Unfortunately problems are quite often very much software-related as well as hardware-related.

In bare-bones configurations, Windows generally does relatively well.

Put the system under a load of software, resident processes, and hardware I/O though, and throw in driver software from vendors who could care less whether it crashes every 12 hours, and you've got one hell of a witches' brew.

The simple fact of the matter is that Windows is huge. More code = more bugs, any way you slice it.

MS don't care about stability or bugs, they care about adding more features as fast as possible to drive the market to produce more money for them. This is the rule commercial software has proven time and time again; you can sell features, but you can't sell quality.

Linux and BeOS OTOH (in a desktop comparison) are designed for stability and reliability ESPECIALLY in high-load/demand situations. However, their development time has been longer than Windows and features added slower, so Joe Consumer isn't really about to jump on the boat for either.

MS software is all about (commercial-oriented) features. Linux and Be are all about proper design.

It's a simple choice, no reason to yell and scream for one or the other, or hate MS, or say Linux/Be sucks because you can't play Starcraft.

You want the latest gadgets and features, go MS. You want mission-critical stability and a reliable system, go elsewhere.

Personally I choose the latter, but I tire of the 'who's better' debate for operating systems. Use what works for you. That's what a OS is for. To -work for you-, not get in your way. If Windows crashes too much, use something designed for stability instead. If there's no software you can use for Linux, go Windows and buy a commercial package for whatever you need.

Whatever it takes for you to operate, should be your operating system.

I operate best at a commandline with a keyboard. DOS box is always open under windows, and I know and use nearly every shell keyboard shortcut. Naturally with linux i'm at home in a console.

It doesn't matter though, even the most stable of Windows systems will be rebooted on a weekly basis. This is unacceptable for development work so we do our testing elsewhere obviously.