Windows 10 is highly anticipated for a variety\r\nof reasons, including it brings a great deal more sanity to the unmitigated mess of Windows 8, and it does not require a third-party utility to make it usable for a natural (or a classic, depending on who you ask) desktop workflow.
However, the underlying operating system (OS) that a user runs is becoming an\r\nafterthought. The primary focus for many users is on the web — as such, the\r\navailability of browsers and day-to-day productivity software is\r\nmore relevant to end users than the old era of buying boxed software in stores.
This gallery highlights various OSs that are, for most\r\nusers, adequate replacements for Windows 10. Many of the options featured here\r\ncan be used in VirtualBox, if you prefer to give it a spin\r\nwithout dual-booting or formatting your system.
Also read:Windows 10 review: Full of promise, but not a must-have just yet
El Capitan is a beta product — though, in general, OS X\r\nis still the biggest commercial competitor to Windows. For the most part, it\r\nmakes more sense if you already have or plan to buy other Apple products.
In comparison to the current release (Yosemite), El Capitan\r\nchanges the system font to the San\r\nFrancisco typeface used in the Apple Watch and the upcoming iOS 9. El\r\nCapitan also brings support for snapping two windows side-by-side, a feature\r\nother OSs have had for years.
Also new in this release is improved display support for Chinese and Japanese, and an improved Japanese IME (Input method editor). The IME allows the user to write in Japanese by typing phonetically (in Hiragana), and generates the correct Kanji without user intervention by using frequency and context-sensitive clues to determine the correct Kanji.
Killer feature: HiDPI (“Retina”) display support is more mature\r\nthan what’s available with other OSs.
Price: Free upgrade, though using OS X\r\nrequires Apple hardware, which starts at $499 for the Mac Mini.
Ubuntu\r\nremains the most visible Linux distribution for people not necessarily\r\npredisposed to installing a different OS. The Unity interface\r\nrequires some level of adjustment compared to Windows, though the name Unity is\r\nat least accurate in regard to presentation — the system behavior is\r\nreasonably well thought-out, and is uniform across applications.
Ubuntu, like other Linux distributions, has native versions of\r\npopular open-source software, such as Firefox and LibreOffice, which are installed by default; offerings that can be installed by the user include VLC Media Player, Pidgin instant messenger, FileZilla, and Audacity. Additionally, closed-source\r\nproducts such as Google Chrome, Skype, Trillian, Steam, Dropbox, and TeamViewer\r\nare also available.
Of note, Ubuntu Kylin, the derivative intended for\r\nChinese users, includes a preconfigured IME and an additional migration\r\nassistant for people switching from Windows, as well as Kingsoft WPS Office in\r\nplace of LibreOffice, as that product is more popular there.
Killer feature: It’s a good entry point for people who don’t\r\nhave prior Linux experience.
Price: Free
Kubuntu\r\nis the first distribution to ship version 5 of KDE Plasma, an alternative desktop environment\r\nwith much improved HiDPI support, and a more modern visual style compared to\r\nprevious releases. Like Ubuntu and other Linux distributions, it has native\r\nversions of various popular open-source and proprietary software.
Killer feature: It’s the de-facto flagship distribution for\r\nKDE, setting it ahead of competing distributions that still include KDE Plasma\r\n4.
Price: Free
Fedora is the flagship distribution for the GNOME desktop environment. Fedora releases serve as\r\nthe basis of Red Hat Enterprise Linux, and a significant\r\namount of the development work on Fedora is done by Red Hat employees. Consequently, Fedora uses more recent versions of the Linux kernel than other distributions. This strikes a balance between having advanced support for newer hardware (compared to Ubuntu), but with greater stability compared to bleeding edge / rolling release distributions such as Arch Linux.
Compared to Ubuntu, the Fedora project has a much stricter\r\npolicy about the use of non-free code in official repositories for software\r\nsuch as audio/video codecs and proprietary programs such as Flash, Java,\r\nGoogle Chrome, and Skype. These can be added with relative ease using the\r\nthird-party Fedy\r\nutility.
Killer feature: Being the de-facto flagship distribution for\r\nGNOME, it provides the most mature HiDPI support among Linux distributions.
Price: Free
Haiku is an open-source implementation of BeOS, which was the\r\nfirst OS designed for symmetric\r\nmultiprocessing and preemptive multitasking. Haiku is named for the peculiar error\r\nmessages from the default browser in BeOS.
The Haiku project is the\r\nmost feature-complete original OS targeted toward general users\r\nthat is not related to the Windows, Linux, or OS X / BSD family. While still in\r\nAlpha territory, it’s generally stable enough to browse the web, listen to\r\nmusic, and do other basic tasks.
Killer feature: Super light-weight, and it doesn’t require much in the\r\nway of system resources, making it a good choice for migrating on older\r\nsystems.
Price: Free
eComStation 2.2 is scheduled for release in October 2015 from the\r\nnew developer XEU, which has taken over from Mensys BV, the previous maintainer\r\nof the project. eComStation is the successor to IBM’s OS/2, with updated driver\r\nsupport and current software packages such as Firefox and Apache\r\nOpenOffice.org. Despite the relative age of OS/2, it still has vibrant community support.
Killer feature: Full binary compatibility for Win16\r\napplications (this is better than the compatibility in Windows).
Price: $145 for the Home/Student edition.
Google’s Chrome OS has slowly added more and more\r\npackaged applications, making Chromebooks much more than the internet appliance they started as. Apps can be added\r\nthrough the Chrome web store, and partial support for Android apps is available\r\nthrough the App Runtime for Chrome (ARC).
Chrome OS lacks\r\nthe ability to do very specific things that traditional desktop OSs can, such as burning CDs or DVDs, though the frequency with which this\r\nis a common task is far less than it was 10 years ago.
Killer feature: Extremely hardened security makes the prospect\r\nof viruses on Chrome OS less likely.
Price: Free, though it is only available on Chrome-branded hardware from various OEMs, starting at\r\n$149. This makes it a prospect of purchasing new hardware, instead of an in-place software\r\nupgrade.
Remix OS from Jide, a startup founded by ex-Google\r\nengineers, takes Android 5.0 (Lollipop) and gives it a productivity-minded\r\ndesktop feel, with proper windowing support and multitasking. Remix OS ships\r\nwith the Jide Ultratablet, and ROM images are available\r\nfor the Nexus 10 tablet. Jide has also launched a Kickstarter for the Remix Mini,\r\nwhich brings the OS to desktop users.
Killer feature: Proper windowing for Android, with support for\r\nMicrosoft Office.
Price: Free, though it only runs on specific ARM hardware either\r\nfrom Jide or the Nexus 10. A ROM for the Nexus 9 is planned for a future\r\nversion.
The Solus OS is a new Linux distribution that is targeted for desktop users. It includes the Budgie\r\ndesktop, which is designed for this distribution. Like Ubuntu, it adds a\r\ndifferent interface to the existing GNOME software stack, and like Ubuntu, it has a well thought-out,\r\nconsistent user interface. Solus is still in beta.
Killer feature: A new, minimalist interface intended for and\r\ntargeted to desktop users.
Price: Free, though they are\r\nsoliciting donations via Patreon.
James Sanders is an analyst for 451 Research. He was formerly a Staff Technology Writer for TechRepublic.
