My eyes have been so glazed over with mac awe lately that I pretty much quit using anything except for the mac book at home.

My main disappointments when using Ubuntu or any other Linux system is not having some of the applications I like the most (textmate, aperture, photoshop).

Both are easily managed from the GUI. This has never been the case previously for Linux distros where the GUI configuration tools were to fragil, specific, or only for actual GUI stuff rather than system. I’m tempted to say that Ubuntu is more easily managed from the console, but this is probably just because I know more about the linux system and its components.

With Ubuntu you get a much better package management system. Having apt-get to install, keep updated, and manage is far more powerful then the quad application package management for serious mac os x users:

1. OS managed packages covering core os packages, updates to apple software, and the system and open source components that they manage.
2. Packages that you download and install manually and keep update manually.
3. mac ports to install and manage software
4. fink to install and manage software

Having apt-get as your key to almost every application you’ll need is a big plus with minimal drawbacks.

Also, some packages like mysql and postgres are easier to install and manage on Ubuntu.

In the end I think OSX still provides a cleaner end to end user experience for everyone from the beginner to the pro. My biggest thing now days is a system that is stable and requires extremely little maintenance since my priorities now are for the most part removed from the system that I am using. I feel that you get this with both Ubuntu and OSX.