Please, I hope this is NOT a no-brainer discussion.
I would like to know if any those IC power house is running Windows based EDA for their IC/SoC design.
I do know that most EDA tool (except Synopsys notably) supports multi-platform tool.
I am Windows power user and have been using EDA tools on Windows since 1996. Besides it is easier to find license for these tools on Windows. Most IC design that I have been involved in were FPGA based (Virtex-II pro, Stratix-gx)
Do you think that I should give up my Windows user friendly tools and migrate to Linux (lots of typing, typing, typing.....)?
Yeah, i'd suggest you to at the very least, give the UNIX/LINUX environment a chance and see whether the migration is worth it.
One thing is for certain though: most of the Appz (especially the latest ones), are said to work explicitly under the different UNIX/LINUX, etc distributables and don't support the Windows platform at all!
Windows is noticably more user-friendly but you should try linux/unix environment. You would certainly be amazed by its stability & as you get accustomed to it, you would certainly be satisfied!
If you notice, most EDA vendors are looking at Linux environment now as it saves up alot of cost on hardware. If you migrate to linux environment, it's more cost-efficient & it would certainly speed-up your works.
Till now, there isn't any IC power house which is using windows environment.