Other OS and the PS3

[Sneaky llama]

Can someone please explain to me why you would change the OS? Sorry if i'm being stupid I'm not that great with computers, but why would you put a secondary os on the PS3? it's for playing games on. Wouldn't changing the os mean it wouldn't do it's original function?
EDIT never mind i just discovered that you could partition and choose the reguired os.
Could you delete this please

 

[migo]

Even if you couldn't partition the system, the cell processor was insanely powerful when the PS3 came out, and still is incredibly powerful today.

 

[Wolfram23]

Yeah it's a pretty good CPU, even if the graphics "card" is low powered (7800GT ish?).

I know the american military - Navy? - use them in a bank for a supercomputer because it's way cheaper than buying Intel lol.

Plus, XMB kinda sucks so if you wanted you could use the PS3 as a home PC with Ubuntu or Linux and exploit all kinds of great features. Use a bluetooth mouse and keyboard... it would be a pretty decent little unit. And at $299 or whatever they are right now, let's be honest, you can't get any game worthy PC for THAT little (~$500 for entry level PC gaming).