Web Hosting Talk : Web Hosting Main Forums : Hosting Software and Control Panels : What are the advantages and disadvantages of FreeBSD and RedHat?

[simon]

Hello!

Can you please list the advantages and disadvantages of FreeBSD and RedHat?

And what OS is easier to use, what are the differences and similarities?

thank you!
Simon.

[cperciva]

Advantages of Redhat:
1. Lots of people use it.
2. Everyone makes sure that their software works on Redhat.
3. It is designed to be easy to use.

Disadvantages of Redhat:
1. It has a long history of security holes.
2. It isn't designed for remote management.
3. Like all flavors of linux, it has large portions of code which were written sloppily several years ago but don't get replaced because they are "good enough".

Advantages of FreeBSD:
1. The BSDs (Free/Net/Open/Pico) were designed from the ground up around the internet.
2. FreeBSD has what is easily the most mature TCP/IP stack.
3. FreeBSD handles heavy loads better than linux.

Disadvantages of FreeBSD:
1. Some software (not much, but some) exists which hasn't been ported to FreeBSD.
2. It isn't designed for user friendlyness (although with tools like webmin/cpanel/etc. you don't need a user friendly OS).
3. 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.

[dektong]

I have always wondered the same ... thx, cperciva!

Wow... seems like FreeBSD 'disadvantages' are no real 'disadvantages' after all! Wonder why few hosts offer it? come on... user friendly is nothing when it comes to server environment, isn't it?

cheers,

[simon]

Thank you very much cperciva!

[cperciva]

Originally posted by dektong
Wow... seems like FreeBSD 'disadvantages' are no real 'disadvantages' after all! Wonder why few hosts offer it?

My guess is that the hosts which don't offer FreeBSD but do offer linux are mostly the same ones as got caught up in the linux/open source/dot-com madness of 1999-2000.

For use on desktop PCs, linux does have advantages... it is easier to configure for newbies, and redhat provides a much more windows-like installation than freeBSD does. But for servers, I really don't understand why anyone would choose to use Redhat.

[simon]

On plesk.com I´ve seen some other OS like BSDI, Slackware and TorboLinux.
Is BSDI like the full version of FreeBSD or are these two totally different OS?

Are plesk or the smarthosting(tools.com) controller, or cpanel3 / webhostmanager (cpanel.net) much easier to use / more comfortable than the Cobalt Linux cp?

thank you.

[cperciva]

BSDI is a different (archaic) flavour of FreeBSD. AFAIK nobody uses it anymore except on really old systems.
Slackware and Turbolinux are flavours of linux.

[cbaker17]

The newest version of Plesk will only work on RedHat 6.2 & 7.0 and FreeBSD 4.x.

and you def. want the newest version it has the bind fix...

[simon]

thank you cperciva!

[nopzor]

I think saying that FreeBSD has the most mature TCP/IP stack isn't neccesarily true.

The Linux kernel 2.4.x probably has a better stack. Even the most hard core FreeBSD advocate would probably admit that Linux 2.4.x is now in the same league as FreeBSD when comparing the TCP/IP stack.

Most of the recent exploits haven't been Linux or FreeBSD specific, but rather with the software that both OS's run pretty commonly.

[MattF]

There is a lot of fuss about FreeBSD being insecure and delays in patches being released (from what I've read anyway). A lot of people recommend OpenBSD in preference to FreeBSD, OpenBSD is apparently much more secure. There's also NetBSD as well.

Another OS which receives little mention is Sun Solaris x86. Solaris is very good operating system, extremely good threading model and very stable. It's not free but around $99.

[simon]

tnx.
is a program supported by FreeBSD also supported by OpenBSD or NetBSD?

is Sun Solaris x86 based on UNIX?
why is nobody using SSx86 then?

[cperciva]

OpenBSD is unquestionably the most secure operating system generally available (I'm ignoring QNX derivatives and suchlike that nobody ever uses.)

However, it is made secure by a process of auditing code before it gets used. And that takes a long time. Which means that there are many pieces of hardware which OpenBSD doesn't support (including multiple processors), the API calls are limited, and generally OpenBSD is very restrictive in what it allows you to do.

OpenBSD is great -- if it meets your needs. If you need more power than OpenBSD provides, use FreeBSD.

To summarize:

FreeBSD: The power to serve.
OpenBSD: Secure by default.
NetBSD: IP-over-anything.

oh, and while I'm here:

Windows: Where do you want to go today?
Linux: Where do you want to go tomorrow?
BSD: Are you guys coming or what?

[nopzor]

I'd just like to add that if you're used to software availability with Linux, be prepared to suffer with OpenBSD. Getting things to run just right is much trickier (although there is a ports system).

That being said, nothing makes a better and more firewall than OpenBSD (although I haven't really gotten a chance to play around with the new IPchains that come with Linux 2.4)

Later,