1: Great to see Windows improving. I will surelly use it to compile my games and play other people offerings.
2: I am a Mac user, a very happy one, and I believe its the best OS option out there for my needs. Others may differ, great for them, have fun and/or be productive with your "windows only" boxes.
3: I like linux. I am a professional system administrator of unix boxes, so it's my job to know about it more than most people. Like the BSD also, actually I like the BSD more, but that is another topic. As far as the desktop (for newbies) is concerned: linux is not "quite there" (yet) in my opinion... for most users Mac OS X is the only option as far as unix systems desktops. For computer geeks linux has been an option for years now, and before the rise of OS X it was the best alternative to NextStep. I believe linux will "make it", and in many devices (consoles and cellphones/pda), as well as a full alternative to windows... however, for that to happen, I believe the current development model people perceive as ideal (i.e. open source) will fail: companies will pick up the the core system (i.e. kernel and userland) and built something decent on top of it, much like apple does with the mach kernel and BSD adding the non-open-source graphical layer on top. Problem is that reproducing what Apple made with OS X is not exactly easy or cheap. But once resources are put into it... it is possible. I believe however the biggest linux success with the masses are and will be small devices (phones, PDA, game consoles, etc). Ah, on the servers side, it is obviously a whole different story. The Internet is built on linux and BSD, from servers to routers, appliances, etc.
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I live on Mac land. I don't care much for windows at all. Looks like most people around here seem to think that mac is "style over content/technology" or a option for those that want to pay "premium rates for design". Good for them. Like windows? Does it work out for you? Great! Keep using it to work and have fun.
Mac is a whole different league, actually I think it's a whole different sport. I am not advocating it. It works for me. I actually like it a lot. I read references to windows being more "responsive" on equivalent hardware... well, on the SAME hardware it is not, not on my core duos, and I will not even go thru the reasons I end up re-installing windows from time to time since I do not have the time or the inclination to deal with crazy registry problems, overwritten dll files, spy/ad-wares and the lot. I have my Windows disk images, and rather restore them whenever things start degrading. None of that happens on OS X. It does its job. I have Macs that have gone thru 4 years of usage, with three major OS X upgrades, without ever needing to restore backup images. They just work like they did on day one. No bullshit, no need for anti-whatever-you-need-to-run to keep windows "healthy". On my windows images: I keep them updated every three months or so, they allways run on a protected enviroment (behind firewalls with very limited and very controled connectivity), without IE / firefox only, no mail, no downloads of any kind, etc, never had a virus in my machines - I work as a unix system administrator as my primary job and am the CEO of a security company). How from simple games install/uninstall (not taking into account the ocasional spyware/adware) the OS can get so damaged is behond reason (easy to understand but really inexcusable).
I use windows also, after all need to compile my games there and test them, but to be honest I do not enjoy the experience at all. I like a couple of windows "only" games and Intel based Macs allow me to jump into that with ease (in cases like catan and magiconline I can even play them in OS X without even looking at the windows OS thanks to parallels coherence mode - it allows me to place windows apps on my Mac dock and launch the programs directly which is great).
Blitzmax is great on Mac OS X (and it was even better while it had the native cocoa editor, that BRL dropped in favour of maxedit a while ago). I like Xcode also. Most of my work is done on a shell (i.e. ssh into unix boxes) and on keynote/pages (a powerpoint/wordprocessor like applications from apple) - I own office but stoped using it in 2003 or so in favour of the more elegant Apple offerings.
Anyway, whatever keeps you happy is the best option. Have fun. Enjoy your computer and OS.
PLS
2: I am a Mac user, a very happy one, and I believe its the best OS option out there for my needs. Others may differ, great for them, have fun and/or be productive with your "windows only" boxes.
3: I like linux. I am a professional system administrator of unix boxes, so it's my job to know about it more than most people. Like the BSD also, actually I like the BSD more, but that is another topic. As far as the desktop (for newbies) is concerned: linux is not "quite there" (yet) in my opinion... for most users Mac OS X is the only option as far as unix systems desktops. For computer geeks linux has been an option for years now, and before the rise of OS X it was the best alternative to NextStep. I believe linux will "make it", and in many devices (consoles and cellphones/pda), as well as a full alternative to windows... however, for that to happen, I believe the current development model people perceive as ideal (i.e. open source) will fail: companies will pick up the the core system (i.e. kernel and userland) and built something decent on top of it, much like apple does with the mach kernel and BSD adding the non-open-source graphical layer on top. Problem is that reproducing what Apple made with OS X is not exactly easy or cheap. But once resources are put into it... it is possible. I believe however the biggest linux success with the masses are and will be small devices (phones, PDA, game consoles, etc). Ah, on the servers side, it is obviously a whole different story. The Internet is built on linux and BSD, from servers to routers, appliances, etc.
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I live on Mac land. I don't care much for windows at all. Looks like most people around here seem to think that mac is "style over content/technology" or a option for those that want to pay "premium rates for design". Good for them. Like windows? Does it work out for you? Great! Keep using it to work and have fun.
Mac is a whole different league, actually I think it's a whole different sport. I am not advocating it. It works for me. I actually like it a lot. I read references to windows being more "responsive" on equivalent hardware... well, on the SAME hardware it is not, not on my core duos, and I will not even go thru the reasons I end up re-installing windows from time to time since I do not have the time or the inclination to deal with crazy registry problems, overwritten dll files, spy/ad-wares and the lot. I have my Windows disk images, and rather restore them whenever things start degrading. None of that happens on OS X. It does its job. I have Macs that have gone thru 4 years of usage, with three major OS X upgrades, without ever needing to restore backup images. They just work like they did on day one. No bullshit, no need for anti-whatever-you-need-to-run to keep windows "healthy". On my windows images: I keep them updated every three months or so, they allways run on a protected enviroment (behind firewalls with very limited and very controled connectivity), without IE / firefox only, no mail, no downloads of any kind, etc, never had a virus in my machines - I work as a unix system administrator as my primary job and am the CEO of a security company). How from simple games install/uninstall (not taking into account the ocasional spyware/adware) the OS can get so damaged is behond reason (easy to understand but really inexcusable).
I use windows also, after all need to compile my games there and test them, but to be honest I do not enjoy the experience at all. I like a couple of windows "only" games and Intel based Macs allow me to jump into that with ease (in cases like catan and magiconline I can even play them in OS X without even looking at the windows OS thanks to parallels coherence mode - it allows me to place windows apps on my Mac dock and launch the programs directly which is great).
Blitzmax is great on Mac OS X (and it was even better while it had the native cocoa editor, that BRL dropped in favour of maxedit a while ago). I like Xcode also. Most of my work is done on a shell (i.e. ssh into unix boxes) and on keynote/pages (a powerpoint/wordprocessor like applications from apple) - I own office but stoped using it in 2003 or so in favour of the more elegant Apple offerings.
Anyway, whatever keeps you happy is the best option. Have fun. Enjoy your computer and OS.
PLS