macOS 10.12 Sierra vs Ubuntu 16.04 Xenial Xenus

When we usually do this kind of comparative, usually a lot of disagreements are generated. Something logical considering that there are fans of both one system and another. Obviously this is a blog about Linux and free software and I myself am a lover of Linux distros and everything that surrounds them. So being totally impartial is difficult, but neither will they be in a pro Apple blog where they make this same comparison. Also, the one who writes is a GNU / Linux user, so I don't want to lie to anyone with my position ...

That said, I will try to make a comparison between macOS 10.12 Sierra and Ubuntu 16.10 Xenial Xenus in the most impartial way possible and thus face both Apple and Canonical operating systems faced in this humble face to face. The truth is that Mac OS X or OS X or as they now call it, macOS, has always stood out for its ease of use (usability), for its performance, relative stability and, above all, for its incredible design, brand of the house of the apple as usual in all its products to distinguish them from the rest.

Ubuntu 16.04 vs. MacOS 10.12

One of the things that catches my attention in some comparisons is that pro-Macs usually use the amount of software available for macOS versus the one available for Linux as an advantage. Something in which I do not agree very much, since the amount of software for Linux is extreme, it is true that perhaps there are more commercial software and video games for macOS than for Linux, that is evident. For example, Apple users have the official support of certain hardware manufacturers for drivers that do not for Linux (although this is becoming less frequent, and if not, we can always pull free drivers).

As you know, you can find some great programs like Adobe and Microsoft, see Microsoft Office for macOS, something that is conspicuous by its absence in Linux. That is true, and we must settle for alternatives (not inconsiderable) such as LibreOffice, Calligra Suite, etc. I do not know what you think, but I think that software is not a front to attack Linux and more lately. Although I repeat, you can still improve a lot ...

Another throwing weapon that we had the linuxers in front of macOS was the price, the expensive Apple products versus the free Linux distro. But that advantage has already disappeared with the new policy of the Cupertino company. Now, in relation to the license, yes that GNU / Linux, and therefore Ubuntu in particular, will be open source and free, which macOS is not.

If we continue like this we could enter into more stupid discussions to decide which of the two operating systems is better, to have more obvious data we are going to use some results from some Insights (made by the boys of Phoronix) for both systems with the same hardware, for the avoidance of doubt: this is a MacBook Air with an Intel Haswell processor (Core i5 4278U Quad-core 3.1Ghz) with integrated graphics Intel HD Graphics 5000, 4GB of RAM, hard drive HDD Apple 1TB, etc. Also in Ubuntu both the GCC and Clang compilers were used. And the results were:

Conclusions:

If you look at the results of the test benches, you can deduce some details:

• SQLite (image 1): the different tests carried out have shown that the performance of one and the other are more or less the same, only the MAFFT test was different. In it, you can see how Ubuntu far exceeds macOS, both with one compiler and another (therefore the compiler cannot be blamed for this performance).
• Compilation (image 2): macOS outperformed Ubuntu on ImageMagick, with one compiler as well as another. But for PHP Ubutnu's results with GCC were superior to macOS and very similar with Clang. C-Ray also gave the victory to Ubuntu.
• PostgreSQL and Charts (image 3): In the absence of some tests with OpenGL, Ubuntu is also comfortable in these tests.

Conclusion, the best operating system is… Depends! If you are a novice user, perhaps the best thing is macOS for its simplicity. If you are advanced and you also want to have the source code, then without a doubt your system is Ubuntu. In the case of wanting a stable system, both are solid as rocks. Regarding performance, you have already seen the comparisons with the benchmarks ... If you want better mobility, macOS is optimized for the hardware you use (play with an advantage because Apple supplies hardware + software) and the official drivers as well, therefore the battery surely last longer in the case of Apple OS. For flexibility, don't hesitate Ubuntu. Can't you decide? Well, use both with a multiboot system.

Please do not forget to leave your comment, both for and against this article. Here we do not censor anyone, and it is always good to see different opinions on the same issue, it is nutritious and you will always be welcome ...