Stirring the turd : Some tests of processors are in order...

[Seanb23]

Http://www.scientificweb.de/mathstef3.html

I've said it before, and I'll say it again. I prefer OS X hands down to XP any day of the week, but it's looking more and more like Moto and now IBM have been laughing all the way to the bank as they take Apple's money and sleep on the job. I'm p*ssed, in other words, that my $3300 laptop cannot handle the exact same complex audio programs that high-end peecee laptops costing less compute with ease. Yes, XP is unstable. Yes, pipeline. Yes, viruses. Etc. Etc. Etc. I DID buy an outrageously expensive powerbook to re-join this camp in the first place, OK ? But this is halfway through 2004, and, well, I've seen the enemy artillery with mine own eyes, in my own house even...

Wake up and smell the burnt rubber, Apple. I found this link from the end of 2003, among many others, with a few minutes of google. Anyone have anything else they have found in the past year or so ? No links to grand descriptions of university superclusters, no links to old MHz Myth speeches from, what, 2001 ? No platform wars, no irrelevancies about Explorer vs Safari vs Firefox...just some raw modern benchmarks.

Yessiree, modern benchmarks only. Let's put our favorite computer company's feet to the fire of the competition. Some, um, Mac rumors have it that even Steve himself uses a lot of profanity when this topic comes around. Good.

[shecky]

i agree.

however i look at it this way, PC's are faster, PC's are cheaper..... but Apple is still better, for basically every other reason.

[cluthz]

Anyway, none of the fastest macs are represented..
Fastest pm is single 1.8 ghz, fastest pb is 1ghz 17".

-tb

[iNetwork]

Well now that the cat is out of the bag. PC's are faster--specifically AMD. If it's raw processing power you want the PC is a year or 2 advanced of the PPC arean. It's a good, easy platform, but it's not FAST!. I think when I get back home I'm going to compile matching Linux kernels on a PC and for different Macs and do some benchies... :) Finally someone to stir the turd!

[Rabidjade]

As I said in another thread, you just can't compare the two. Why? Baseline speed is based on software, which is written to perform on certain platforms. Software written for PC's has to take in account of thousands or even millions of variations of hardware and 3rd party software that might have to run along side of it. Software written for Apple computers runs at a faster speed because it’s designed to run on 1 platform only, an Apple. PC software has to be open to run on Intel, AMD, Cyrix/VIA, and the other smaller processor companies who still make processors. There are a lot of different shoes to fill when writing code for these platforms. More code=slower access times=slow computer. PC has its ups and downs, as does Apple but no matter what the media hype is, they don't replace each other, period. Most sites I found are biased towards one side and leave critical facts out to debunk their claims. Can't compare apples and oranges. Those who bash XP don't know how to run it, been using it since the beginning and only had errors that were either my fault or bad hardware. You can blame the OS for the viruses and other bad things that can happen but that is mostly based on the user and the precautions they have to take. Because you hate something enough to make it bad, doesn't mean it is bad.

[Sun Baked]

If you really think cheap is better, then you shall have it the day Wal-Mart drive MicroSoft and Dell out of business.

Who needs Gucci style and price when you can have Sam's quality products everywhere in your life.

[crazzyeddie]

That little list is hardly what I would call a "scientific" test. The test can be run on Mathematica 4 or higher, so right off the bat you have multiple versions of the app being tested. Then, I see nothing in there saying that Dual processor Macs were used for testing. The xServe and G5 could both be single processor, not to mention the 700mhz difference between that 1.8ghz and the current 2.5ghz. After even more analysis, it appears that both the Xserve and G5 ARE the single processor models.

Additionally, I just noticed that different versions of OS'es are allowed (Win 2000, XP Pro, Linux, etc...). Plus, there is no way that a 1.7ghz P4 can be faster than a 1.8ghz G5 unless a version of Mathematica was used that had no G5 optimization. This test is crap.

[crazzyeddie]

If you want some fair benchmarks with specific versions of apps and dual processor Macs, try this page. (http://barefeats.com/g5op.html)

[James L]

Http://www.scientificweb.de/mathstef3.html

I've said it before, and I'll say it again. I prefer OS X hands down to XP any day of the week, but it's looking more and more like Moto and now IBM have been laughing all the way to the bank as they take Apple's money and sleep on the job. I'm p*ssed, in other words, that my $3300 laptop cannot handle the exact same complex audio programs that high-end peecee laptops costing less compute with ease. Yes, XP is unstable. Yes, pipeline. Yes, viruses. Etc. Etc. Etc. I DID buy an outrageously expensive powerbook to re-join this camp in the first place, OK ? But this is halfway through 2004, and, well, I've seen the enemy artillery with mine own eyes, in my own house even...

Wake up and smell the burnt rubber, Apple. I found this link from the end of 2003, among many others, with a few minutes of google. Anyone have anything else they have found in the past year or so ? No links to grand descriptions of university superclusters, no links to old MHz Myth speeches from, what, 2001 ? No platform wars, no irrelevancies about Explorer vs Safari vs Firefox...just some raw modern benchmarks.

Yessiree, modern benchmarks only. Let's put our favorite computer company's feet to the fire of the competition. Some, um, Mac rumors have it that even Steve himself uses a lot of profanity when this topic comes around. Good.


There is nothing new here, I am sure Apple is quite aware of the speed differences between the various chip manufactuers.

The choice is simple, if you prefer to work in the OSX environment, you buy a Mac. If you think you can work, or peform, better in a different OS or on a different platform then you buy that.

I love my Macs, and have been a Mac user since 1986 or so, but I don't have blinders on at all... there is a LOT of PC hardware out there that kicks Apples butt. Do I get mad about it... nope. I am an educated consumer and buy what works best for me. To date that has always been Apple. If I ever thought a PC would serve me better I would probably buy one.

Don't stress about your machine, or that other machines are faster. You can collect all the benchmarks in the world showing that PC's are faster, and all it is going to do is stress you out more. Shop around, buy what you are most comfortable with, and enjoy!

Cheers,

James - 18 year Mac user

[Mord]

dude those benchmarks are flawed, i bet that 1.8GHz g5 had a nvidia 5200 which is pure crap

we need some fair benchmarks between macs and pc's

i'd like to see some 3d rendering tests with maya, some photoshop tests, some audio tests when both platforms use the same app the same with video editing.

i'd like to see equal amonts of ram both systems with the same gpu (preferabley a 9800xt or a 6800u) both with the same HD and the same speed ram, make the comarison to just test the difference in cpu with both systems running debian or mandrake linux

that would be the ultimate benchmark.

i'd like to see a 15" 1.5GHz powerbook vs 2.0GHz pantium m

i'd like to see a dual 2.5GHz g5 vs a dual opteron a quad opteron and a dual xeon and maby a p4 3.4 ee.

[justinshiding]

This test is crap.


Yup.

It actually wouldnt matter even if they were dual processors...mathmatica has zero support for multiple cpus. They actually used it as a benchmark in an issue of maximum pc a few months back, zero percent increase when using a dual cpu machine.

You know...for all of these supposed benchmarks are supposed to report they really seem kind of pointless. I would say that the subjective appearence of speed is more important.

example: my computer is an althon 700mhz w/384mb ram, my friend has a celeron 2.x ghz w/128 megs of ram which is cluttered with all sorts of spyware, and programs that load that shouldnt need to (both running xp pro). my computer feels faster in day to day usage... subjectively it feels faster most of the time. That's what i've noticed about the macs I've used(mostly at school) that they arent faster than pcs but they feel more responsive. They have a feeling of snappiness. You click something it happens. I realize there would be great differences in their benchmarks of the machines mentioned above, but I wouldnt take that celeronfor anything.

(yes i realize it isnt all that fair to compare an althon to a celeron..and the ram difference too)

What're you going to do with all of that speed anyways ? Unless you're going to be gaming or doing something very cpu oriented then you probably dont need all that extra power.

[tomf87]

There is nothing new here, I am sure Apple is quite aware of the speed differences between the various chip manufactuers.

The choice is simple, if you prefer to work in the OSX environment, you buy a Mac. If you think you can work, or peform, better in a different OS or on a different platform then you buy that.

I love my Macs, and have been a Mac user since 1986 or so, but I don't have blinders on at all... there is a LOT of PC hardware out there that kicks Apples butt. Do I get mad about it... nope. I am an educated consumer and buy what works best for me. To date that has always been Apple. If I ever thought a PC would serve me better I would probably buy one.

Don't stress about your machine, or that other machines are faster. You can collect all the benchmarks in the world showing that PC's are faster, and all it is going to do is stress you out more. Shop around, buy what you are most comfortable with, and enjoy!

Cheers,

James - 18 year Mac user

I have to say this has been the best post I have ever seen in a PC vs Mac speed test. You can find benchmarks all over that say the Mac is better or the PC is better. I agree with James. Buy what fits the bill. I have a 17" PB and it works for me, and I couldn't care less how fast PC's are. I enjoy my Mac life because it works for me.

[jrober]

I like this thread, absoloutely true "whatever floats your boat" I couldn't agree more.

However:

If people are always comparing speeds how should we do it. Here in Europe we have the Euro NCAP car safety tests. At first manufacturers complained that these this was not fair and that test is flawed, but fact is consumers now look to these to tell them how safe their current and crucially their next car one is. Manufacturers now work hard to produce the best car based on these scores and as a result consumers have a clearer choice.

So how would we do a similar test on how fast a computer is? One which consumers could have confidence in and would not contest with discussions about which card was used or whether the spotlights on the front affected the result.

Over to you?

[kettle]

However:

If people are always comparing speeds how should we do it. Here in Europe we have the Euro NCAP car safety tests. At first manufacturers complained that these this was not fair and that test is flawed, but fact is consumers now look to these to tell them how safe their current and crucially their next car one is. Manufacturers now work hard to produce the best car based on these scores and as a result consumers have a clearer choice.

So how would we do a similar test on how fast a computer is? One which consumers could have confidence in and would not contest with discussions about which card was used or whether the spotlights on the front affected the result.

Over to you?

That NCAP Crash Test is a complete red herring to the chip speed problem.
Now, if you had a load of customers complaining about durability of their machines, then maybe we could devise a fair tenth floor window test. :)

meanwhile, back to the real problem....

[MisterMe]

....

If people are always comparing speeds how should we do it. Here in Europe we have the Euro NCAP car safety tests. At first manufacturers complained that these this was not fair and that test is flawed, but fact is consumers now look to these to tell them how safe their current and crucially their next car one is. Manufacturers now work hard to produce the best car based on these scores and as a result consumers have a clearer choice.

So how would we do a similar test on how fast a computer is? One which consumers could have confidence in and would not contest with discussions about which card was used or whether the spotlights on the front affected the result.

....What you are describing has already been done and already discredited. The thing about these kinds of benchmarks is that lend themselves to fraud and manipulation. Intel is notorious for this. Intel has compilers whose sole purpose is to run benchmarks. That is to say that these special compilers cannot compile the code for Microsoft Word or the next version of Doom, but it will compile certain benchmarks. One of the tricks is to recognize the code for a particular benchmark and replace the algorithm with the result.

For most of today's computer tasks, the slowest element is the user. No matter how fast the processor, the time required to complete your memo is determined by your secretary's typing speed. Your web surfing performance is limited by your network.

The only benchmarks worth anything are those that simulate your workflow. Anything else is merely a substitute for thinking.

[NusuniAdmin]

For most of today's computer tasks, the slowest element is the user. No matter how fast the processor, the time required to complete your memo is determined by your secretary's typing speed. Your web surfing performance is limited by your network.


that will be true until we get computers that can read human brains....human brains are still the fastest computers ever :p

[patrick0brien]

-All

Love the "Stir the Turd" metaphor - I'm stealing that.

Here's a little camparo - from a user perspective. I just finished a huge rendering project for a video using Electic Image - touted to have the "Fastest Rendered on the Market".

I renderfarmed the frames to the project using the Camera renderer - there are not tweaks to the configruation of Camera. All machines have over 1gb RAM And here we go:

1.3ghz PPC 7455, One processor, One Frame, Rendered @ 3:34min. Set to Raytrace 640x480.
1.5ghz PPC 7455, One processor, One Frame, Rendered @ 3:17min. Set to Raytrace 640x480.
2ghx Pentium 4, One Frame, Rendered at 6:45min. Set to Raytrace 640x480, but produced 'dirty' images (explored why, but couldn't solve in time).

So quick and dirty, the P4 produced half-quality @ twice the time. Yes, before the propellerheads pipe up, I was running a minimum services set, and no virii or other apps running.

This is not meant to really "Stir the Turd" it's just some perspective from a guy with a foot in both camps.

[Seanb23]

Yeah, obviously different platforms are going to be optimised for different programs, and I'm not at all suprised at the allegation about Intel benchmarks.

Here at the house, we have compared my Pbook 17" 1gig with a top-of-the line custom made Mchip laptop, and an older 2 Ghz AMD desktop, all with 1gigRAM, in two very-high-end audio programs called Reaktor 4 and Live4. Not suprisingly, The pentium and AMD compute identical processees at about 1/2 to 1/3 of the CPU load of the powerbook in Reaktor4, which some claim was optimized for Windows first, and then OS X. In Live 4, which was developed for the Mac market first and foremost, the pentium and AMD handle the same applications at about 60-70 percent of the CPU load that the powerbook does.

Both machines are fairly stable, for machines running Windows, that is.

It was nice of one person to actually post a Dual g5 link to an obviously biased Apple benchmark site, but the link showed Apple slightly behind, even if you allow for the different video cards.

I suppose I could post up all these benchmarks that show M chips and AMDs far, far ahead in the laptop race, but since you claim that you have evidence that the tests are always going to be rigged in Intel's favor...well, actually AMD is currently way ahead there, too.

What do I need all that speed for, you ask ? Well, when I paid $3300 for this machine, I bought into the idea that Macs tend to run much more efficiently on slower CPUs, and that 1 GHz would be more than enough. It isn't, even with 1 gig of RAM, not to run complex audio editors side by side. Get enough going and the CPU just shuts right down, while the M chip hums right along.

I too want my work station to be nice and efficient, pleasant to use, and fast enough to get the job done. Unfortunately, I also want it to be portable, and the powerbook, while, "acceptable enough to get by on," is by no means the powerhouse I was led to believe it was. Sorry. But I'm just not ready to go back to the world of Windoze headaches, so this leaves me in a bind.

Maybe we'll see those G5 powerbooks sometime in the next 3 years. Somehow I doubt it.

[vraxtus]

Http://www.scientificweb.de/mathstef3.html

I've said it before, and I'll say it again. I prefer OS X hands down to XP any day of the week, but it's looking more and more like Moto and now IBM have been laughing all the way to the bank as they take Apple's money and sleep on the job. I'm p*ssed, in other words, that my $3300 laptop cannot handle the exact same complex audio programs that high-end peecee laptops costing less compute with ease. Yes, XP is unstable. Yes, pipeline. Yes, viruses. Etc. Etc. Etc. I DID buy an outrageously expensive powerbook to re-join this camp in the first place, OK ? But this is halfway through 2004, and, well, I've seen the enemy artillery with mine own eyes, in my own house even...

Wake up and smell the burnt rubber, Apple. I found this link from the end of 2003, among many others, with a few minutes of google. Anyone have anything else they have found in the past year or so ? No links to grand descriptions of university superclusters, no links to old MHz Myth speeches from, what, 2001 ? No platform wars, no irrelevancies about Explorer vs Safari vs Firefox...just some raw modern benchmarks.

Yessiree, modern benchmarks only. Let's put our favorite computer company's feet to the fire of the competition. Some, um, Mac rumors have it that even Steve himself uses a lot of profanity when this topic comes around. Good.


You know I actually agree in some regards. What is the most sad is Mac gaming... if such a field really even exists. This was taken from Barefeats:

Speaking of Windows PCs, I was sent a link to Xbit Labs' site. They ran UT2004 BridgeOfFate botmatches (among others) on an Athlon 64 3400+ desktop with various graphics cards. I read carefully their test parameters and tested the G5/2.0MP with 9800 Pro using their settings. Here's how it compares to the Athlon 64 with 9800 Pro:

At 1024x768, G5 = 67 fps, Athlon = 153 fps
At 1280x1024, G5 = 63 fps, Athlon = 128 fps

At first I thought it wasn't a fair fight. But a "3400+" Athlon is running at an actual 2.2GHz. Though the Dual G5 offloads the sound processing to the second CPU, the Athlon offloads the sound processing to a SoundBlaster Live card. So we'll call that even. That leaves one 2GHz G5 cpu to process the game instructions while the Athlon 64's 2.2GHz cpu processes its game instructions. In other words, they should be about even.


That kind of performance gap is truly truly sad. My Mac might really work for me but when it comes to something like that... it's not so positive.

And, while Mac game ports are usually not as great, and DirectX outperforms OpenGL... you still see 1/3 of the framerates that very comparable PCs would give... *tear*

[Seanb23]

That kind of performance gap is truly truly sad. My Mac might really work for me but when it comes to something like that... it's not so positive.



So, to bump the thread a lil' bit, does anyone have any hard evidence yet that proves that high-end Macs, particularly laptop models, process modern stuff, like real life third party CPU intensive programs, as quickly and efficiently as cheaper and far faster laptops made by "our enemy" ?

That they come anywhere close ?

Anything at all, beyond mere conjecture ? My observations are leading me further and further to the conclusion that Apple is simply laughing at it's customers...like me. This feeling is strikingly similar to the feeling I used to get from M$oft when their double-talk became grindingly obvious and loathsome.

Am I ready to tackle Linux, if only for the sore fact that I am allowed to run it on modern hardware ? Will the superior Mac OS ever be allowed out onto the open market ?

[Abstract]

I agree with the Seanb23, the original poster of this thread.

Its simple. Apple is far far behind the competition in terms of speed, and it doesn't matter that our operating system isn't 64-bit optimized, or whether program X or Y would run faster if it was 64-bit optimized, or made to take advantage of Altivec, as people would argue 3 years ago. The fact is that the software, the operating system, and the games available are NOT optimized for the Mac, and whether its the software manufacturers' faults or not is irrelevent. Yes, maybe they can adjust their software so it would perform optimally on Apple computers like on PCs, but in reality, meaning "the world we live in", it isn't. So all this "hypothetically, if they were to optimize blah blah blah to take advantage of X, Y, and Z, then Macs would be faster" bullsnit can stop, because that isn't reality. With the software available today and tomorrow, Macs are behind.

On the other hand, I'd rather use my 12" Powerbook any day of the week, and if I had to buy a laptop all over again, there's no way I'd go PC. My reason is not that using my Mac brings a smile to my face. My reason is that it doesn't bring a frown, or frustration. So my reason for using Macs is due to something that doesn't occur, not because I actually smile or feel happy when I use my Mac. I just use it, and I don't need to think about anything else other than what I'm doing. :)

[NusuniAdmin]

I agree with the Seanb23, the original poster of this thread.

Its simple. Apple is far far behind the competition in terms of speed, and it doesn't matter that our operating system isn't 64-bit optimized, or whether program X or Y would run faster if it was 64-bit optimized, or made to take advantage of Altivec, as people would argue 3 years ago. The fact is that the software, the operating system, and the games available are NOT optimized for the Mac, and whether its the software manufacturers' faults or not is irrelevent. Yes, maybe they can adjust their software so it would perform optimally on Apple computers like on PCs, but in reality, meaning "the world we live in", it isn't. So all this "hypothetically, if they were to optimize blah blah blah to take advantage of X, Y, and Z, then Macs would be faster" bullsnit can stop, because that isn't reality. With the software available today and tomorrow, Macs are behind.

On the other hand, I'd rather use my 12" Powerbook any day of the week, and if I had to buy a laptop all over again, there's no way I'd go PC. My reason is not that using my Mac brings a smile to my face. My reason is that it doesn't bring a frown, or frustration. So my reason for using Macs is due to something that doesn't occur, not because I actually smile or feel happy when I use my Mac. I just use it, and I don't need to think about anything else other than what I'm doing. :)

well said. Several times in the yahoo mac room I get in arguments like these and people really think macs are the fastest out there. They are NOT. Mac diehards really need to get over themselves. Ever notice how apple does not benchmark against AMD....its because they are scared of AMD even though they have not done all that well lately..they are still below 2.6 ghz last i checked.

[wrldwzrd89]

well said. Several times in the yahoo mac room I get in arguments like these and people really think macs are the fastest out there. They are NOT. Mac diehards really need to get over themselves. Ever notice how apple does not benchmark against AMD....its because they are scared of AMD even though they have not done all that well lately..they are still below 2.6 ghz last i checked.
Rightly Apple should be...AMD uses the same technology IBM does (since the two companies share manufacturing plants), so AMD is logically Apple's biggest threat.

[NusuniAdmin]

Rightly Apple should be...AMD uses the same technology IBM does (since the two companies share manufacturing plants), so AMD is logically Apple's biggest threat.

actually AMD designs its own chips still, so technically it does not use the "same" technology as IBM.

[Converted2Truth]

Over the past while, i've reached the same conclusions as above. Abstract has it nailed. I'm always out of focus on my PC... trying to get it to work. Now generally, i don't mind fixing things because i find it challenging. I've owned a 800mhz TiBook, and now my dual G5. I never have 'fix' or 'tinker' with the hardware, and i rarely have a software problem. When the end of the day rolls around, i find that my greatest productivity is on the Mac because it just works. And besides, Mac OS is just so nice...i've got my complaints, but i do prefer it. I guess the only reason i bought a pc was to play City of Heroes. :D

Another thing i find interesting is how much faster my Dual G5 folds compared to my 3.0e P4. the dual helps i am sure, and they don't have a program for HT P4's yet...

Like all the others here, I say just use what you like for what you like. Apple is not supreme on every battleground. If you invested 4k on a mac thinking that it would spank PC in everything, you'll be dissappointed.

[superbovine]

Http://www.scientificweb.de/mathstef3.html

I've said it before, and I'll say it again. I prefer OS X hands down to XP any day of the week, but it's looking more and more like Moto and now IBM have been laughing all the way to the bank as they take Apple's money and sleep on the job. I'm p*ssed, in other words, that my $3300 laptop cannot handle the exact same complex audio programs that high-end peecee laptops costing less compute with ease. Yes, XP is unstable. Yes, pipeline. Yes, viruses. Etc. Etc. Etc. I DID buy an outrageously expensive powerbook to re-join this camp in the first place, OK ? But this is halfway through 2004, and, well, I've seen the enemy artillery with mine own eyes, in my own house even...

Wake up and smell the burnt rubber, Apple. I found this link from the end of 2003, among many others, with a few minutes of google. Anyone have anything else they have found in the past year or so ? No links to grand descriptions of university superclusters, no links to old MHz Myth speeches from, what, 2001 ? No platform wars, no irrelevancies about Explorer vs Safari vs Firefox...just some raw modern benchmarks.

Yessiree, modern benchmarks only. Let's put our favorite computer company's feet to the fire of the competition. Some, um, Mac rumors have it that even Steve himself uses a lot of profanity when this topic comes around. Good.

http://www.osnews.com/story.php?news_id=3921


...well, think about Gucci, Giorgio Armani, Prada, etc. are they interested in economies of scale ? I don´t know any american big shopping chain, but think about the german cheap Lidl or Aldi, they sell cheap products at cheap prices, they are interested in economies of scale, sell as much as possible in order to sum all the very little margins and make a profit as well as investing the cash they get and make a few more cash before the have to pay for the products they have already sold. In esence, two completely different business models, both work, but both target different segments of the population, this is quite hard, but so it is. And no, I am not in the Gucci segment, I am in the cheap no-name PC brand, I would like to buy an Apple but I cannot afford it. And I want to repeat, if you are not in the economies of scale business, your brand is your biggest asset, take care of it as if it is your own child.

[Seanb23]

[Seanb23]

http://www.osnews.com/story.php?news_id=3921


...well, think about Gucci, Giorgio Armani, Prada, etc. are they interested in economies of scale ? I don´t know any american big shopping chain, but think about the german cheap Lidl or Aldi, they sell cheap products at cheap prices, they are interested in economies of scale, sell as much as possible in order to sum all the very little margins and make a profit as well as investing the cash they get and make a few more cash before the have to pay for the products they have already sold. In esence, two completely different business models, both work, but both target different segments of the population, this is quite hard, but so it is. And no, I am not in the Gucci segment, I am in the cheap no-name PC brand, I would like to buy an Apple but I cannot afford it. And I want to repeat, if you are not in the economies of scale business, your brand is your biggest asset, take care of it as if it is your own child.


We aren't comparing cheap mass produced PCs with Macs here. The specific comparason is between the high-to-ultra high end of each. And Macs are far, far behind in performance, despite their high quality build, and there is a growing body of evidence that supports this fact. I certainly don't take issue with the design quality aspect of my powerbook...it is beautiful and reliable, though somewhat slow for what I need it for. Much slower than the Mac salesman and just about every Mac zealot I talk to will admit. But it does have that killer OS...that's what keeps me hooked, I'll admit it.

To use the well-worn "Macs are like BMWs" automobile analogy...would it not aggrivate you if you were cruising down the coast highway at 75 MPH, testing the handling limits of your nice, overpriced, fancy BMW, and then saw a large convoy of happy looking people in nice, though far cheaper Ford cop cars whip around you at 120 mph while towing heavy trailers, handling the hills and curves as effortlessly as you do, only at a far higher rate of speed with a heavier load ? Would it not also aggrivate you further if you only saw a handful of this convoy wrecked or broken down later on down the road, rather than most of 'em, as your BMW salesman predicted to you would be the case in his sales pitch for the more expensive BMW ?

[Mord]

all of you saying pc's are faster seem silly to me, first off i have only seen two proper benchmarks of g5's with everyday apps, the barefeats ones and the apple ones, some of you my say they are biased and you may be right, the other benchmarks i have seen are from pc, mac bashing sites that just have gameing tests with a stock dual 2.0GHz g5 and a pimped out pc, even if they were equall the mac would still be beaten in gameing but thats a directx thing and who uses there mac to game?


what i would like to see is benchmarks on the same os (gentoo or debian linux) with the same applictions (some 3d rendering, gimp, some video encodeing, that type of thing (all dual awear))

but untill those benchmarks the fact is still in my mind that a dual 2.5GHz g5 is damn fast (and so is the 2.0 and the 1.8) and any top end pc is damn fast.

[superbovine]

We aren't comparing cheap mass produced PCs with Macs here. The specific comparason is between the high-to-ultra high end of each. And Macs are far, far behind in performance, despite their high quality build, and there is a growing body of evidence that supports this fact. I certainly don't take issue with the design quality aspect of my powerbook...it is beautiful and reliable, though somewhat slow for what I need it for. Much slower than the Mac salesman and just about every Mac zealot I talk to will admit. But it does have that killer OS...that's what keeps me hooked, I'll admit it.

To use the well-worn "Macs are like BMWs" automobile analogy...would it not aggrivate you if you were cruising down the coast highway at 75 MPH, testing the handling limits of your nice, overpriced, fancy BMW, and then saw a large convoy of happy looking people in nice, though far cheaper Ford cop cars whip around you at 120 mph while towing heavy trailers, handling the hills and curves as effortlessly as you do, only at a far higher rate of speed with a heavier load ? Would it not also aggrivate you further if you only saw a handful of this convoy wrecked or broken down later on down the road, rather than most of 'em, as your BMW salesman predicted to you would be the case in his sales pitch for the more expensive BMW ?

if your are comparing high-end pc with macs you still have to deal with the fact that they cheaper, and made in larger quantities. as to your analogy, could you expand on it further. it doesn't make sense. are you saying bmw can't go 120, or the cop cars weigh more and can go just as fast? also, did the bmw sales predict that most ford's would be break down? have you ever talked with a bmw salesman?

[whenpaulsparks]

i could really care less if my photoshop images are rendered 2 seconds faster on a PC... that's the problem with this society... gotta have it now, and if its late, we need to blame something. and i'd rather use OS X than XP any day of any year in any alternate universe.

but, from my personal experience, i have found macs to be quite quicker, when you don't look at raw benchmark scores, and you actually look at "user" speeds, or how it feels. my 450MHz G4 Cube, 512MB PC100 SDRAM, was far faster than my brother's 1.2GHz Athlon PC with 512MB DDR running windows 2000 (which was faster than XP on his computer). Not only that, the cube had a worse video card (64MB Radeon 7000) and his had a GeForce 4 64MB DDR. and still, my cube would boot up, start applications, run applications, etc. far faster than his. in terms of usability, i could really care less if his could render an image quicker... i could start mine up, check my mail, talk to some friends quickly, check macrumors, shut it down, and be back on with my day before he could start up his email program doing the same routine. i recently sold my cube, only because i wanted the speed and upgrade-ability of a PowerMac G4, so i got a 1GHz, which, needless to say, kills his computer.

do i care? no. is my mac faster than PCs twice its speed? yes. so go on arguing if you want.

[Seanb23]

Yeah, Macs ARE blazin' fast on Photoshop...they always have been. This, I believe, has to do with RAM usage and other mac-specific things. But I'll re-iterate : These powerbooks, today, simply lack the raw cpu power needed for some complex audio (and video) stuff. Go on believing that your antique Cube runs twice as fast as PCs if it makes you happy...and it appears that most Mac zealots are indeed in awe of the Emperor's summer '04 wardrobe...but I've seen other, depressing hard evidence with my own eyes that, here in the year 2004, they are lagging pretty badly. And I really would like some legs under my platform here, um, to coin a phrase. You are right though...there really is no point in arguing with you fine folks, the mac faithful...

That said, I'll eat my hat if I am driven back to working with windoze due to Apple's hardware inadequacies. I, like you, dislike it THAT much, and, like you, would never argue that OS X isn't simply the best OS out there ! Christ, as a youngster, when I first saw UNIX on the big mainframes, I immediately thought of how crummy DOS was even then, before the really sickening heyday of the swindlers up in Redmond. But, hey, I'm not so blinded by mac fandom as to not be able to admit that they spent some of that largesse on some pretty impressive hardware, esp. lately.

Maybe we will see them G5 powerbooks before my dire predicament of having to re-switch. Maybe.

But it would be refreshing to see Apple take a cue from it's competition and develop a superfast "Mobile" type chip, instead of attempting (probably, in vain) to shoehorn the G5 into a pretty lil' laptop. Yeah, I know they don't want to go back on their word, but it does take courage to admit that you were wrong, and now you are trying out another path.

Maybe I'll just have to get a gigantic portable power supply and rickshaw of some sort and just haul a dual G5 tower around behind me or something...

[oingoboingo]

all of you saying pc's are faster seem silly to me, first off i have only seen two proper benchmarks of g5's with everyday apps, the barefeats ones and the apple ones, some of you my say they are biased and you may be right, the other benchmarks i have seen are from pc, mac bashing sites that just have gameing tests with a stock dual 2.0GHz g5 and a pimped out pc, even if they were equall the mac would still be beaten in gameing but thats a directx thing and who uses there mac to game?

MacWorld did a comparison of the G5s to an AlienWare system back in December I think, and the G5 was beaten out in most tests by the AlienWare machine. If a Mac-friendly magazine like MacWorld can't even manage to cook up some tests where the G5 wins everything, I think that is telling us something.

[Mord]

can anyone provide a link to these tests? i'd like to check them out and here validity, i'd also like to see a test for the dual 2.5GHz g5 as soon as someone can get there hands on one

[Rabidjade]

As I said before, the overseen cause of computer speeds is the software. Mac software developers have it easy, they write code for one type of hardware their brethren have designed and that’s about it. Even the hardware they write programs for is limited (OSX on a PowerMac 9600, anyone? How about XP on a 333mhz P2?) . The less hardware you have to write for the less clutter your software has to sort when accessing and faster read/write times for your drives, cpu's so forth. Point being the bench marks on the Mac side is on software DESIGNED for only Macs. PC side is tougher; they didn't design software to force users to upgrade. So they have to take in account of the billions of variations and third party hardware that their software will run on.

Now if you built a PC with same specs straight down the line with a Mac, designed software from the ground up for the specific hardware the PC is built of (or even the same family of hardware). Take this then put it against the Mac in benchmarks, anything you find on benchmarks will be drastically different. Think about it people. :cool:

(Sorry for the edits, long day and numerous mispellings)

[jhu]

Well now that the cat is out of the bag. PC's are faster--specifically AMD. If it's raw processing power you want the PC is a year or 2 advanced of the PPC arean. It's a good, easy platform, but it's not FAST!. I think when I get back home I'm going to compile matching Linux kernels on a PC and for different Macs and do some benchies... :) Finally someone to stir the turd!

may i suggest you use povray (http://www.povray.org) for benchmarking. load linux on the pc and the mac, compile povray on both, and follow the benchmark instructions.

[jhu]

We aren't comparing cheap mass produced PCs with Macs here. The specific comparason is between the high-to-ultra high end of each. And Macs are far, far behind in performance, despite their high quality build, and there is a growing body of evidence that supports this fact. I certainly don't take issue with the design quality aspect of my powerbook...it is beautiful and reliable, though somewhat slow for what I need it for. Much slower than the Mac salesman and just about every Mac zealot I talk to will admit. But it does have that killer OS...that's what keeps me hooked, I'll admit it.

To use the well-worn "Macs are like BMWs" automobile analogy...would it not aggrivate you if you were cruising down the coast highway at 75 MPH, testing the handling limits of your nice, overpriced, fancy BMW, and then saw a large convoy of happy looking people in nice, though far cheaper Ford cop cars whip around you at 120 mph while towing heavy trailers, handling the hills and curves as effortlessly as you do, only at a far higher rate of speed with a heavier load ? Would it not also aggrivate you further if you only saw a handful of this convoy wrecked or broken down later on down the road, rather than most of 'em, as your BMW salesman predicted to you would be the case in his sales pitch for the more expensive BMW ?


here we go with the car analogies. perhaps a better analogy would be an acura nsx vs. a cheverolet corvette.

[gekko513]

It's very difficult to find benchmarks that can compare the potential of different processors.

I will give an example. I once wanted to make the encryption algorithm RC4 run fast. This algorithm is implemented in the open-ssl library and is available for "all" platforms.

I was working on a Dual Opteron system, a dual Xeon system and a single PIII computer at the time.

The original open-ssl library had a special optimized version for Pentium and a general version for all other processors. However, that version must have been optimized for the Pentium II, because it ran like crap on PIII and Xeon. After playing a round with the code for a while, I ended up with 3 different versions that did excatly the same thing, but each version ran fast on one processor and slower on the two others.

Most programs can be heavily optimized for a particular platform. Usually we're talking about a factor between 2 and 4.

So if you take a program that has been optimized for the P4 (Winzip for instance) and run it on an Athlon processor, the P4 will be much faster. Even worse, if you take a program that has been written for Windows and optimized for the P4 and port it and compile it for Mac OS X, then the Mac will almost always be slower, unless of course someone takes the time to optimize it for the G4 and/or the G5. This goes both ways.

When it comes to pure benchmarks, they will give some indication on some aspects of the performance of the system, but mostly it will give an indication of how much effort the compiler developers have used to optimize the compiler for that particular benchmark on that particular processor.