OPERATING SYSTEM:
An Operating System is the most important software that runs on a computer. It manages the computer’s memory, processes, and all of its software and hardware. It also allows you to communicate with the computer without knowing how to speak the computer’s language. Without an operating system, a computer is useless.
The advantages and disadvantages of each Operating Systems are
Windows 7 (codenamed Vienna, formerly Blackcomb) is a personal computer operating system developed by Microsoft. It is a part of the Windows NT family of operating systems. Windows 7 was released to manufacturing on July 22, 2009, and became generally available on October 22, 2009, less than three years after the release of its predecessor, Windows Vista. Windows 7's server counterpart, Windows Server 2008 R2, was released at the same time.
Windows 7 desktop
ADVANTAGES
Windows 7 is faster than its predecessors, both in terms of installation and boot up time.
Calculator has been enhanced with some new features like unit conversion, calculations like fuel economy and auto lease payment.
WordPad in Windows 7 has improved much better and look similar to the Microsoft Office Word. It can be used to open, edit file names with docx extension which was earlier introduced with MS-Office 2007. Word prediction is the new feature in Word Pad. Realistic brush has been added in Paint.
It also supports advanced touch and handwriting recognition.
Windows 7 supports Virtual Hard Disks with the support of enhanced performances of multi core processors.
Windows Media Player 12 has got much enhanced features in the Windows 7 and drag and drop option has been added which were not there in the previous versions.
Windows 7 allows the user to make the best use of graphic cards from the different vendors.
Bitlocker is a feature which provides encryption for the internal drives in vista, but it is extended to the external drives in windows 7. This makes backup and restore much easier.
Default settings of User Account have been eliminated, to protect form the unauthorized software to be installed.
Windows 7 has included a new concept, jumplists which organize the recently used files as well as web pages.
More than that, it also allows the user to overcome the clutter in the desktop by introducing three new features Aero Peek, Aero shake and snap.
Home networking has been made much easier than its previous operating systems and is probably safe from hackers.
DISADVANTAGES
Some of the users are not satisfied with the new features, because, they need to buy out additional resources such as RAM, etc to make use of them.It is expensive than the previous Microsoft operating systems.
Some of the users have problems such as; their system hangs after installing Windows 7
If the user has got an HP multifunction printer, and its driver being upgraded to the Windows 7, then the printer doesn’t response to the print commands. So, the user needs to go to the new HP solution Center to resolve this problem.
Windows have specific themes for United Kingdom, Germany, Canada, Japan, South Africa and Australia, if the user is not from the above country and he wish to have a specific theme of his country, he will not get that, hence the user will not satisfied with that feature.
Some of the features like Start Menu user interface, Windows Ultimate Extras, InkBall, Windows Photo Gallery, Windows Movie Maker, Windows Calendar Windows Mail called Windows Live Essentials were included in Vista are removed in Windows 7.
Windows 8.1 (codenamed Blue) is an upgrade version of Windows 8, a version of Windows NT, a computer operating system released by Microsoft. First unveiled and released as a public beta in June 2013, it was released to manufacturing on August 27, 2013, and reached general availability on October 17, 2013, almost a year after the retail release of its predecessor. Windows 8.1 is available free of charge for retail copies of Windows 8 and Windows RT users via the Windows Store.
ADVANTAGES
Modernistic user interface.
Exceptionally fast Operating System.
Improved performance to that of Windows 8.
Improved firewall and security features.
The Windows media center is also improved and supports a wider range of audio-visual file types.
Better networking, connectivity and compatibility to different connections like Bluetooth, Wi-Fi etc.
Minor bugs fixed that were in Windows 8.
DISADVANTAGES
The start screen works better with touch sensitive interface in phones, laptops and desktop monitors. So a common user will find it a bit awkward.
Many preinstalled apps are not used at all and the use up quite some space of your hard disk.
The system requirements are a bit on higher side, so low end PCs will have to wait.
Some settings have been so well organized, new users waste hours searching for them.
Ubuntu is a Debian based Linux operating system and distribution for personal computers, smartphones and network servers. It uses Unity as its default user interface. It is based on free software and named after the Southern African philosophy of ubuntu (literally, "humanness"), which often is translated as "humanity towards others" or "the belief in a universal bond of sharing that connects all humanity".
Development of Ubuntu is led by UK based Canonical Ltd., a company owned by South African entrepreneur Mark Shuttle worth. Canonical generates revenue through the sale of technical support and other services related to Ubuntu.
ADVANTAGES
Ubuntu is one of the most secured operating system and defines the highest level of security as compared other operating system.
Ubuntu is an open source OS.
Ubuntu is most popular Linux operating system.
Most of the soft-wares in Ubuntu are pre-installed to enhance user experience.
It is available free of cost.
1 GHz x 86 processor (Above Pentium 4)
512 MB Ram
5 GB space must be free on hard drive
Graphic card with 800 x 600 resolution
USB port or DVD drive for media installation
DISADVANTAGES
Ubuntu is very conventional to new technologies. You can instead go for Fedora Distro.
It is very perceptive to faults in hardware which makes it less steady as compared to other operating systems.
There is a little hardware support for Ubuntu OS. Some of the users complain that it becomes difficult to configure modem to start work on internet.
It is not possible to play the modern games in Ubuntu OS. It shows the poor graphics quality and ne have to use emulators to do so that harms the graphics quality.
Though Linux (Ubuntu) has number of free applications and software available on net, but most of the applications are not found for Linux use.
Ubuntu is not capable of playing MP3 files by default.
The forum support for Ubuntu is really very poor. It takes weeks and even months to get our query solved.
The installation of Ubuntu is one of the major problems. It does not come installed in modern PCs. One needs to install it by himself.
The drivers support is also absent in most of the cases as compared other operating system.
And finally one more major drawback of Ubuntu is that a user switching from Windows or MAC will not like user experience on Ubuntu and will have difficulty in operating the OS.
Windows XP is a line of OS's produced by Microsoft for use on personal computers, including home and business desktops, notebook computers, and media centers. As of the end of March 2009, Windows XP is the most widely used OS in the World with a 62.85% market share.
Windows XP desktop
ADVANTAGES
It supports most of the hardware without need of external drivers.
It offers good GUI.
Many applications are developed for Windows only.
Windows XP offers universal plug and play features.
The availability of this is very high.
DISADVANTAGES
Security loopholes exit in it. Hence it is easily affected by virus.
Many flaws and bugs are present in it.
It is expensive to purchase.
It is very heavy system and old hardware can’t run it.
No file encryption facility in XP.
It comes with single user license so it can’t be loaded on multiple PCs.
OpenSUSE formerly SUSE Linux and SuSE Linux Professional, is a Linux-based project and distribution sponsored by SUSE Linux GmbH and other companies. It is widely used throughout the world, particularly in Germany. The focus of its development is creating usable open source tools for software developers and system administrators, while providing a user-friendly desktop, and feature-rich server environment.
ADVANTAGES
It is much more secure compare to other OS.
It is user friendly.
openSUSE has a large resource of softwares.
openSUSE has a lot of support forums.
It uses tha YaST control center.
DISADVANTAGES
Lack of application support terminal.
Difficulty in setting the proxy server.
OpenSUSE have bugs.
6. MAC OS X
ADVANTAGES
The people who make Mac software are the same people who make the Mac hardware so it reliable.
You can always get bootcamp which will allow you to install a copy of XP on a partition on your Mac.
It is not popular like windows so it is not more target.
DISADVANTAGES
Many programs that run on windows won’t run on Mac.
If Apple computers became more popular, they would become less secure.
Mac OS is too expensive.
Windows 10 is a personal computer operating system developed and released by Microsoft as part of the Windows NT family of operating systems. It was officially unveiled in September 2014.
The first version of the operating system entered a public beta testing process in October 2014, leading up to its consumer release on July 29, 2015 and its release to volume licensing on August 1, 2015.
Windows 10 desktop
ADVANTAGES
It is easy to use social media sites like Facebook, twitter, It is the latest Windows operating system which features many changes and very eye catchy user interface, It delivers new features on free upgrade.
You can upgrade to Windows 10 free.
Windows 10 will include extended built-in mobile device management ( MDM ) capabilities making it easier to manage device from the cloud.
Windows 10 will be great for gaming , Microsoft is bringing big changes to PC gaming with Windows 10.
Microsoft has added an Xbox app , you can see what your friends are doing and send them messages , check out achievements , and look at game clips , people have pre-recorded.
Windows 10 will include universal Office apps , Microsoft is creating universal Office apps that will be touch-friendly and run on all devices.
Windows 10 will have hologram technology , Microsoft introduced Microsoft Holographic.
DISADVANTAGES
Windows 10 can not upgrade oldest windows versions such as windows 2000 , windows 2001 etc… , there is more cost for new PCs with Windows 10 .
touch friendly features has been removed from windows 10.
there is no update in Windows media player, It is the same as it was earlier.
if you get fed up with testing Windows 10 and want to revert the PC to the OS you were running before , It won’t be easy.
You must understand that installing Windows 10 Technical Preview disables the PC’s ability to play DVDs using Windows Media Player.
ADVANTAGES
Price of a Chromebook is very budget friendly when compared to Windows laptops or Macbooks.
Chrome OS boots at flashing speeds, it just takes only 10 seconds for booting up. This a pretty good point when compared to Windows laptops.
Chrome OS is based on Linux, which means possibility of getting infection is fairly low. Linux offers a virus free environment when compared to Windows which is very high.
Chrome OS can update by itself, means when you boot up it starts with automatic updated version.
Chrome OS built with multiple log in feature, which lets login with different user accounts.
DISADVANTAGES
In Chromebooks optical drives are absent and even they don’t support external optical disks. If you are still using CD/DVD’s Chromebook is not for you.
Chromebooks are not ideal for gaming. It supports games in your browser only in HTML and Flash formats. Chromebook is not meant for serious gamers.
Chrome OS doesn’t have a direct printing option in its OS. For printing you need to use “Cloud Print”.
The storage space of a Chromebook is very less. It normally comes up with 16GB SSD, in that OS consume 6GB remaining 10GB is usable to store your files, documents, pictures and videos.
Chrome OS supports work offline, but the most of your content is stored online which requires a internet connection to access.
FreeBSD is a free Unix like operating system descended from Research Unix via the Berkeley Software Distribution (BSD). Although for legal reasons FreeBSD cannot use the Unix trademark, it is a direct descendant of BSD, which was historically also called "BSD Unix" or "Berkeley Unix". The first version of FreeBSD was released in 1993, and today FreeBSD is the most widely used open-source BSD distribution, accounting for more than three-quarters of all installed systems running open-source BSD derivatives.
ADVANTAGES
The BSDs (Free/Net/Open/Pico) were designed from the ground up around the internet.
FreeBSD has what is easily the most mature TCP/IP stack.
FreeBSD handles heavy loads better than linux.
DISADVANTAGES
Some software (not much, but some) exits which hasn’t been ported to FreeBSD.
It isn’t designed for user friendliness (although with tools like webmin/cpanel etc. You don’t need a user friendly OS).
It is not as common as RedHat, so you’ll have to look a bit harder to find someone who will provide support for it.
Solaris desktop
ADVANTAGES
Reboot is not required for Solaris so it can run 24/7.
It support zfs file system.
It can handle many users at a time.
In Solaris we have many good backup tools.
Fully virus protected.
DISADVANTAGES
This OS is not user friendly.
It is not recommended to run Solaris on other architectures.
Lack of good GUI.
Not a OS for home users.