what can osx do that ubuntu can't?

[cardinals_fan]

The same goes for movie editing, photo management/maniupulation, webcam, calendar, music playback, and built-in utilities.

I won't contest the music or video stuff because I don't use either, but I'm going to disagree about photo management and manipulation. I personally maintain my decent-sized photo collection (amateur photographer) with the trifecta of GIMP, Picasa, and GQView. I use the GIMP for more major or comprehensive editing, Picasa for quick fixes, and GQView to catalog and view my images. This setup works flawlessly for me. All of these apps run on both Linux and OS X (if you count DarwinPorts for GQView).

I'm sure OS X is better for those with specific needs (Photoshop?), but I don't have any. You can't make blanket statements about needs and preferences.

OS X is also Unix compatible, making it the best choice for scientist.

Apple paid to officially be genuine UNIX. Linux is UNIX-like and will do many things the same way, but I personally would recommend BSD or Solaris to anyone who needs a real UNIX system for research or scientific work.

Virtualization is also better in OS X.

Another super-subjective statement. I personally like VMWare, which runs on Windows, OS X, and Linux.

It's also much faster, and once Snow Leopard comes out, OS X will handily beat every other OS when it comes to speed.

Got any evidence to back that up? And what are you measuring? Boot time, app launching time, RAM use?

It's cheaper, but better? I don't think so...

"Better" is a subjective term that will vary for different people.

OS X does many things very well for many people. So does Windows, Linux, BSD, Solaris, Haiku, and just about every other operating system. Everyone has their own needs and desires, and only they can say what works best for them. Let's not go around putting words into people's mouths with generalizations and blanket statements.

[handy]

But we know they could use any extra revenue... they are losing so much on the PS3. Good thing it is powerful enough to last a long time, time for prices to come down, and time for game developers to make games that can take advantage of it.

I agree.

From what I have read, the cell processor offers multiple challenges to software developers, which would be the reason why the PS/3 has not been flooded with software that pushes it too its limits.

Sony have stated that they will not market a more advanced version (PS/4) until software being produced for the PS/3 shows it to be necessary.

[Frak]

Yes, I've seen that site & some info' on the famous professor who built the PS/3 cluster.

It's a shame Sony don't build a PS/3 with at least the provision to add more RAM. Just one RAM slot would make a lot of people very happy.

Obviously not enough sales in it to make it worthwhile, from Sony's perspective.

Aye

Even if it was FB-DIMM (expensive, but fully buffered, which is win for clustering) I'd buy the RAM for it. It'd be worth it.

Got any evidence to back that up? And what are you measuring? Boot time, app launching time, RAM use?

Wouldn't matter anyways, since OS X will at least attempt to load most drivers from the EFI, saving it some serious time. There is no commercial computer that has this ability, which would skew actual times.

[Mason Whitaker]

Well I think it depends on what you are doing, and with the Mac Mini, it could make more of a difference. Ubuntu, and Linux in general, is not optimized for more powerful computers, but tends ot do better on a Mac Mini, in your case. I've noticed that across all Operating systems; linux does better on lower end systems, while OS X can't be beat on higher end systems.

Also, was it Tiger that you ran?

Leopard on a 2GHz Mac Mini

[aceinthenight]

Yeah I can see it not being that much of a difference or being very different. On my laptop, Ubuntu is much faster than Windows. On my Mac Pro, Ubuntu is uber fast, but OS X is faster.

[SunSpyda]

OSX doesn't even compete with BSD/Linux/other Unix OSs at being used as a server. OSX is a very nice for desktop users who want a stable, consistent, chrome filled GUI, but as a server it looks rubbish compared to OSs like FreeBSD and customized Linuxes.

I'm not sure if this is true, but I read nearly three quarters the super computers in the world either run off a *BSD OS, Linux OS or a customized Unix OS of some sort. I doubt OSX even runs 1 of the worlds top 500 super computers.

OSX is for people who want a hassle free desktop, a music/video production suite or a fashion statement. It is very good at these things. All the power users I know simply won't touch OSX due to it's uncustomizable GUI and the fact that it has been proven to be one of the weakest platforms around. Yes, it is insecure. In the official security test of all the main OSs a year ago, OSX WAS WORSE THAN WINDOWS. Windows took longer to hack than OSX in the compitition. A FreeBSD OS with a customized kernel came 1st I believe.

When OSX users say that OSX is used a lot in servers, it just makes me laugh.

[kk0sse54]

What's really funny is it is an amazing server OS. Full Unix compatibility, and it is BSD?

Mac OSX is *not* BSD, so don't try to assume it has all the benefits a BSD server/desktop would have. Yes it might have borrowed some BSD code to use as a base in the beginning but since then it has deviated so far from BSD that you really can't call them similar.

[SunSpyda]

Mac OSX is *not* BSD, so don't try to assume it has all the benefits a BSD server/desktop would have. Yes it might have borrowed some BSD code to use as a base in the beginning but since then it has deviated so far from BSD that you really can't call them similar.

Exactly my point.

I think *BSD is superior to OSX, but that is my opinion.

I hate it when OSX users brag their 'BSD Kernel' when they have no idea what actually is. OSX has little if any positive similarities with *BSD.

I think a £400 64bit PC with *BSD would eat a £400 64bit Mac for breakfast as far as security, reliability and robustness goes. Even if the *BSD PC was running a full DE like KDE 4.2.

[Sorivenul]

OS X and *BSD are two completely separate systems, though they have some similarities.

OS X's networking stack, VFS layer, POSIX system calls, and high-level abstraction (with the exception of threads) are loosely based on FreeBSD, though anything still directly related to FreeBSD is in userland.

OS X is built on a Mach kernel, XNU. Mach itself forked from 4.2BSD I believe, and when Steve Jobs went to NeXT they used it along with the 4.3BSD userland for NeXTSTEP. Then Apple aquired NeXT, forked the OS again (basically making Raphsody). They then proceeded to Darwin/OS X (server). The desktop incarnations of OS X started with Mach 4, I believe, and FreeBSD 3.1; 10.2 took code from FreeBSD 4.5, and 10.3 took code from 4.8. Tiger borrowed code from the FreeBSD 5.x series. I'm not sure what Leopard is using...

To further your education (and to have a defining "geek" moment), go print the UNIX History and put it on your wall or in your cubicle.

So, the OS X kernel, as well as init system, are quite different from any BSD.

Once you get past those differences, you get into the Single Unix Specification (SUS), which sets for the a list of qualifications to be called "UNIX" under the trademark. I follow NetBSD's philosophy, and "call it a duck".

[uc50_ic4more]

I just stumbled across this thread, and thought I'd throw my 2 cents in, as I currently (must) use a Macbook Pro for all of my work, and the rest of my home is loaded up with Ubuntu and Slackware systems. My wife runs Win2k in a VM because, as a high school teacher, there are a few programs that are Win/ Mac only that she must use.

As soon as there is a viable, *professional* level alternative to Final Cut, Logic Pro, Photoshop, Illy, Indy and Flash I will jump ship with glee. It'd also be nice to see something like Automator.

For day-to-day consumer use, though, I cannot highly enough recommend Ubuntu to anyone and everyone unable to flee.