Suprisingly I made a whole article about this a year or two ago, I might as-well copy paste it here:
Scroll to the end for a TL;DR
Hey Guys, It’s Derek or u/Glucksritter here, and Today we’re going to be talking about which operating system is the better for the average customer to use.
Well as we have it here our three contenders are Windows, macOS, lo and behold Linux.
You’re obviously thinking in your mind “Oh Linux is gonna get kicked out this big time.”
Well that’s not what we’re comparing here
We’re going to be grading them one by one based on Usability, Support, Security, Performance, and accessibility
You might be confused about what these things are so I’m going to explain it to you how these work
Usability - Usability is based on the software’s UI, how easy it is to navigate through it the feel and a standpoint from a person who hasn’t used the OS will adapt to it, and how easy it is to do a task.
Support - Support is based on how easy it is to get support for the OS whether it be from the company who made the Operating System or an External Source and also how quickly they will respond to you upon a request.
Security - How good is the Operating system without antivirus protection - how good is it a finding out what is a virus and what isn’t
Performance - How good does your computer specs have to be to run the Operating System smoothly without many issues
Accessibility - How easily can the Operating System be used by a person with a Disability we will be testing for the Blind, and the Deaf. Also how easy it is to use/install software
To kick it off we’re going to be starting with the Operating System you're probably using, Windows… there are multiple distributions of Windows but the most popular distribution of Windows is Windows 10 at 73% of the market share according to Statcounter
We will start off by rating the Usability of Windows 10, Windows 10’s User interface has developed over time and I assume that most people have updated to the latest major update 1903 that came out around in late March or early May of 2019 according to Microsoft.
While using Windows it was quite easy to navigate through it I could open a side menu to look at apps that were downloaded into the computer, I could also use it to navigate through files in my computer but that had some limitation as it was a bit hard to find certain files hidden inside other folders but I will still stick to “file explorer” application.
Adapting to the UI of Windows is quite easy as while installing the Operating System it teaches you a bit of how to use it
Overall I will rate the Usability a 7/10
Support:
Microsoft Who made the Windows operating system has a page on their website - https://support.microsoft.com/ which is live chat-based support, they are open 24/7 and queues to talk an agent isn’t very long and on busy days the longest queue you’ll probably get is 3 people ahead of you
Overall the Support for Windows 10 is a 9/10
Security:
Windows is very susceptible to viruses. Most of Windows viruses are from the infamous port 22 and smb ports (What caused WannaCry) Windows defender is okay and can easily find viruses but it isn’t the greatest antivirus If you want a good antivirus consider getting Bitdefender Bad AntiVirus. In my opinion, I think windows should consider a bit more on security on their operating systems so people don’t get screwed over
Security is a 3/10
Performance:
Windows 10 Performance is quite lacking as their site does not actually tell the truth as much. On their site: Windows 10 system requirements. They claim that the required specs to upgrading/switching to Windows 10 is:
- Processor: 1 gigahertz (GHz) or faster processor or SoC
- RAM: 1 gigabyte (GB) for 32-bit or 2 GB for 64-bit
- Hard disk space: 32 GB for both 64-bit and 32-bit OS
- Graphics card: DirectX 9 or later
- Display resolution: 800 x 600, a minimum diagonal display size for the primary display of 7-inches or larger.
But under investigation, using Windows 10 with these specs will cause Windows 10 to crash more than often and make the OS more or less useless to the average user/consumer but according to Winaro for optimal performance on your PC you need at least
- Processor: Intel 8th generation processors (Intel i3/i5/i7/i9-7x), Core M3-7xxx , Xeon E3-xxxx, and Xeon E5-xxxx processors, AMD 8th generation processors (A Series Ax-9xxx, E-Series Ex-9xxx, FX-9xxx) or ARM64 processors (Snapdragon SDM850 or later)
- RAM: 4 gigabytes (GB) for 32-bit or 16 GB for 64-bit
- SSD/NVMe: at least 128 GB for both 64-bit and 32-bit OS
- Graphics card: DirectX 9 or later
- Display resolution: 800 x 600, a minimum diagonal display size for the primary display of 7-inches or larger.
This is a big surprise, I would call this false advertising because I have a friend who has a computer with 2GB ram and outdated specs from around the early 2000s and when he goes to watch youtube videos the player/video becomes all grainy as his ram has not enough space to use, this comes along with common crashes. If you have an old computer DO NOT switch to Windows 10 as it’s a resource consumer.
Performance gets a 6/10
Accessibility:
Windows 10 has multiple software that you can install and it’s not much of a hassle to install. It also has a wide array of software for the Blind and Deaf - they have Cortana a virtual assistant that can be used to help you - Windows has preinstalled software for the Blind and Deaf as well including Colour blind people.
Accessibility has an 8/10
Overall Thought:
Windows is in many regards the system that can do anything Windows excels in gaming and standard office productivity software. For creative purposes or software development, it’s probably better to go to Mac or Linux respectively. Still, if you’re looking for a system that does everything, Windows is definitely a solid choice! Also, these systems tend to have the most potential for adding RAM, hard drives, GPUs, and other hardware to max out performance! If you’re a gamer, Windows is definitely the best choice. If you’re using the computer for ERP or productivity software, Windows is also a great choice. For more specialized applications, MacOS or Linux may be better.
Final Rating for Windows 10 is a 6.6/10
Next up we have MacOS… We will be rating MacOS Sierra - Big Thanks to u/yuhhhandrew for writing all of this out!
As usual, we will start off with Usability: The MacOS user interface is designed to be very user friendly, although it doesn’t have very many customization options. Generally, it runs smoothly, but sometimes the system just isn’t capable of doing everything a user may want.
If you are familiar with the Linux terminal, you will find that the MacOS terminal runs with almost identical UNIX based commands. For most users, the GUI is a bit simpler than Windows, however, users have less control over the file system than Windows or Linux.
Overall the usability is about a 6/10.
Support: Of course, no OS is going to have perfect support that solves every problem. That being said, Apple has a great infrastructure for handling support issues. Users can bring their device to any Apple Store location to have experts troubleshoot their system. Much of this can also be done remotely.
Also, most repairs and warranty tickets can be handled directly at the Apple Store and users can walk out with a repaired device, or even a new device, the same day! As the operating system is limited in some regards, it is also quite easy to troubleshoot issues at home using the Apple website.
Overall the support is about a 9/10
Security: MacOS has an extremely secure system which is not susceptible to very many threats. That being said, it is always best to still practice basic internet safety. Downloads from unofficial websites can quickly infect your computer with malicious ‘freeware’. Still, the likelihood of getting hit with a full-on virus is low.
Overall the security is about a 7/10
Performance: A lot of how well MacOS runs depends on the specs. Most official Apple devices will run it well, but after about 5-10 years the system will likely begin to have performance issues. When running high-performance software like Blender, After Effects, or Unity, it is important to have a top-of-the-line Apple system. Generally, the processing power in a $2500 Mac is nowhere near that of a similar price PC.
So, the overall performance is 6/10.
Accessibility: MacOS has a large variety of accessibility settings that can be toggled for users who are blind, partially blind, colourblind, or deaf. These are very easy to use compared to other systems.
Overall accessibility is an 8/10
So the overall MacOS rating is: 7.2/10
Overall Thought - u/yuhhhandrew:
Apple has a number of proprietary creative software such as Logic Pro X for music production and Final Cut Pro X for video editing which draws many users to the OS. However, there are definitely high-quality alternatives. Overall it can run most creative software with ease, although high-performance software such as AutoDesk Maya will likely require a top of the line system
Finally, we have Linux we will be rating it on the whole thing not a single distro of Linux thanks to u/yuhhhandrew for writing this with me
Usability:
Linux has multiple distros to choose from each one using their different type of “Customiser?” some of them are XFCE, Gnome, and KDE Plasma. Each one has their ups and downs - you have your own choice in which one you would like to use as there is basically no backlash of using another one because they either use apt or Pacman file manager.
Overall Usability gets a 10/10
Support: As there is no centralized organization which maintains Linux, it will be harder to find support for issues. Still, there is a massive community which has developed many helpful procedures and tools for troubleshooting.
To properly do much of what you will want to do on Linux, it is important to learn how to use BASH (The Bourne Again Shell) to give the computer commands directly. If you’re not prepared to troubleshoot by reading forums and entering commands into the terminal, you will have some trouble with support on Linux.
So, Linux support gets 4/10
Security:
Linux Security is Great it’s self Linux doesn’t really have any vulnerabilities in its system as it is lesser-known and everything in its system goes in as an average user which means you have to personally type in a command to allow the virus to compromise your PC this is huge up for security. Also, this means that a virus could be in one of your folders and you’ll never know and it will never infect your computer! can you believe that!? This also means that you don’t really need an antivirus for your Linux machine.
Overall Linux Security gets a 9/10
Performance: If performance came down to how efficiently Linux uses system resources, it would win outright. The problem is that it doesn’t run a lot of software users care about. There are solid freeware alternatives, but they’re just not the same as their professional counterparts.
Instead of Photoshop and Illustrator, Linux has GIMP and Inkscape. Instead of Microsoft Office, Linux has LibreOffice (although Microsoft Office can still be run from the browser). Also, most games don’t run on Linux. You can get around all of this by using the Wine software to emulate Windows inside the Linux environment, but that takes such a toll on the system that it outweighs the native performance benefits of Linux.
So, all these means is that while Linux is fast, it only runs select softwares well. If you’re a programmer, this works well, as Linux runs software like Visual Studio Code and Atom better than any other OS. If you are a casual user or a content creator, it’s probably not your best bet.
So, performance gets 5/10 because it’s only great for select users
Accessibility: There are some native accessibility features built into some popular distributions like Ubuntu, but it’s really not ideal compared to Mac or Windows.
Accessibility gets 3/10
The overall rating for Linux: 6.2/10
Overall Review for Linux: u/Gluckstritter
Linux is a Good Operating system in General and does a great job in doing mundane things. But it has some limitations as it can’t do things that windows or MacOS can do, it excels in Security and Usability but it drastically drops in Support and Accessibility which are the key things for any OS to have. The gaming end of Linux is quite small but gaming companies are now considering to make more games for Linux as it has a huge potential for slower/older computers that need a new life(OS) If popular Linux Distros could focus on accessibility maybe more people would be lenient to hop aboard the Linux Train.
Final Review/Summary: u/Gluckstritter u/yuhhhandrew
Windows:
Windows is in many regards the system that can do anything Windows excels in gaming and standard office productivity software. For creative purposes or software development it’s probably better to go to Mac or Linux respectively. Still, if you’re looking for a system that does everything, Windows is definitely a solid choice! Also these systems tend to have the most potential for adding RAM, hard drives, GPUs, and other hardware to max out performance! If you’re a gamer, Windows is definitely the best choice. If you’re using the computer for ERP or productivity software, Windows is also a great choice. For more specialized applications, MacOS or Linux may be better.
MacOS:
Apple has a number of proprietary creative software such as Logic Pro X for music production and Final Cut Pro X for video editing which draws many users to the OS. However, there are definitely high-quality alternatives. Overall it can run most creative software with ease, although high-performance software such as AutoDesk Maya will likely require a top of the line system
Linux: Linux is a Good Operating system in General and does a great job in doing mundane things. But it has some limitations as it can’t do things that windows or MacOS can do, it excels in Security and Usability but it drastically drops in Support and Accessibility which are the key things for any OS to have. The gaming end of Linux is quite small but gaming companies are now considering to make more games for Linux as it has a huge potential for slower/older computers that need a new life(OS) If popular Linux Distros could focus on accessibility maybe more people would be lenient to hop aboard the Linux Train.
Scores:
Windows 6.6/10
MacOs: 7.2/10
Linux: 6.2/10
Winner: At the End MacOS wins
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Bibliography:
Stats - https://gs.statcounter.com/
Major Update: What's new in Windows 10, version 1903 - What's new in Windows | Microsoft Docs
Microsoft Support: https://support.microsoft.com/
Winaero: https://winaero.com/blog/the-real-system-requirements-for-windows-10/
Tbh, Linux is better but I'd have reviewed it differently now. but please tell me what you think about it.
Derek
I am so glad you are back, this forum wasn't the same without you here. So welcome back, now the balance has been restored, I can breath agian. 
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