There's a few things about virtual desktops on OS X (the OS I use at work) that just absolutely kill them for me:
1. OS X will re-order keyboard inputs when the inputs contain virtual desktop commands. That is, if you have two terminals open, one in one desktop, and one in another, and you type ^→¹ "hi", where "hi" ends up depends on how quickly you type the command. If you know the desktop on the right has a terminal, and you know what you want to run in that terminal, you have to switch, wait for the animation to complete, and then type the command; it's an artificial limitation on your speed.
2. OS X will re-order desktops. Which means I never know where, in this virtual space, the desktop I'm seeking is. The latest version of OS X made this even more annoying, because now if you do an exposé, you don't get thumbnails by default, so you can't even see where the desktop might have gotten moved to. (You have to grab the mouse and hover over the darn things.)
Compare this to the rather simplistic multidesktop functionality in MATE: desktops don't move. The switch is instant and keyboard input order is maintained. The space is 3D, not 2D. There are small thumbnails in your tray. (I could wish for some things from MATE, in particular, I don't know how/if it's possible to reorder whole desktops.)
[1]: (change to desktop to the right)
(Also, OS X will occasionally just get stuck in the middle of a desktop switch. As in, I'll have no hands on the mouse/keyboard, and I'll be looking at the left half of one desktop and the right half of another.)
Edit: I forgot 3. OS X will combine desktops if the set of attached displays changes. I really wish I could have it just move the desktops to the laptop, not combine them. (Also, I really wish that when the external display was reattached, that the windows would restore the size and layout they had; as it is, today they all get resized to the size of the smaller laptop screen — which makes sense while they're there, but once the external is back, I want the sizes back too.) I have no idea how MATE compares here.