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It should be noted that the core components of Darwin are open source, and available via the Apple Source license, however, key drivers to hardware are _not_ available as open, even though a base functioning computer would require them.
The Broadcom chipset is a mess for free software in general, so I'll exempt the Airport Extreme.
However, the freaking KEYBOARD driver for laptops is closed. So is the graphics chipset. So is the MOUSE. (Likely anything that is ADB based).
I'm running Gentoo Linux on my Aluminum Powerbook, and it's (as many have mentioned before) "does eveything I need it to do". I'm mainly a software developer, but I do all those things "normal people" do: movies, music, photos, text editting and word processing, etc.
I did use OS X on a different powerbook from 10.0 though 10.3, dual boot install with an LFS Linux install. OS X always felt, fwiw, slower than the LFS install, however, obviously, I didn't have that Aqua interface on the Linux side. I am quite indiffernt to the Aqua interface in general, as it did some neat flashy things, but to change the blindly white theme to something more gentle on my eyes required closed, 3rd party software, that (again, fwiw) likely violates any sense of a warranty one has (not that any software vendor actually cares about that ;-))
For a mobile user, I'll say one thing that's a plus for Apple Hardware (running any OS worth it's salt): sleep. Compared to PC laptops, sleep on Apple hardware is basically instantaneous. For me, it's a make or break feature, as I travel around for work somewhat. OSX and Linux support sleep in my old powerbook and my new aluminum powerbook (it should be noted to be fair that the for the newest aluminum powerbooks sleep under Linux is somewhat newly supported [well]).
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