Best OS for engineering work

[Alexvader2]

Hi Forum Users

I would like to know what do you consider to be the best platform for Engineering work
( design and drafting, simulation, either CAE, CFD, Montecarlo or Heuristic (genetic/evolutive approach )), considering several indexes of merit:

Stability, speed, availability of software, ease of peer review of simulation/design tools, portability of built applications.

Windowze, Linux, Mac OS, PC BSD.

Give me a hint on your experiences either as engineers/designers or as application developers.

Thanks in advance

Alex

[continuum]

I would always recommend Debian stable and CentOS (a RedHat clone). Both are stable and not many updates as other cutting edge distros. Debian has more applications in its repos than centOS. I have tried both and I like them both very much.
Parallel processing is better done in linux, so I am told,

Windows XP is also good if you keep the system very well maintained.