But everytime I want to do something slightly interesting on our linux boxes, I'm thwarted by everything being so damn out of date on RHEL.
I can't run Sublime Text2, which irritates me, but worse I was wanting to use node-webkit for an experimental project and I can't even run that.
I'm more devops than sysadmin, so more expertise may have changed my experience, but when I did run a CentOS server, I thought, "yay, this is great"... until it came time to actually update.
Then, I realized that I had simply been accumulating up all of my upgrade pain as debt - with compound interest.
By comparison, upgrading Debian servers from version to version felt like hopping from bed to bed in a mattress store. Aside from a missed footing or two, it was usually a nice soft landing.
This is a huge downside for me. I worked for a remove server management company, and every time I had to work on a new (to us) RHEL4 or RHEL5 server (or CentOS equivalent), it was like pulling teeth. In order to run half the software our clients needed, I had to compile newer versions of daemons, create our own RPM packages, patch and recompile code. RHEL5 didn't even include memcached for crying out loud!
For 'enterprise deployments' I can understand wanting to go with RHEL if you don't know much about server administration and want to make it 'easier' on yourself, but even for basic web apps, most of the software you'll want to use is absent, out-of-date, or incompatible. I can't imagine anyone working for a startup wanting to use it.
In comparison, I think "sarge" was the stable Debian in 2005. "sarge" is no longer oldstable- nor is etch. oldstable is "lenny", released in 2009.
Don't get me wrong, I like Debian, but when you compare "ease of upgrading", don't forget to consider "need to upgrade"!