Choosing between a Mac and a Linux PC

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Image:Powerbook on bed.jpg Ever since I got to borrow a PowerBook G4 from IBG in 2004, I've wanted a Mac. I got a first-hand experience of what it's like to use Mac OS X, and it's great.

But now when I'm about to buy one of the new MacBook Pro computers, suddenly everything is not crystal clear anymore. More specifically, Ubuntu suddenly rears its attractive head in the Linux distro space, with claims of being as good as — or better than, on some points — Mac OS. Confused cries of "Is Linux ready for the desktop?", long heard within the Linux community, have given way to enthusiastic fanboy-like exclamations of "Ubuntu rocks! It Just Works!", a refrain usually only heard from the Mac OS X camp. And while I'm not exactly lured in by Ubuntu's charm (yet), the change in the community has made me realize that Linux does have its strengths.

So, I don't know what to do. This article is about that.

Contents

Questions I'm wrestling with

  1. Will I be buying additional quality if I buy a Mac? And the same question re service and maintenance. Is it worth the money?
  2. Is it possible to achieve the same holistic creativity in Ubuntu (or other distro) as in Mac OS?
  3. Is it worth the cost to buy OS/applications/bonus apps, and then throw out the majority of the applications, or at least never use them, because I prefer FOSS products anyway?
  4. Is it worth it to be running a modified UNIX which sacrifices some of the POSIX behavior in favor of backwards compatibility? Is it worth the extra trouble of changing defaults until one is satisfied?
  5. What signals will I send as a FOSS developer and fantast if I buy a closed, commersial platform on which to develop? How is it that basically everyone in the same situation, who has had the means, has gotten a Mac?

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