Some people requested I do this a while back, it took a while, but here it is.
Let it be known, the grass isn’t always greener.
This was initially even longer and more drawn out, so after a few too many re-writes trying to condense it down, here it is.
Let’s get this out of the way first. While I can backup, wipe and do a fresh install of any other OS listed below in less than an hour and be fully up and running (for the most part), that is NOT going to be the case for you. I employ some very specific data management that allows for this including using platform independent apps, a file server to host my data, backup software and excessive knowledge of where everything is stored. For most people switching involves seeking out new programs, learning where things are located and just getting used to everything.
It gets even harder when switching to Linux.
When a user switches to or from Windows or Mac there is not only plenty of documentation, they are also locked into an ecosystem. Just as switching your phone, you are thrust into it and you have no choice but to make it work. With Linux, most people dabble, dipping a toe in using Virtual Machines or a usb stick. At the first sign of the unknown they go running back to the OS they know and understand and later may or may not come back. If you REALLY want to switch and make it work, you need to dive in fully. I spent years dabbling with Linux, and even after relegating Windows to a secondary drive, I still didn’t really know what it was like to be a Linux user until one of my drive failed. Even when I hadn’t touched windows for months, my handling of Linux changed when that drive failed and I lost my training wheels. It’s for this reason that Linux is hard to switch too, remember that if you decide to switch. You have to fully commit or it just will not happen. Mac and Windows people commit by buying a brand new computer, they invested, with Linux you don;t have to invest and therefore you don’t.
Lets dive deeper.
First the OS’s, I’m going to stick to the more recent major OS’s, so Win7+, MacOS 10.11+ (El Capitan, Sierra, High Sierra), Linux as it pertains to today and Hackintosh, which while actually MacOS has some very important differences. While I won’t explicitly cover BSD, just replace any Linux reference with BSD and it will read about the same. I know BSD users heads just exploded, but we aren’t dealing with specifics, just outside looking in so relax.
We’ll start with Linux, for diplomatic reasons.
f Linux does one thing well it’s the user interface or desktop environment (D.E.), not that it’s perfect mind you, but that you can change it. No, I don’t mean taskbar on top or bottom, no, I mean you can use what amounts to a Winxp interface (LXDE, Mate etc...), Win7 interface (Cinnamon), OS2 Warp (Enlightenment), Mac OSX (Pantheon), or something closer to Windows 10 (Budgie) or something completely new such as Pixel, KDE, Deepin, Gnome or Unity and more, and most can have a Mac style deskbar added to them, among other things and then theme them. While Mac users have few if any choices really, Windows users are probably saying they can do this too, but often times it requires hacked files or spending money on this sort of thing. Even better, you can simply log out and switch to another in many cases.
Linux also has fewer security problems, costs less, and once you understand the system, can even be FAR faster to re-install everything than any other system. Besides the fact that you can place all of your files on another partition or even another drive altogether, you can so a single command line and install most if not all of the programs you use regularly (this can be done on Mac and Windows, but few know about it and it's severely limited). No multiple clicks or anything, I copy, paste press enter, enter my pass word click yes, and it installs 20 programs without any further effort from me. This also means you can install things like Chrome or Firefox without having to go online with I.E. and risk infection.
Did I also mention these programs are updated along with the operating system? No waiting on a Windows or Mac update, then reboot, only to find X program has an update as well and as you finish with that, another says it has an update. Nope, all updates come in from the same system and can be installed in one shot, at your choosing. You can even download and wait to install them later and odds are you won't need to restart.
Besides being able to be run on almost anything, Linux even lets you run from a USB stick, I don’t mean it brings your files, I mean you can run the entire system from a stick. Mac and Windows can now do this, but they learned it from Linux and at least in the case of Windows, is still crude by comparison.
Speed, support, stability
While it may not do games as well, Linux is FAST and runs on almost anything. Memory management is good and so is stability. Remember Linux came of age running servers. You rarely need to restart and it supports more hardware than Mac and Windows combined, with a caveat.
So what does Linux not do well.
Support… While it has gotten better, in fact TONS better (you can thank Ubuntu for that), it’s not as good as Windows support. There is tons out there and the problem is no longer jerks telling you to RTFM and flooding the search results with just that, the problem now is fragmentation. I’ll give an example, remember I said there is lots of D.E.’s and you can change between them, I once did this going from Cinnamon to Gnome which I wanted to try, the problem is that no one mentioned that since Cinnamon was based on Gnome and shared files, that installing Gnome on top would effectively kill Cinnamon. While an easy fix for me now, at the time it was easier to just re-install. Yes, you can switch, just not back and forth like you can if you install say, LXDE, KDE and Cinnamon. If you can search and are willing everything you need is there, you just can't call MS or Apple for help, not that either I or they would want me to (let's just say there is a history and leave it there).
Programs…
That easy install method that did everything for me works great, until it doesn’t. One of the biggest claims for Linux is that programs and downloads are smaller since it only gets what it needs. In a perfect world this works well, you tell it to grab Firefox and it installs Firefox, if you tell it to install a video editor and it needs another program as a dependency, it goes and gets that program as well. However, what if it can’t find that other program. That is a problem Linux has been fighting for a while now because it can be several links long. This needs this, which needs that which needs this other thing, which needs that other thing, oops, but that person stopped maintaining it and is no longer available. It just broke the whole chain unless you can find a work around. The community is working on a fix for this where they package all a program needs but guess what… We are back to large programs and while it works in cases where there are problems it also creates new ones. Windows has also tried both methods and had problems, there's no easy solution.
Hardware support is a bit odd.
Linux does support more hardware than Windows out of the box, what many don’t tell you though is that much of that hardware it supports is outdated and your new shiny part may not be. 10 years ago I setup a server and the network card was no longer supported by Windows but was by Linux, in fact they had done a driver update less than 2 years prior, the card however was almost 20 years old at the time. At the same time a wireless card needed some downloads just like Windows to get running. So while Linux users brag about driver support, especially out of the box being better, just tell them to shut up because the support isn’t really better for real world parts you are going to use. Would you rather have support for a 20 year old network card or would you rather it support the new wireless card you just bought? You can get most anything working in Linux, but it may take some work. Windows, you buy something it probably has a Windows driver. Yes you have to install it, but at least you know it will work and if it doesn’t the manufacturer will fix it. So again, Linux users need to shut up about this because it’s BS.
And driver support changes depending on what distribution of Linux you used. Take for instance my Macbook Air, one Linux distro HATES my screen backlight, another hates my wireless card, and another hates both, and while fixable, finding those fixes are not easy and you never know if the information is too old to even work anymore, or the person who created the fix still makes the necessary files available, much less up to date. Mac users are already here and Windows10 users are just starting to really have this issue, which is pretty bad when you consider how young Win10 is by comparison. People if you do a support article, PLEASE DATE IT. Linux has a problem of too much info and at the same time, too little. Linux is also terrible for battery life and heat, it can kill batteries in no time. Though this is mostly fixable it means more time invested. This means laptop support is also not always great, as battery life is usually about 40-80% what Windows usually gets and about 30-70% what Mac will get. However some tweaking can get you up to about 80-90%. I’ve managed about 90-95% on my last few laptops.
Windows
One of the best things about Windows is what I just mentioned is a problem on Linux, hardware support. If your system is new, odds are the manufacturer supports Windows running on it, in fact even Mac’s support Windows being installed on them. There is lots of support (even for dummies) and it works on pretty much any new computers and no one is arrogant enough to say read the manual, usually.
Windows also works will in offices for this same reason, chances are the printer in your office supports Windows. So does your CNC machine, 3d printer and scanner. Most people also know how to operate Windows at this point, with it’s huge market saturation odds are if you have used a computer, at some point it was Windows.
Games, need I say more on that?
Win10 is probably the best and most secure O.S. Microsoft has made (sorry 3.x, 9x, XP and 7 fans but it’s true). It’s also the worst.
Blah blah blah malware, trendy, unsecure… I won’t go into that, it’s too easy to attack and we have all heard it. Same with discussing telemetry and forced updates. For as good as it is, MS is the real problem with Win10, not the OS itself, it genuinely could be fantastic with just a few easy changes, but it won’t happen without government invention. Ironically, the Chinese government edition of Win10 may actually be the best Windows, but who knows if it will leak or be able to be translated or run here, and would you want to use it knowing it was mandated by the Chinese gov.?
Also, why are we STILL using two control panels? Come on Microsoft, get it together. This should have been dealt with before release. I know this is a stupid complaint, but it just shows where their priorities lie, which seems to be with annoying me into using/buying their preferred product over what I want to use. Go back to using another OS, even Win7 for a week and then come back and see just how much crap MS is shoveling you with Win10. There’s a reason the start menu ads, Office popups and Edge popups were rolled out over time… Had they done it all at once on rollout, people would have rejected Win10.
Something of serious note.
Expect more and more problems with Win10, not less as time goes on. Yes, I know it has gotten better since launch, but remember what i said about too much information above? There used to be a nice shortcut to get to network adapters, then an update came out and it was altered to point somewhere else. Then creators update came out and changed it again. See with Xp, Vista and 7, you had clearly labeled service packs, and they rarely made UI changes of that magnitude even with a service pack. Win10 isn't clearly delineating updates, heck, MS is doing all they can to hide them from you, so how do you know what version you have? How old is the tutorial you are using?
This is only half the problem. You see on prior versions of Windows they used to run it on several hundred computers to test compatibility and it took a long time and lots of manpower, this is no longer the case. As of now most Win10 testing is done in virtual environment. Virtual is not real and it only has x number of iterations compared to the infinite variations of real hardware. It doesn't take into account how one but of hardware (x) may conflict with another (y) if mixed with software (z). Virtualization is great, I use it a lot, but it's not a real computer.
Macintosh, the minefield.
Note: Macs only come on Apple hardware, so in some cases they cannot be separated.
Fantastic looking, nice feel, great battery life, usually a trendsetter. (though not always in good ways as of late!) and always a fantastic touchpad. We all know those arguments. Let’s get to the meat of it.
Older Macs also continue to run well and appear to hold value better than a Windows machine.
Content creation is often favored on Macs.
Another spot where Mac absolutely shines, I mean it utterly destroys anything else, and that is repair. No, I don’t mean the Genius Bar (that isn’t as good as you think it is!). No, I mean, you just replaced or corrupted your hard drive, on a Windows machine this means getting a copy of Windows and performing an install, you can do this on a Mac as well, but what makes Mac amazing is that it can fire up the network (even wireless) without an operating system and download/install the latest copy of MacOs you had installed on your computer. Meh you say… I installed Linux and Windows on my Air and destroyed the Mac partition on the drive. I simply booted into the emergency system, connected to my wireless and it did the rest. All of it. No drives, no drivers, no security codes, and while it wasn’t as quick as using a disk, it took care of everything restoring it to factory. It was an amazing experience after years of Windows and Linux disk installs. I cannot stress how impressed I was with this, EVERY store bought machine should have this.
Parallels… Why is this too not implemented on Windows and Linux. Wow. I mean seriously, WOW. Linux and windows users, and probably some Mac users are scratching their heads right now. Okay, what this program does is use your Boot Camp… Okay, let’s back up… Boot camp is just a fancy Apple name for dual booting Windows on a Mac. So what Parallels does is allow you to run Windows, from inside your mac. Big deal, that’s just Virtualization, but you would be wrong. I mean it runs both, from the partition, at the same time, and with very little loss, and seamlessly (it can even run CAD programs and games this way!). You will never look at dual booting and virtualization the same after having used it. It’s AMAZING, and thanks to Macs fantastic memory management you won’t see a serious slowdown unless you do something to tax the machine in total.
You can also do development for Mac, Windows and Linux on a Mac thanks to how it works.
So what’s the bad?
I own Mac, this will be bad, deal with it.
First up the lie about content creation. Windows has caught up and in MANY ways exceeded Mac on content creation. It is standard in the industry though because the older people involved in it calling the shots grew up on it. As new blood enters the ranks making buying decisions this has been shifting. It doesn’t help that Apple’s new designs are not great for it, and in some cases almost hostile towards media creation.
Office compatibility goes right inline with this. Does the scanners and printers in your office all work with your Mac? If so, congrats. Will they all work next update? Oops. Think about this, you cannot plug your brand new Iphone into your brand new Mac without an adapter. The same applies to software, Photoshop usually only works for one or two versions before you need a newer version, I experienced the same problem with firewalls and cad programs. I'm pretty sure Photoshop 4, not CS 4, Photoshop 4 will run on Win10 and you can also install Office 2010 on Windows 10, however on a Mac, as of Sierra Photoshop CS6 and earlier no longer works.
The hardware…
Ever see what happens to aluminum when it gets hit? It looks great when new, but leaves harsh edges, has zero give before bending, transfers heat… Which is made worse by a lack of cooling vents (WTF!). Oh, and that “premium” exterior often hides some pretty mundane internal parts. It’s also been known to hide some pretty crappy parts as well. Take note I never said premium internals. Yes you get a great processor (ignore the plebs using Mac minis!), but it’s often crippled by heat throttling and is often surrounded by par or sub-par components. I’m not saying all Macs have crap parts inside, but a large amount do, and even if they are merely average, you could still do better for the money. And how about upgrades? Oh wait, that’s soldered in place, not that it matters as Macs do not speed up like a Windows or Linux system does when you put faster parts in it (I’ll cover this more later). Or what if a component is failure prone, such as the Nvidia cards of years past, sorry, your Mac is dead. Even if Apple replaced the board, it WILL happen again and this time it won't be covered. Louis Rossman makes a darn good living repairing Macs for this reason (look him up on Youtube).
What about that gorgeous interface? The one where they removed the battery indicator? Too soon?
It looks great, but the truth is the OSX user interface has actually gone backwards in terms of usability and to be fair, it was never that great to begin with. Things are hidden, they are practically forcing users to the Apple Store and while the touchpad makes a mouse almost irrelevant, you need an instruction manual to remember all the modes. Did you know that originally Apple computers only used a single mouse button so users wouldn’t get confused about right and left click, and now they expect you to remember all of these finger combinations, though they still retain the single mouse button... While they work well, somehow I suspect that a second mouse button would be simpler, especially since the Apple touchpads actually do have two buttons underneath, and if you dual boot Windows, works like a dual button touchpad. Why not a switch in the OS? No, that makes to much sense, and this is the problem with the entire user inferface, it's meant to look really pretty, not function well.
Mac doesn’t like multiple copies of certain programs open at the same time either, take for instance 3d printing, sometimes when setting up a print I will have several copies of the slicing program (file preper) open and not only doing it’s thing, but each will have slight differences trying to adjust print time or how much plastic it needs, Mac doesn’t like this. In fact Sierra is almost doing what Windows 8 did, in that it is tabletfied. Everything is tap here tap there, actually trying to work with multiple programs and functions though, is a mess.
Apple is also doing all they can to keep you from using programs obtained outside the Apple Store, this is fixed with a simple toggle in El Capitan (IF you know it exists) but requires a command in Sierra (just look up sierra master disable on Google), but while you may so so what, you shouldn’t need to do that.
Steve Jobs must be rolling in his grave with the decisions Apple has been making. The system no longer "just works".
Think I'm kidding... the Iphone (including the latest ones) have a Lightening connector and you use a USB to Lightening cable.. okay fine. The cable is a USB type A, the new Macs laptops only have USB type C. This is a perfect example of how Apple currently functions, it doesn't.
Let’s also talk about that resale value…
Contrary to what most people think Macs do not actually hold value better. Macs do have a higher resale price, that doesn’t mean it’s necessarily holding it's value. A 3 year old high end Mercedes is still worth more than a brand new Nissan, but that has as more to do with how much it cost when new than it does retaining value. A high end Mercedes can lose $30k a year (the price of a new Nissan) and still be worth more than a new Nissan for several more years. That doesn’t mean it retains value, it means it was just an expensive car. Depreciation on most Macs is actually terrible (like Mercedes), it only looks good because of the initial cost gives it further to fall. The laptops that actually held value were some of the last Japanese made, high end Sony Viao. I'm not saying Macs depreciate fast, I'm just saying they aren't holding resale value as people claim.
I take that back, two Apple Macs are holding their value really well.
The 2015 Macbook Pro and the 11.6in Macbook Air, especially the 8gig models. The Air is retaining value because there is little that competes with it, I can buy a decent HP laptop for the price of my logic board (motherboard). The 2015 Macbook has the same distinction, it's still plenty powerful, upgradable and a truly "pro" machine and both a re quite reliable, so long as no fluid gets on the board, and by that I mean even an insect peeing on it (yes, that has killed them)...
Hackintosh, also sometimes called a Crapintosh by “real” Mac users (PC users used to call Macs, Crapintosh)
Hackintosh, for those who don’t know is a PC running Macintosh.
Hackintosh leaves you free to pick and choose your parts (kind of!) and set your price point. It’s not too difficult to outrun current Mac Pros for less than the price of an Imac, and you can upgrade it with off the shelf parts (kind of!). While for years Mac users crapped all over Hackintosh, these same people are actually now turning to them to replace aging Mac Pros. It’s believed that it was this that caused Apple to actually announce a new Mac Pro, as Apple almost never announces products before release. Another reason it was stupid for Mac users to crap on them is that most Hackintosh users often were/are Mac owners.
Sounds great right, a Mac using the parts you want? Yes and no.
You still have some of the drawbacks of a Mac, but it adds some new issues too.
While you can upgrade a Hackintosh’s you have to be SUPER careful, not just hardware but also with Apple updates as a slight change can bring the machine down. You have to pick your parts from a very small list, deal with lots of little install problems and on updates wait for the experts to figure out what changed and if it’s safe. If not, how to fix it, and that can at times mean either not getting an update or buying new hardware that is compatible. For example AMD video cards worked fine for a while, now, they cause boot and sleep problems and no one has figured out a solution yet. You fight a constant cat and mouse game with Apple on this.
Hackintosh is by far the hardest of the operating systems listed here to install and keep running. It’s list of compatible hardware is small and in some cases is determined down to revision numbers on firmware. Even if you get the right parts there is no guarantee it will be easy or survive the next update. Not all Apple programs will run on it, there is limited support, it’s not like Apple will help you, especially since you are violating their user agreement. Oh, and you almost require an actual Mac to get the operating system, it can be done without, but it’s even more difficult and more of a legal grey area. Same for some hardware, it's pretty much Intel only, unless you run a hacked kernel to allow AMD processors.
Installing Arch Linux is pretty close to the difficulty of doing your first Hackintosh. Arch takes a bit more command line work while the Hackintosh requires more pre-planning on what hardware to use. Both require a lot of research and time and will self destruct with a simple update (note, I like Arch!).