What OS do you use, and why?

[FoodProduct]

Win7

Couldn't get gaming performance up to par on Ubuntu via Wine (unfortunate, since I really like the concept of Linux, and Ubuntu is supposedly the "easiest" to start with). This is annoying because I'm a software engineer and I've decided it just wasn't worth that much more time.
I don't like the Mac UI, and the fact that it's tailored toward non-technicals isn't for me.
I may try Win8 in the future, but it seems like it's built for a tablet (which I don't use or want) and will wait for SP1 to make sure it's stable first.

[Laize]

Win7

Couldn't get gaming performance up to par on Ubuntu via Wine (unfortunate, since I really like the concept of Linux, and Ubuntu is supposedly the "easiest" to start with). This is annoying because I'm a software engineer and I've decided it just wasn't worth that much more time.
I don't like the Mac UI, and the fact that it's tailored toward non-technicals isn't for me.
I may try Win8 in the future, but it seems like it's built for a tablet (which I don't use or want) and will wait for SP1 to make sure it's stable first.

Windows 8 isn't designed for a tablet. The Metro Interface is, but Metro is limited mostly to start-menu-esque functions in windows 8.

If you stop thinking about Windows 8 as a whole new interface and start thinking about it more as Windows 7 with upgraded start menu and application integration it's really 100x better than Win7.

I mean right now I'm on the Win8 desktop, my music player is docked to the left and that automatically shifts my desktop icons to the right. Not to mention putting the mouse in any corner of the screen brings up useful things. Top-left is most-recent application switching, bottom-left is start-menu/Metro and the entire right side is a quick access menu for control panel, startup/shutdown and such.

Windows 8 is really just Windows 7 with some awesome features.

[Acquilae]

At home: Windows 7
On the go: OS X Mountain Lion/iOS

[schwarzkopf]

Windows 8 - because I earn a living doing point of sale software for Windows.

[zingar]

XP. but i will have to "upgrade" to 7 soon thanks to DX11 which sadly is an artificial limitation microsoft themselves put in place
why i use it? other than dx11 i see no other reason to change it

[TxAg]

Why not save yourself a few hundred bucks and build yourself a Hackintosh? That's what I do.

I have gone that route before. It wasn't too bad however I had two problems with it. One, I share the machine with my wife and kids so any little thing that didn't work just so, I would hear about it. Two, our computer is in an open area on a nice, open writing desk. There is nowhere to hide the cables, tower, speakers, etc. I really enjoy the simplicity of the iMac and how clean it looks.

[darkhybridx]

XP. but i will have to "upgrade" to 7 soon thanks to DX11 which sadly is an artificial limitation microsoft themselves put in place
why i use it? other than dx11 i see no other reason to change it

I was in your boat for the longest time. Tried out Vista in a dual boot when it came out, hated it. Then Vista again later on, hated it. Dual booted 7 when it came out and was still meh. Finally made a switch a few years ago and I'm telling you now, Win7 is better then XP as long as you're not running on a 8 year old machine.

With that said, I'm running Win7 pro and Mint dual boot. Put Mint on my old HD when I got a SSD and tossed it back into my machine so I'd have something to play around on.

[Vvhooya]

Umm

Home: Windows 7
At school: OS X Mountain Lion/iOS

[a21fa7c67f26f6d49a20c2c51]

My day job is a mix of writing code in this horrible "almost c++, but not really" IDE that only runs on windows and that stores source code in a binary format. I have windows 7 there. The other half is standard issue c or ruby on an hp/ux system so I use a Mac for that. If I can get enough of that IDE mess abstracted into libraries then I'll probably go to Mac is full time. IMO writing c on windows for a unix platform is a big bag of hurt. Q

At home and school I use a macs. A Mac pro for "real work" (which really needs an update), a MacBook pro for school and
an air for browsing the web while I cook diner.

Sadly, Macs make for terrible gaming platforms so I keep a pc running windows in the nerd cave to run Warcraft. I bought windows 8 but found some of the UI changes frustrating (broken searching, advertising in bundled apps, and the disjointed muti-tasking experience, and some annoying multi-monitor behavior) do I've opted to go back to windows 7 until the OS gets some more polish.

All of the operating systems suck but at least Mac OS X sucks in predictable ways that don't get in my way. I find that total cost if ownership for a Mac is lower than windows or Linux and it does have some features that are legitimately good (arguably the best open source/developer community for the kind of things that interest me to hobby-about with, automatic backup and restore, typography, and pretty awesome if dated hardware, some best-of-breed applications).

[Laize]

I have gone that route before. It wasn't too bad however I had two problems with it. One, I share the machine with my wife and kids so any little thing that didn't work just so, I would hear about it. Two, our computer is in an open area on a nice, open writing desk. There is nowhere to hide the cables, tower, speakers, etc. I really enjoy the simplicity of the iMac and how clean it looks.

That's fair enough. Most of what you pay for in a Mac is design... it's certainly not the hardware. I'm not hating on (all) Apple stuff... but their price tags can be a little ridiculous. Really all you pay for in Apple stuff is the design and Operating System (both of which are top notch).

[zingar]

I was in your boat for the longest time. Tried out Vista in a dual boot when it came out, hated it. Then Vista again later on, hated it. Dual booted 7 when it came out and was still meh. Finally made a switch a few years ago and I'm telling you now, Win7 is better then XP as long as you're not running on a 8 year old machine.

With that said, I'm running Win7 pro and Mint dual boot. Put Mint on my old HD when I got a SSD and tossed it back into my machine so I'd have something to play around on.

oh sure its probably got some minor advantages. and no my pc is not 8 years old, got almost 400 games on steam and can run any of em fine :P
thing is in XP i know every single process, service, file and what not and im very used to it. i like to feel really in control of whats running and whats not (i try to keep less than 25 simultaneous processes at all times )
anyways ill have to upgrade soon due to hitman absolution and some other games that will start requiring dx11 so..

[Bluesftw]

using vista on my desktop and win7 on laptop just cause they were there when i bought the machines ^^

[Nev12]

Widows 7. Will probably switch to linux soon though.

[64Bit]

Windows 7 - because it works.

[saffi]

Why not save yourself a few hundred bucks and build yourself a Hackintosh? That's what I do.

Good alternative for desktops, but laptops.. meh.

[Nasriel]

Windows 8 because I happen to like it, the issue my laptop had from the day I purchased it has now disappeared... So thats a big win for me. I liked it so much I converted my desktop too