What are the benefits of Linux VS. win2k?

[lsd]

My freind keeps bugging me about how linux is so much better than win2k.

Can anybody give me a decent reason why it would be better?

I have d/led a few iso's already. I`m wondering if i wasted my time.

 

[Sensei]

Linux is scalable more secure and comes with compilers for virtually every programming language. It is customizable as well.

many more benefits.

 

[Shuxclams]

Its free, customizable, runs on less H/W and can be secured better.
W2K is a excellent product as well, the interface and ease of doing daily small business serving is excellent, but pound for pound, dollar for dollar Linux just does much more, small to large scale. IMO








SHUX

 

[owensdj]

You can't really say that Linux is better than Win2K. There are advantages and disadvantages to both. The biggest Linux advantage is that you can use it without having to pay a licensing fee. Linux also runs better on lower-end hardware, especially on machines with a relatively small amount of memory.

 

[Charles]

I just started using Linux since about 3 months ago and I can't see its benefits over Windows 2000.

Here's my reason:

It takes less than 5 minutes to install NVidia Detonator driver in Win2k.
It took me about 5 days to install it under Linux Mandrake 7.0 and I still can't play Quake III on it.

 

[Spiff]

The question is too broad in scope. What people should be looking at is "What OS will do everything I need it to do?" Define what your requirements are and then determine which OS will provide the greatest benefit.

Linux requires a smaller hw footprint than Win2k and provides options for tight security without the flagrant loopholes that exist in MS OS'.

Let's say your primary needs are gaming, web browsing, web development, email... typical stuff even for many home users as there are so many individuals now with a web presence.

Win2k can do all of this. Yes, even your games... probably 95% of the games most people are going to play today.

Linux can do all of this as well and it will provide exceptional performance on less powerful hw. But Linux but is far more limited in game support. Not only that, but the support for multimedia hw is also very limited; much more so than Win2k.

MacOS can do all of this, but is also extremely limited in the games ported for the MAC.

Win98 can do all of this, support 100% of your games, and 100% of your hw.

What about the security?

Who cares if Linux offers tight security if you don't know how to set it up? Who cares if Win2k offers NTFS if you don't know enough to remove the "everyone" group and disable NETBios over TCP/IP across your internet connection?

I don't know enough about MacOS to comment on its security model.

Win98 offers no worthwhile security.


what about cost?

Most commercial Linux distro's are far less expensive than a copy of Win2k Pro. Even if you say "Linux is free"... only the kernel is free (and Linux is little more than the kernel... the core of the operating system). You still have to find all the tools you'll need in order to have a functional operating system. That's all RedHat, Caldera, Mandrake, et al are offering. Pre-packaged tools for using your OS... oh yeah, and a manual. And there is contention there about which distro's are better than others...

In terms of cost of OS and cost of hw, Win2k is more expensive than Linux hands down.

Mac's are pricey in terms of hw and OS. Hw for a MAC is usually considerably more than for a Win2k PC of equivalent performance. This is largely due to the proprietary nature of the MAC systems.

In terms of cost of OS and cost of hw, Win98 is more expensive than Linux.

What about ease of use?

Linux requires a steep learning curve to get it to do what you want... and even then it may not do it all

Win2k requires a minimal learning curve to get it to do what you want... and even then it may not do it all

Win98 requires a minimal learning curve to it to do what you want... and even then it may not do it all


In order to say that "Linux is better than Win2k" or "Win2k is better than Linux" you have to define "better at what?". What good does the OS do me if I cannot use it for anything that I want it to do?

 

[BudB]

If your time in setting up and learning Linux is worth nothing and you care little about broad hardware and software support then Linux may be cheaper than W2K. But if your time is worth anything at all then the cheaper argument goes out the Window(s), so to speak.

 

[Davegod75]

if your os does everything you need don't bother. It's just harder to do everything in linux. It's getting better but usuability is nothing compared to windows

 

[Shuxclams]

Thanks spiff,
In order to decide you must define your needs, most peeps on this BBS have no need to learn Linux, but that should mean that Linux is not worth while, ask anyone who does real IT work and I bet they have found a use for linux as well as any other OS since not 1 OS can do everything, and certainly not in a IT budget, Linux However does fill many many roles, from routing, to print servers, to web serving, to file serving, to mail serving, graphics development, to modeling to hardcore scientific numbers crunching, to the amazing BEOwolf cluster super computers that turn a bunch of used old 486 machines into something that kicks the boogers out of a CRAY,etc, etc.....
So just because you can't get your super duper hot rod VC to work under it doesnt mean its not a very powerful and useful OS.








SHUX

 

[Leo V]

"Win2k can do all of this. Yes, even your games... probably 95% of the games most people are going to play today."

NOT QUITE SO. I'll be the devil's advocate and remind everyone: Win2000 is a very quirky game platform. I wrote another post before, exhaustively explaining the frustrating range of problems that ALL games I tried under Win2000 experienced (reduced performance, unsaveable settings, refusal to install, crashes from multimedia or certain DirectX usage, Window kicks, crashes, even complete lockups--depending on the game). And I used the most "vanilla" hardware--unoverclocked Intel P3, BX chipset, NVIDIA GeForce tested with most all Detonators released for Win2K.

Neither is Win2000 (or even NT) completely stable. Just a couple days ago, I caused a hard lockup in both my systems (one Win2000, one NT 4.0 SP6) by trying to transfer too large a file over the LAN! Win2000 is even less stable, since DirectX apps can sometimes hose it too.

The only decent OS for games is Win98 Second Edition. After that, it only goes downhill (WinME reduces performance and bundles anti-consumer SDMI compliance).

This is why I'm switching to Linux as my primary OS, and leaving Win98SE exclusively for games.

 

[utopia]

I have never seen a Linux server crash :Q W2k is stable, but does crash once in a while.

 

[zzzz]

linux is better for developers or calculations, for things that really need computers. For playing games, one can buy dreamcast or other such things by the money saved to buy the OS.
It is a bit hard on the beginners and the hardware support is not as good as windows. As (and if) linux becomes popular, there would be better support.

 

[Spiff]

The stability argument is a load of crap... i'm not flaming anyone.. I'm just tired of hearing it.

a system is only as stable as its admin. period.

if the admin knows what he/she is doing then the system is going to be stable (exceptions given to hw failure) regardless of OS platform.

I ran Win98 for months without a reboot and no system crashes
I run NT 4.0 for months without the need for a reboot and no system crashes
I have been running Win2k for months without the need for a reboot and no system crashes

stability is not a valid argument. as a sys admin, that's bs

Leo V, once again it comes down to the admin and what that person wants out of their system. You have to design your system around what you want it to do. the problem I see, is that most people build a system and then decide they want it do x, y, and z. Win2k does support the games that people are likely to be playing today as I stated in my original post. If you choose hw that is not supported or if you choose hw for which the hw developers have written flaky drivers, then you have made a bade choice either in terms of OS or ni terms of hw depeding on what you want to do. Remeber, MS does not write drivers. The hw manufacturers do. That is their responsibility, not MS'

Shuxclams, I'm not sure if this was directed at me, but just to clarify, I never stated that Linux was not a good OS. It is a very powerful tool, but it is also a power user's tool and does not work for the common consumer who doesn't want to know how computers work, and shouldn't need to know.

Whether in IT or for home use, the same rules still apply... what are my requirements and what will fulfill those requirements in the most efficient and effective way possible?

 

[Leo V]

"a system is only as stable as its admin. period...if the admin knows what he/she is doing then the system is going to be stable (exceptions given to hw failure) regardless of OS platform..

..Leo V, once again it comes down to the admin and what that person wants out of their system."

An unprovoked attack on my administrative capacity by Spiff. Since I have years of experience with hardware and particularly MS operating systems, I have no choice but to respond in kind:

A system is only as proven as the capacity of its user. If user S used his installation exclusively to play Solitaire, he may develop a condescending attitude towards problems experienced by those who actually use their systems for serious tasks and multitasking. Spiff appears to exhibit just such an attitude.

His attitude is immediately revealed by his assumption that I'm using faulty hardware or firmware/drivers. Even so much as reading my post would've revealed that I: 1) used bread-and-butter unoverclocked, properly assembled Intel/BX and NVIDIA hardware, as standard as a PC gets, and 2) used some of the best drivers in existence for either operating system--for which NVIDIA in particular is known.

Next, Spiff scrambles to defend the viability of Win2000 as a gaming platform, by assuming again that my lengthy experience is somehow irrelevant--because people are somehow expected to be playing games designed with Win2000 in mind (?) Wake up and smell the coffee, Spiff. Some of the most recent games have minor to major problems with Win2000. You'll have a hard time dismissing my competence in troubleshooting, as I was able to get unruly games to run at all after thorough registry surgery, hardly something most Windows users are likely to be doing today, as you eloquently implied. (What's with the emphasis on 'today'? Do you work for Microsoft? 😉)

Your entire post radiates a vested interest in defending both Windows families, shrugging off contradicting facts and dismissing people bringing them. Either that, or an arrogant incapacity to admit mistakes. I don't like arguing (or even talking) with individuals whose ego insults the intelligence of those around them, but I'm compelled to defend my credibility vigorously when it's attacked.

 

[Spiff]

If you had read the first line in my post... I explicitly stated that it was not meant as a flame.

I find that the "stability" argument is tossed out constantly as a reason to use one OS over another. My point as I tried to explain in the rest of post... if the admin does some research prior to building a system, then that person will not likely have these consistent stability issues that people constantly gripe about.

If you had read both my posts, then you'd see that I'm not attacking anyone.

I am not a MS advocate of any kind. I explicitely stated more than once that determination of the OS is goverened by need. I even threw in Apple in an example showing the most common OS' people are going to choose from these days (yes... today).

To repeat myself again on another point, nowhere do I say that Win2k will run all games or even suffice for all needs. I did state that it would run 95% of the games that people are likely to be playing today; today, as in recent titles. Would it make you feel better if I dropped that percentage a little? 85%? It still covers the majority of games, which is pretty good given that the OS is meant to be more a business platform as opposed to a gaming platform.

You are correct in one statement... Win98 will play all your games from old to new. It is an excellent choice if you want a gaming platform. I believe I stated as much in a previous post as well.

the original topic of this thread was along the lines of "Is Linux better than Win2k or vice versa". All of my posts have been directed at addressing what my experience tells me is an inaccurate but extremely common question. The question should be "what will fulfill my requirements?"

So once again, I am not flaming you, I was simply addressing a comment you made, which I felt to be an inaccurate blanket statement. If I were flaming you, you'd know it for sure. As it stands, I think this is a simple misunderstanding.

 

[Sunner]

Spiff, sorry to say, but saying the stability is all up to the admin is BS.

I agree that it matters, and alot at that, but even if properly setup, serevrs do crash, due to HW failures, memory leaks, evil apps etc etc, only some OS's are more prone to these problems than others, take Solaris, a vastly supperior server OS compared to any windows IMO, its generally way more stable than any Windows, given equally skilled admins.

 

[Spiff]

HW failure is not something that can be effectively controlled. I alluded to this in a previous post that hw failure was not a consideration in overall stability.

Solaris is a very powerful tool. No question there. But it does have its share of problems, there isn't an OS that doesn't.

In a professional IT environment, you have the ability (in fact it is necessary) to develop your functional platforms and test them and modify them until you have systems that will work.

The home user does not have that luxury in most cases. They have to rely on their reseller to provide a platform for them. what ends up happening is that most home users are installing software left and right with the belief that it should all work correctly and become frustrated when it does not. Hence we have these blanket statements that "this OS sux" or "that OS isn't stable".

The problem typically does not exist with the OS, it usually exists with the hw manufacturers that don't write fully functional drivers for the OS and with the sw developers that don't write fully compliant sw... which in the case of games, is extremely difficult to do given the thousands of configurations that exist.

So yes, you are correct in stating that is not solely up to the admin. It is not entirely up to the admin/user who has no control over developers who write faulty drivers or sw. There's little that can be done there except to gripe at NVIDIA or Valve or whoever and then play a waiting game.

So although I am correcting you for making a blanket statement, it appears as though I may have been making my own blanket statement. That's fine. My experience tells me that stability is still largely subjective because I can still choose an alternate OS or I can choose alternate hw or I can choose alternate sw and I can do the research involved in getting something to work.

 

[Leo V]

Spiff, I responded as I did because your comment unambiguously suggested that I don't know my ABC's. Adding the "not a flame" rubber stamp didn't really help. You're obviously free to profess & express your opinions about me on a public forum (it's a basic freedom we ought to protect), however I'm compelled to respond, since others will also read your post.

With this out of the way, I think we can agree to a formula of this kind:

system_stability = (admin_knows_what_theyre_doing)*(hardware_reliability)*(drivers_reliability)*(OS_kernel_stability)*(system_application_stability)

where each ranges from 0 to 1. Consequently, all have to be fault-free to ensure flawless operation. However, I deliberately didn't include applications into this formula; if all previous links are solid, an OS must be able to subdue any delinquent application with no resulting crashes or memory leaks. Neither Win9X nor even WinNT/2000 are always capable of doing that; Linux is. A great number of faults I've encountered while using Windows point directly to leaks, bugs, or insecurities in the WinDOS or NT kernel (or basic system apps) as the culprit.

Given these solid criteria, stability does become a reasonably defined, palpable concept. The Windows family are not faultless products, whose outrageous behaviour is to be blamed on drivers, users, software, anyone but Microsoft. As it happens, Windows products come complete with bugs, memory leaks, and poor design all by themselves; NT/2000 being no exception (though still better than W9X). Even when used to spec, with MS-certified drivers and the most common hardware, Windows can produce unpredictable kinks with any demanding usage. Saying that I'm a moron because I shouldn't run more than 2 applications in Win98 (or transfer large files across an NT network) allows me to respond: if this is somehow inappropriate, then why does Microsoft allow it? Too confident about their products? If I'm accused of incompetence for trying these things, wouldn't Microsoft stand accused of sheer idiocy for allowing the same?

 

[Spiff]

man I don't know you, don't know what your level of experience is. never made anything close to an accusation of you being moron or of you being incompetent.

I simply addressed a generalization in your post and you are continuing to turn it around as personal attack. In my last post I even acknowledge the fact that I too made a blanket statement.

I'm not interested in OS bettlefront wars, they are pointeless... I don't give a rat's ass about MS or Linux or Sun or IBM or Apple... I only care about what will get the job done and there is no single solution for all needs.

 

[Leo V]

No offense is taken 🙂 You may not know me, but neither do most Anandtech readers--so I had to prevent getting a bad rap. I have since explained what I meant about stability, and at this point we're back to normal discussion.

 

[LtlBeastie]

>>>>>EDITED<<<<<

this is the difference between win2k and *nix (fBSD on my box):

freeBSD box: dual p166, 128 megs

win2k (formerly NT4 box): dual pII 550e, 256.

fbsd can do everything the NT/2k box could do (except PDCing and maybe they can do that with the right proggy) and on about 200 bucks worth of hw, as opposed to thousands. Also, the sw is free, and you don't have to install some 120 dollar software to get ls and grep.

Also, our 2k is bogged down being our BACKUP external server (granted, it's our PDC, but only on a 12 user net, both comps fileserve, but 2k machine == nfs gateway, so there's a LITTLE more strain on it) and our dual p166 sits there at 20% / 45 megs free all the time (40% / 3-4 megs free while serving a number of X apps).


Both OS's are damned stable, and they are both good. It just depends on what you're doing with it. NO ONE IN HIS RIGHT MIND SHOULD INSTALL LINUX ON A STRICTLY PERSONAL COMPUTER. LINUX IS A POOR MAN'S COPY OF REAL UNIX, an OS designed for servers. Win2k is a very nice internal server/pc os.

Someone prolly already said that, but I don't wanna read all that stuff up there =].


BTW, I might go so far as to say that stability is solely based on ADMIN. Since it's his/her job to buy the hw, set it up, decide which system best fits the application, compile/write modules for the kernel, etc... If he does any of that wrong, and the system crashes, it's still his damned fault.

I pride myself int he stability of my machines, and if my HD goes out, i say to myself... &quot;I shoulda done more research, gotten a better drive&quot; or &quot;gee, maybe i shoulda spent that extra few hundred and gotten raid... sure would be handy now&quot; then i kick my own ass.

Now, should someone be placed in a position where he MUST run some os (either by a need to play games, or by previous sysadmins screwing things up, and everyone's unwillingness to pay for/deal with it's fixing, he can only do so much. I went to a place with a consultant to help him fix a windows server... I was thinking winNT... it was WINDOWS98. What the hell is that? Anyhow... a sysadmin/consultant should know what to choose for his clients.

It is totally impossible to run windows 98 for a month with no probs (not just crashing the OS, i'm talking about 3ds crashes, quake quitting out, net neighborhood ceasing to post net info, losing hardware, unfixable mem leaks... having crazy alert boxes not go away, and positioning them really far down the screen and hoping no one notices). Maybe if you just turn it on and leave it there, it'll be ok when you come back to it.

 

[extra]

Linux and Win2k both have advantages and disadvantages.
(i should note that on my computer i only have one operating system: debian gnu/linux)

1. Stability. Win2k is stable. Linux is also stable. Both are very stable in a common home environment, and as a server.

2. Security. Both can be very secure, if set up properly. It's my OPINION that a default install of Linux-Mandrake is probably LESS secure than a default install of Win2k. However, again, it's my OPINION that default install of Debian is probably more secure. IT all depends, a good sysadmin (which i am not! all i can do is set up basic routing in linux!) can make either secure, or either a peice of swiss-cheese.

3. Compatability. Win2k has better support for the latest hardware, no doubt about it. It's EASY AS HELL to get a matrox g400 going with games in win2k. It's HARD AS HELL to get it going in linux with 3d support. However, you can argue that linux has much better performance on older hardware, and you would be right.

4. Flexibility. Linux is probably more flexible, shoot, you can compile the kernel with as much or as little options as you like. You can download many different gui's, different shells, different tools, etc. However, it can be argued that it doesn't have the flexibility of win2k in a way, because you can't play very many games or run software such as dreamweaver (vmware excused).

5. Fun. This is what I find in linux. It's like a new frontier, it's different, it's free, it clears my conscience, you don't need to pirate linux, it's free. In a way it's an adventure. Also, with everything set up, I can get things done just as fast and easily under linux.

6. Web browser: IE is better than netscape. Linux doesn't have IE, obviously. So you are stuck with netscape, which sucks, and crashes a lot. However, kde2.0's browser, konqueror, is quite good, i find that it loads pages faster than netscape, is more stable, and supports netscape plugins. If you try linux, try kde2.0 and it's browser, I like it a lot, you might also.

 

[Leo V]

&quot;LINUX IS A POOR MAN'S COPY OF REAL UNIX&quot;

LtlBeastie, I've heard people say this before. What do you (or they) mean by this? (Other than the fact that Linux is free.) Even companies like IBM are putting Linux on their enterprise servers nowadays. Is there some kind of grave disadvantage to Linux that makes it an intolerable form of Unix? Please educate a Unix illiterate 🙂

 

[LtlBeastie]

>>>>>EDITED<<<<<


//////Amendment to previous post\\\\\\\
Even if box does crash, there should always be another machine that can pick up where it left off... I don't know of a singel app (besides central computing type stuff, but if ur peeps run that, their apps'll be so slow they may not even notice a crash) that can't have another server running it backup... That goes for web, DNS, fileserving, even DB. Just distribute ur storage, and have some cheap short term backup. And that's up to the sysadmin too. So maybe it's not all about how he sets up the machines in the first place... there's something to how he plans for failure.



Linux is free... But i was talking about hardware.

Anything that runs on an x86 and is anything but an internal server is a poor man's server. Real servers include dec alphas (almost spelled it 'alfa' =]) running true64bit unix, sun machines on solaris, and anything else that costs a lot =]


I should ammend that.... Anything but something running on proprietary AT&amp;T stuff isn't unix =]


In sum, there are a few OS's that REAL servers run on: solaris, hp-ux, true64 bit are the main ones. Then there's what the rest of us who don't work for yahoo (run FreeBSD front ends and solaris back end) or the Cal university (hp ux app servers, true64bit web/commerce servers) have to deal with =].

Keep in mind... I'm talking about a certain niche in the server market. Obviously, win is the best server if all ur clients run win, which they should =]. Even true64bit would be pretty useless on an all NT network, and that's about the best you can get. It's all relative.

By no means is linux (or it's better brother, FreeBSD) a bad os. Put it to the right task, and it rocks. Web serving, cgi related stuff... any sort of non win server that doesnt require a big database is fine with it. The only time u need a real server is when you can't just put multiple cheap boxes together (example: yahoo spreads their web traffic across a buttload of FBSD boxes, but you can't do that with a DB, so they have to use suns), which is usually for DB purposes.

 

[Leo V]

Thanks for the info! I guess Linux isn't so bad for a poor guy like myself 😉