You don't have to spend a lot of time customizing the desktop. It works fine out of the box. The difference is that you have an option to customize the desktop and are not locked in.
In any case, customizing one's computer teaches useful tech skills. I've solved many problems that better programmers couldn't solve, because they didn't know basic unix stuff.
totally agree knowing unix stuff is really handy, but mac has all that stuff there too. all it's missing is X and custom window managers (and you can even run that, if you really want to).
In any case, customizing one's computer teaches useful tech skills. I've solved many problems that better programmers couldn't solve, because they didn't know basic unix stuff.