Cassandra runs just fine on almost any recent version of Linux. Ubuntu and CentOS are among the most popular chosen flavors of Linux. Make sure to use the latest, full-patched version of your desired Linux flavor to ensure that Cassandra will run optimally.
On Linux, you should adjust the following lines in your /etc/security/limits.conf configuration file:
* - memlock unlimited * - nofile 100000 * - nproc 32768 * - as unlimited
Cassandra is officially supported (by several third-party companies) in production as of version 3 on Windows. Be aware that there were several bugs that had to be fixed before Cassandra could work properly on Windows. Running Cassandra on Windows is still a very new thing, and is not recommended. Your best chance for building a successful, high-performing Cassandra cluster is to run it on Linux.