I currently have a 1.25Ghz G4 Mac Mini, and I have been thinking about moving to MBP in the first half of 2007. My question is related to the CPU. We all know that C2D mops the floor with the G4. But how much faster is it, really? Is it faster, clock-for-clock? If so, how much so? If I moved from single-core 1.25Ghz G4 to dual-core C2D running at around 2.33Ghz, how much more CPU-power would I have at my disposal? 3-4 times as much?
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Core 2 Duo vs. G4: how much faster is it?
- Thread starter Evangelion
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dukebound85
macrumors Core
all i know is i have an excel file that uses iterative calculations for a heat trasfer approximation and the results are from this file
with 3000 iterations and same settings
400mhz G3 imac 256mb ram tiger(and yes tiger IS useable)
~4min 33sec in excel v.x
1ghz G4 emac 512mb ram tiger:
~1min 47 sec using excel v.x
2ghz pentium M sony viao 1gig ram windows xp
~6sec using excel 2003
2ghz cd blackbook 1.5gb ram tiger:
~1min 16sec in rosetta using excel v.x
<3 sec while in bootcamp using excel 2003
I wish rosetta was quite a bit faster than that since 3 sec is quite amazing
clevin
macrumors G3
there is few data compare C2D and ppc G4
its hard to find clock-for-clock comparison, in these two different system, clock speed can't be compare directly
excel's result above probably more decide by memory than CPU.
only thing i can find is this.
http://www.anandtech.com/showdoc.aspx?i=2685&p=13
its G5 vs. CD, clock for clock, almost.
cant really tell C2D and G4, but 4 times faster might be exaggerated.
some ppl say its 50% improvement from G4 to C2D
http://www.engadget.com/2006/10/24/macbook-pros-go-core-2-duo-at-last/
its hard to find clock-for-clock comparison, in these two different system, clock speed can't be compare directly
excel's result above probably more decide by memory than CPU.
only thing i can find is this.
http://www.anandtech.com/showdoc.aspx?i=2685&p=13
its G5 vs. CD, clock for clock, almost.
cant really tell C2D and G4, but 4 times faster might be exaggerated.
some ppl say its 50% improvement from G4 to C2D
http://www.engadget.com/2006/10/24/macbook-pros-go-core-2-duo-at-last/
Thanatoast
macrumors 65816
dukebound85
macrumors Core
True but what good are clock for clock when only the performance output matters.
I agree 4 times faster is exaggerated but depends what you are doing. things like the internet and stuff i can't really tell the difference too much but definitly can with handbrake for example.
with my emac always got like 11fps with my blackbook its around 50-60fps on the average id say
clevin
macrumors G3
most CPU heavy work i can think of is decoding and encoding of video, which is the pics i cited above.
dukebound85
macrumors Core
good point yet i know alot more people that deal heavily in excel and not video as well. depends what field you are in
iPhil
macrumors 68040
But dukebound85 is giving you actual number/spec for a job
To the OP its 3-4 times faster depending on app. if the app is uni-binary or not ..
If the apps that you want to run on the intel chip via mac, make sure there uni-binary because if not then you'll take a 15% to 20% performance hit using rosetta for the app to run
I meant that 2.33Ghz C2D might be about 4 times as fast as 1.25Ghz G4. If it were only 50% faster, I would be REALLY disappointed 😉.
Depending on what you do, it'll be a lot faster than that.
Remember - we're talking about a totally different chip architecture here, in addition to everything else.
But, it depends on what you're doing. My main PC (yeah, yeah, I know, I know) is a Dell Core 2 Duo notebook and, for something like just running Windows, it isn't appreciably faster than my previous PC - an older Celeron M. But for things like DVD ripping/encoding, playing games, and so forth, it's amazingly faster.
Indeed, the main bottlenecks here are other parts.
JD92
macrumors 6502a
Remember that programs which deal with BIG numbers like video and audio encoding could receive a BIG boost with Leopard due to it supporting the C2D's 64bit capabilities in Cocoa apps, which is something the G4 can't do.
EDIT: As long as you run a 64bit version of the software, of course.
EDIT: As long as you run a 64bit version of the software, of course.