many ways, not all of which are on the surface. We help average users—people with enough tech savvy to install and an own OS and serve as tech support to friends and family, even if they don’t consider themselves tech gurus. How do they choose between Mac ‘Leopard’ (Mac OS 10.5.1 after the first automatic update), Windows XP SP2, Windows Vista (pre-Service Pack 1), and Ubuntu 7.10 Gutsy Gibbon (Linux)?”
The full article explains the scores given below:
Price (on scale of 0-5; 0 is worst, 5 is best):
4.5 – Ubuntu
4.0 – Mac OS 10.5.1
3.0 – Windows XP
2.0 – Windows Vista
Installation:
5.0 – Mac OS 10.5.1
3.5 – Windows Vista
3.0 – Windows XP
3.0 – Ubuntu
Interface:
5.0 – Mac OS 10.5.1
4.0 – Windows Vista
3.0 – Windows XP
2.5 – Ubuntu
Bundled Software:
4.5 – Mac OS 10.5.1
4.0 – Ubuntu
3.5 – Windows Vista
2.5 – Windows XP
Third-Party Software (Quantity, not Quality):
5.0 – Windows XP
4.5 – Windows Vista
4.0 – Ubuntu
3.5 – Mac OS 10.5.1
Drivers/Hardware (Quantity, not Quality):
4.5 – Windows XP
3.5 – Mac OS 10.5.1
3.5 – Windows Vista
2.5 – Ubuntu
Networking:
4.5 – Windows XP
4.0 – Mac OS 10.5.1
4.0 – Windows Vista
2.5 – Ubuntu
Security:
4.0 – Mac OS 10.5.1
4.0 – Ubuntu
3.5 – Windows Vista
3.0 – Windows XP
The Victor: Mac OS X Leopard (10.5.1)
MacDailyNews Take: All this before the massive Mac OS X 10.5.2 Update which brought about countless improvements over the version that PC Magazine has declared the OS winner. For example, Mac OS X 10.5.2 would have at least tied Windows XP in the networking category.
Griffith reports, “Mac OS 10.5.1 is the product to pick for our mythical average user who wants something secure, easy to install, and easy to master. That you can also run Windows and Ubuntu on today’s Intel-based Macs—enabling you to use all these OSs on the same PC—is just gravy.”
Griffith reports, “We’re under no illusions that our choice of a top operating system is going to change how most of our readers do their computing… If the OS you have already works for you, don’t rush to change. Sure, we like the Mac OS, but switching to it from Windows means buying new hardware.”
MacDailyNews Take: Translation: Keep on advertising in our pages Window-centric product peddlers!
There’s much more in the full article – recommended – here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Readers “Brian” and “Corinne” for the heads up.]
MacDailyNews Take: Only OS-unlimited Apple Macs can run all of the OSes discussed above, from the best, Mac OS X, to the worst, Windows. That’s why it’s a no-brainer that your next computer should be a Mac. You get two or more computers for the price of one!
i still prefer tiger to leopard
“we like the Mac OS, but switching to it from Windows means buying new hardware.”
And… switching from XP to VISTA does not mean buying new hardware and getting the worst OS?
I don’t quite get the security scores. I guess I might have gone with: Mac 5.0, Ubuntu 4.5, Vista 2.0, XP 1.0.
How can they even argue otherwise?
I mean, when OS X gets its first real virus in the wild, then drop that a little. Until then, seems to me a 5.0 is the only way to go . . .
If you run a G5, you can’t run Windows on your mac – there are still a few of us PowerPC users out there.
wow… a complete waste of time reading that article. Totally unscientific, purely subjective, and poorly researched. I am surprised that Leopard 10.5.1 even won the competition, given how poor the analysis was.
And of course, I disagree with many of the statements made in the article.
10.5.2 – running strong.
I wonder what the market share of Ubuntu is?
Linux geeks are constantly saying how wonderful it is. Seriously, are there any decent apps available, aside from server tweaking utilities?
I guess if you want to run Photoshop on your generic Ubuntu DOSBox™ you’re still stuck with Windows.
Totally weird of them to recommend Windows to photographers.
Windows’ colour management is non-existent compared to Mac where it is all built in – and works.
Networking, windows XP, are they for real?
It takes me two minutes max to setup any network on mac os x, or 3hrs on anything XP.
Vista is better, takes under 20minutes …
also means buying new hardware. Eventually, you WILL buy a new machine.
Make it a Mac, and if you still need Windows (hint, you probably won’t) then run Windows on it too. Which means software quantity (not quality) always favors the Mac.
(To Bone Machine: yes there are old G5s out there still, but they’re not in stores to buy so it’s not a buying decision people have to worry about.)
@Paul
Even with Leopard installed, Virtual PC still runs Windows fine on any G5 or G4 with sufficient memory.
I thought MDN’s contents to ads and other junk ratio was poor, probably less than 10% of each page on that site is content!
Sooner or later you will have to buy new hardware – sooner with Windows than with a Mac. You might as well buy a Mac when you update.
Before I finally got rid of my last “Windows” laptop, a Dell, I installed Ubuntu and could not get a stable platform. It would freeze after about 1 – 3 minutes.
I’m happy with my Macs.
They should’ve also included Panther and Tiger in the comparison and it would have highlighted Apple’s dominance (in quality) of it’s operating system.
I don’t understand why so many people, even those who like OS X are so down on Safari, sure it’s not as expandable as Firefox but for me, for everyday browsing, it’s quick and pain free.
Let me add my voice to the opinion the article was poorly researched. They dissed Safari as a bad browser! Safari has grown on me to the point I am switching to it from FF.
I mean IE7! Yak! I saw my 17 yr old nephew struggling with its abysmal GUI. What M$ lacks is the notion that human beings have to work with their gui. Safari is minimalist but soundly designed where IE7 is just straightforward baffling in its desire to withhold functionality from the user.
M$ simply cannot get any worse at interface design than IE7.
Did anyone else catch this????
From Bundled Software
“among them the slick Internet Explorer 7 (especially slick when compared with Safari on the Mac, a bad browser),”
“For example, Mac OS X 10.5.2 would have at least tied Windows XP in the networking category.”
Not for me. I still can’t network my Cube and PowerBook together to drag and drop files between the two (DropCopy was my favorite for this on Tiger) even though I am using an Airport Extreme.
And, yes, I have file sharing allowed on each.
I actually dual boot with Leopard and Ubuntu. Ubuntu is really easy to use once to get it up and running. Problem is getting it up and running isn’t always easy. Little stuff like setting up your wireless card using ndiswrapper can be a pain. So, it’s not for the average joe at the moment, but it’s getting there.
So, Leopard is the winner atm. MS is seriously screwed. Windows 7 is probably going to suck as well. Momentum can only carry you so far. Eventually people are just going to start dumping Windows in very large numbers.
Has SP1 for Shitsa been released yet?
If so, I heard nothing about this, which to me is laughable, or are they talking about the beta?
If SP1 is out there, is it even shittier than before?
Best I could see they didn’t facilite comments on their articles and it’s probably just as well.
They equate a Windows XP Service Pack with a Mac System upgrade like from Juguar to Tiger to Leopard when it probalby should be equted as being like 10.5.1 to 10.5.2.
They also continue to insist that Unix is just as insecure as Windows – It’s just that poor Windows is picked on more than the Mac. If I was a hotshot hacker/virus writer, which would I rather do – write the 946,543rd virus for Windows or the First to write a comparable virus for the Mac? Don’t tell me it’s just that the Mac isn’t worth being a target.
@Name,
The dumping of Winblows is happening faster than Enron execs dumped their stock in their last few weeks.
Mr. Reee said
“Seriously, are there any decent apps available, aside from server tweaking utilities?”
All the freeware apps you see on OS X and Windows are also available for Linux (Vlc, mplayer, firefox, truecrypt, torrent clients, etc).
>>I guess if you want to run Photoshop on your generic Ubuntu DOSBox™ you’re still stuck with Windows.
If you wanted to run photoshop on Linux you would use either wine or crossover. They’re compatibility layers. They’ll let you run windows apps without needing windows. Wine and crossover are also available for OS X. As long as you aren’t trying to run a graphics intensive game both should work.
@Cubert
>>The dumping of Winblows is happening faster than Enron execs dumped their stock in their last few weeks.
I’m thinking that by 2011, OS X will have a market share around 20%.
I find it laughable that they rated xp higher than OS X on networking. As someone who switched to OS X about a year ago, I can tell you unequivocally that OS X is far easier to setup and share with other computers than Windows.
@Cubert: No SP1 has been delayed (yet again): http://www.crn.com/software/206901670
This is hilarious, “Early reviews show that Windows Workstation 2008 is the speediest and most secure version of Windows to come along in a decade” the problem being that “Microsoft doesn’t actually sell a product named Windows Workstation 2008“: http://www.informationweek.com/blog/main/archives/2008/03/microsoft_relea.html