My Own mini "PC, Mac, Linux" Review

[Sapphiron]

PC (Vista):

pros:
Can do gaming
refined software
infinite 3rd party software
Is compatible with almost anything
Can be supported by any IT guy

cons:
Resource hog
unstable
not secure

Score: 7/10



MAC:

pros:
out-of-box solution
stable refined software
good performance
very little driver issues
can also run windows

cons:
Proprietary hardware (BIG CON!)
can only be supported by "MAC houses"
no gaming (no Direct X 10)
limited software
Expensive hardware
Limited software

Score: 6.5/10



LINUX (Ubuntu):

pros:
stable
reasonably secure
excellent performance
free (mostly)

cons:
unrefined
lots of hardware incompatibilities
difficult to find support for
generally scrappy software
no gaming (no DirectX)
difficult and time consuming to setup
lack of fully compatible peripherals

score: 4/10


In summary, I would like to use my normal PC hardware with a MAC OS for work and media and dual boot it with windows Vista for gaming only. Sorry Linux, your free, but you loose.

 

[bwana]

Nice, but you forgot triple booting a Mac

 

[Sapphiron]

Nice, but you forgot triple booting a Mac

What I don't like about MAC is that it is for MAC hardware only.

I can't use it on a Cheapo PC or my expensive big-rig. With MAC the only option is MAC

 

[Tux]

LINUX (Ubuntu):

pros:
stable
reasonably secure
excellent performance
free (mostly)

cons:
unrefined
lots of hardware incompatibilities
difficult to find support for
generally scrappy software
no gaming (no DirectX)
difficult and time consuming to setup
lack of fully compatible peripherals

score: 4/10

I set it up and it installed drivers for even my TV card
You asked the wrong people if you say it's difficult to find support
scrappy software? virus free freeware, and there's a shirtload of software. Just look for it.
no gaming? Once again, just ask around. lots of bloody good linux games on the net. Install Cedega etc and you can play games like NFS Carbon on your linux pc
Difficult and time consuming to setup? nope. it takes 2 hours from start to finish to do a complete SuSE10.2 setup on an old box. And then I got more software installed and ready to use than you can install in 6 hours on your winders PC

But that's just my opinion.

 

[bwana]

What I don't like about MAC is that it is for MAC hardware only.

I can't use it on a Cheapo PC or my expensive big-rig. With MAC the only option is MAC

You mean the OsX? Sure, but you can run any number of OS's on the hardware itself - not that I would want to.

BTW - you mentioned "Limited software" twice, and in my experience its not necessarily true.

 

[Sapphiron]

linux can't:
Give good performance in 3D (not within 80% of windows)
multiplex my 2 lan cards for ultimate copy speed
not even getting close to Gigabit network copy speeds (think 250mbit, while Vista gives me 800MBits)
support the RAID controllers on my motherboard
use any of the 3 non-onboard sound cards I have lying around
play even 30% of the games that are available for windows
show me the battery life of my G7 mouse (MAC can)
output digital 5.1 (cant upmix sound per default) to my speakers via an optical cable (some issue with my ADI sound controller driver)
does not work with my nikon Digital Camera
browse large file shares on Vista (folders get displayed as files)
work with the wireless adapter I have lying around (the PC freezes when I try to connect to a network (Fedora, Ubuntu and SUSE)
My card reader does not work (no drivers)
hotswopping hard drives don't work properly (drive won't unmount)
My bluetooth dongle does not work (no drivers)
Sync with my Cellphone.
The media buttons on my keyboard does not work
Work on my 22" widescreen at native res without lots of tinkering.
Have a badly designed Anti-virus App that crashes every 30min


Even if half these problems are solvable, it will take a long, long time to setup.

 

[Sapphiron]

You mean the OsX? Sure, but you can run any number of OS's on the hardware itself - not that I would want to.

BTW - you mentioned "Limited software" twice, and in my experience its not necessarily true.

That is the problem OsX = MAC

I want to run OsX on my PC with Vista.

WRT the Limited Software: Compared to MS, the available software for MAC is limited, but the applications that are available for MAC tend to be of good quality (like Adobe)

 

[wcoetzee]

check this site
http://digg.com/apple/Install_OSX_10_4_8_on_a_regular_Intel_AMD_computer

 

[bwana]

That is the problem OsX = MAC

I want to run OsX on my PC with Vista.

WRT the Limited Software: Compared to MS, the available software for MAC is limited, but the applications that are available for MAC tend to be of good quality (like Adobe)

I guess that's the fundamental difference - I can run Vista on my mac - I just dont want to.

check this site
http://digg.com/apple/Install_OSX_10_4_8_on_a_regular_Intel_AMD_computer

10.4.8? I guess by the time they catch up to where apple is now Leopard will be out.

 

[Tux]

I guess I'm just lucky. Have no hardware issues with linux

It even detects my Nikon digital cam too

 

[fskmh]

linux can't:
Give good performance in 3D (not within 80% of windows)
multiplex my 2 lan cards for ultimate copy speed
not even getting close to Gigabit network copy speeds (think 250mbit, while Vista gives me 800MBits)
support the RAID controllers on my motherboard
use any of the 3 non-onboard sound cards I have lying around
play even 30% of the games that are available for windows
show me the battery life of my G7 mouse (MAC can)
output digital 5.1 (cant upmix sound per default) to my speakers via an optical cable (some issue with my ADI sound controller driver)
does not work with my nikon Digital Camera
browse large file shares on Vista (folders get displayed as files)
work with the wireless adapter I have lying around (the PC freezes when I try to connect to a network (Fedora, Ubuntu and SUSE)
My card reader does not work (no drivers)
hotswopping hard drives don't work properly (drive won't unmount)
My bluetooth dongle does not work (no drivers)
Sync with my Cellphone.
The media buttons on my keyboard does not work
Work on my 22" widescreen at native res without lots of tinkering.
Have a badly designed Anti-virus App that crashes every 30min


Even if half these problems are solvable, it will take a long, long time to setup.

You mean YOU can't do those things with Linux. I will say this though, nvidia SLI support is not as good in Linux, but that's nvidia's fault.