Unix Versus Windows- Which OS to choose?

1.Availability :

UNIX:UNIX operating system and Kernel, by design are free from viruses, worms and malicious system threats including spying software

WINDOWS:Windows Operating system inherently capable of being attacked by large number of viruses, worms and Trojan horses. These are potential threats to systems stability and may crash even a powerful production server running on windows or even corrupt the production data.


Additional Comments:
I
According to Dr. Nic Peeling and Dr Julian Satchell's Analysis of the Impact of Open Source Software
Windo("There are about 60,000 viruses known for Windows, 40 or so for the Macintosh, about 5 for commercial Unix versions, and perhaps 40 for Linux. Most of the Windows viruses are not important, but many hundreds have caused widespread damage. Two or three of the Macintosh viruses were widespread enough to be of importance. None of the Unix or Linux viruses became widespread - most were confined to the specific files."


2. Downtime Costs:

UNIX:Down time costs are low in case of UNIX.

WINDOWS:Downtime costs are high in case of windows OS.


Additional Comments:
Windows Server Downtime Costs Companies two to three times as much as Linux/UNIX server downtime. This is not due to any inherent flaws in the Windows server OS, but rather reflects the crucial nature of the data and applications running on Windows servers. Windows application servers racked up the biggest downtime expenses: $5,624 per hour versus $1,168 in hourly downtime costs for comparable Linux
Source :
http://www.iaps.com/Linux-Windows-TCO-Survey-2005.04.html



3. Stability:

UNIX:Unix is more stable operating system and it does not go down as often as Windows does, therefore requires less administration and maintenance

WINDOWS:Blue screen is a common windows dilemma. System crashes are very common due to many possible reasons including hardware and software.

Additional Comments:

According to latest servers reliability survey 2008 http://www.iaps.com/2008-server-reliability-survey.html,
UNIX has a superior edge over windows in terms of reliability and availability.. According to same survey report, IBM AIX is leading UNIX variant in terms of less down time, with HPUX as number two.


4. Performance:

UNIX:Unix possesses much greater processing power than Windows.

WINDOWS:Windows Operating system running on CICS architecture machines and is bit slower. Moreover, recent Microsoft attempts to increase OS hardening have also reduced windows performance little bit.

Most of leading UNIX servers are RISC architecture based and therefore much performance oriented as compared to Windows servers.


5.System Upgrades:

UNIX:Software upgrades are straightforward and does not require any prerequisites. Moreover time required for patch management is not high

WINDOWS:Software upgrades from Microsoft often require the user to purchase new or more hardware or prerequisite software. Time required for patch management is quite high due to large number of patches released by Microsoft.

6. Security

UNIX:Unix has greater built-in security and permissions features than Windows


ADDITIONAL COMMENTS:For example, on a Windows system, programs installed by a non-Administrative user can still add DLLs and other system files that can be run at a level of permission that damages the system itself. Even worse, the collection of files on a Windows system - the operating system, the applications, and the user data - can't be kept apart from each other. Things are intermingled to a degree that makes it unlikely that they will ever be satisfactorily sorted out in any sensibly secure fashion.


7.Manageability:

UNIX:UNIX system administration is available through command line as well as through GUI ( KDE, XWINDOWS, GNOME)

WINDOWS:Windows administration is more users friendly and available through GUI.


Traditionally speaking UNIX is considered as command line text editor oriented operating system, however availability of XWINDOWS and KNOME etc has changed the perspective and UNIX administration is far easy as compared to what it was ten years ago. Still, in terms of user friendliness , Windows have an edge.

8.System Recovery:

UNIX:System recovery time is slightly higher in case of UNIX systems

WINDOWS:System recovery is faster in windows systems

According to a survey, Linux Servers Take Nearly Four Hours or 30% Longer to Recover from a Security Attack than a similar Windows Server. The survey respondents revealed that it took them 17 hours on average for their Linux servers to recover from a security attack compared to an average recovery time of 13.2 hours for Windows Servers.
Source: http://www.iaps.com/Linux-Windows-TCO-Survey-2005.04.html

9. Virtualization:

UNIX:Virtualization is built-in for most of latest commercially available UNIX variants. AIX for example supports Lpars, Micropartitioning, PLM and WPARS for virtualization.

WINDOWS:Virtualization is available through third party tools like VMware, however possesses certain limitations.