Windows, Mac, and Open Source...the clear winner?

Windows expert to Redmond: Buh-bye Scot Finnie says "sayonara" to Windows, but his search for Mac software continues: If you give the Mac three months, as I did, you won't go back either. The hardest part is paying for it -- everything after that gets easier and easier. Perhaps fittingly, it took me the full three-month trial period to pay off my expensive MacBook Pro. But the darn thing is worth every penny (ComputerWorld)

I have no intention of inflaming the Mac/PC wars. Frankly they were fought and won for the most part in the late 1990s as the author is still discovering. My biggest complaint about the Macintosh is the sheer cost of the hardware. A pretty stripped down dual-core Mac will run you close to $2500. A similar Intel or AMD machine will cost you $1000 or less and, in fact, many of those machines will have more hardware in the box than a Mac.

If you don't want to move to Vista, a decision that is not a trivial one, nor is it one I would encourage anytime soon, there are plenty of open source operating systems that will give you the look and feel of the Mac, without the burden of Windows (but with the ability to virtualize Windows just like on a Mac for those one or two programs that just won't run on any other system and for which there is no good substitute) and with the same levels of hardware support. The Mac runs a derivative of BSD, a UNIX based operating system. Linux is also a UNIX based operating system. So if you are considering converting to the Mac, save yourself the money and go open source. In the long run, you will be much happier.