Even as a fairly new Linux user, I always receive the comment "Why do you use Linux". A lot of my friends think it's the worst operating system in the world. "It's so hard to use","You can't do anything on it", "It doesn't support any hardware" they say. The truth is; I don't know why I use it, I just love it. The fact is, it's faster, free and 99% of the applications made for it are open source. It looks better, I find it more compatible and if you program at all you will most probably find it 10 times better than any other operating system. Don't get me wrong, I like Microsoft Operating Systems (I have never been into Macs.... Bit of a ripoff in my opinion). I still use Windows to play all my games and do all my word processing. Sure there's wine (a Windows file system and registry emulator) but i just prefer to do those things on Windows. As for browsing, I don't care what OS I'm using, they both have IM clients and they both have my two favorite browsers (Chrome and Firefox). I get annoyed when people say they hate Windows, it's not a bad OS. It's probably the most user friendly OS available. People need to stop saying it's crap.

As for the question which one is better; I have to say Linux but only because of the applications i run. If I were a pro gamer, I would use Windows. If I was a hobby programmer, I would use Linux. It's as simple as that.