G5 2.7Ghz Early 2005 or G5 2.3Ghz Late 2005, which will perform better?

R-T-B · Jan 17, 2013

Hello all, I'm RTB, a Java and C# developer who just purchased a pallette at his local state surplus store with two powermacs on it. I'm curious which is more powerful. I wikipedia'd the Late 2005 and it has more L2 Cache and faster DDR2 ram. I'm thinking it might just edge out the higher clocked 2.7Ghz model, but not sure how they compare "clock for clock." Any opinions?

By the way, I revamped the (leaky) liquid cooling in the 2.7 model following a guide, averting any damage and I am confident it will no longer leak, so let that be forgotten in the comparison. I am looking at raw performance. I will be using this as a development box to develop PowerPC software ports for the community, I'm going to start by learning some Objective C.

I'm a Java programmer as I said, so I believe heavily in that technology (that and C# via mono). I believe Java on the PowerPC (an architecture I loved but could never afford until now) has been sadly neglected and I am interested in trying to port the OpenJDK 7 and the Shark JIT to PowerPC, so we can finally have a good Java version in our system with native quartz and all that. Once that is done, I hope to use a "package manager" I have been writing in Java to create a PPC "App store" of sorts to facilitate distribution of software. I'll keep you guys informed.

In the meantime, what's a better performer? I want to fully deck either one out with all the upgrades possible, but will the extra cache really give the 2.3Ghz DC an edge over the 2.7Ghz DP?

Thanks in advance!

-RTB

MisterKeeks · Jan 17, 2013

I you can do that, you will become a PowerPC rockstar.

Combing through all of the Geekbench benchmarks, the 2.7 beats out the 2.3 by 200 to 300 points, which makes the 2.7 I'm typing on feel warm and fuzzy.

As for the App store, there are a few things you may want to check out. One is MacLibre. It had free software for Macs. I believe it connected to a server and retrieved a list of downloadable apps. It does not work anymore. Please, don't take any cues from the interface though, it is poor. The MAS interface is pretty good, something like that (perhaps more lightweight) would be good.

The other thing to check out is a website that is being set up right now by 2 members of Macrumors (myself and spyguy10709).

There is nothing online yet, but I have gathered and collected about 200 pieces of software that I will be uploading very soon. It would be very cool if your App store could connect to the webserver, get the descriptions, authors, date released, compatibility, display it in a beautiful Mac App Store interface, and offer it for download.

R-T-B · Jan 17, 2013

MisterKeeks said:
I you can do that, you will become a PowerPC rockstar.

Combing through all of the Geekbench benchmarks, the 2.7 beats out the 2.3 by 200 to 300 points, which makes the 2.7 I'm typing on feel warm and fuzzy.

As for the App store, there are a few things you may want to check out. One is MacLibre. It had free software for Macs. I believe it connected to a server and retrieved a list of downloadable apps. It does not work anymore. Please, don't take any cues from the interface though, it is poor. The MAS interface is pretty good, something like that (perhaps more lightweight) would be good.

The other thing to check out is a website that is being set up right now by 2 members of Macrumors (myself and spyguy10709).

There is nothing online yet, but I have gathered and collected about 200 pieces of software that I will be uploading very soon. It would be very cool if your App store could connect to the webserver, get the descriptions, authors, date released, compatibility, display it in a beautiful Mac App Store interface, and offer it for download.

Actually, the plan is to have the poorer performing G5 act as a very nice webserver for the store, so yes it's in the plans. I could even provide hosting for your website if you'd like it hosted on a real PowerPC.

One thing I'm not touching though is the web plugin, I think most Java applets are garbage anyhow... May change my opinion later but it isn't priority.

As for the look of the app store, it is currently a rather ugly swing (the "Java" GUI Look) implementation. I'm looking at adapting it to be a very nice native mac look, but may take some time. I'll be announcing more details as they come, thanks for the advice.

MisterKeeks · Jan 17, 2013

R-T-B said:
Actually, the plan is to have the poorer performing G5 act as a very nice webserver for the store, so yes it's in the plans. I could even provide hosting for your website if you'd like it hosted on a real PowerPC.

Thanks for the offer. Fortunately, spyguy10709 already has a hosting account with unlimited data/bandwidth, so we shouldn't need it. As for having the poor G5 act as a webserver, I'm fine with it. However, I think it would be a good idea to just use the current website for hosting, as it provides all of the metadata for every file. It should be relatively easy to hook up the site to the Store (we are using Joomla with JDownloads). It would also combine and thus reduce the work per person. It would be a waste of time for both of use to catalog the same hundreds of apps.

I'm open to questions/comments/suggestions, as well. I'm pretty excited, people have talked about doing something like this, and here you are, saying, "I've got it, but I don't like the interface". Any sort of interface is farther than we have ever gotten.

Edit: Just remembered, both of those have Liquid Cooling Systems. If you do decide to use one as a server, you'll have to keep an eye on that.

666sheep · Jan 17, 2013

MisterKeeks said:
Edit: Just remembered, both of those have Liquid Cooling Systems. If you do decide to use one as a server, you'll have to keep an eye on that.

If you mean 2.3 Late 2005 is liquid cooled, I must disappoint you - it isn't

OP - I'd personally use 2.3 over 2.7 as everyday workhorse. Why? More RAM available and bigger L2, what nicely plays with the RAM. With 16GB you can use part of it as RAMdisk. If you'd want to have2 displays, 512MB Quadro will drive them very nicely.

ybz90 · Jan 17, 2013

Do a lot of people here use Power Macs are web servers? I read about a lot of people doing it, but it seems like a really poor idea as far as energy efficiency is concerned. I mean, don't get me wrong, I love to see PowerPC Macs repurposed and getting new life, but the power draw seems like it might not be worth it (and it's bad for the environment, if that's something you happen to care about).

MisterKeeks · Jan 17, 2013

666sheep said:
If you mean 2.3 Late 2005 is liquid cooled, I must disappoint you - it isn't

Whoops- for some reason I though the DP 2.3 was air, DC 2.3 was liquid. I see now that all Power Macs above 2.5 are liquid, all below air.

California · Jan 17, 2013

666sheep said:
If you mean 2.3 Late 2005 is liquid cooled, I must disappoint you - it isn't

OP - I'd personally use 2.3 over 2.7 as everyday workhorse. Why? More RAM available and bigger L2, what nicely plays with the RAM. With 16GB you can use part of it as RAMdisk. If you'd want to have2 displays, 512MB Quadro will drive them very nicely.

2.3 DC over the 2.7 DP any day. 2.7's very finicky, low ram, older tech.

MisterKeeks · Jan 17, 2013

California said:
2.3 DC over the 2.7 DP any day. 2.7's very finicky, low ram, older tech.

I know that the 2.7 can use less, slower, RAM, but I think that if they have the same amount, one should use the 2.7, as it is faster. Perhaps if he plans to upgrade one, he should use the dual-core, but perhaps not, as the extra 2x400MHz makes a difference.

R-T-B · Jan 17, 2013

Yep, the 2.3 is aircooled, just checked. That's nice, no leaks to worry about.

I still think I am going for the 2.7 for general development work, as it came decked out with 8GBs of ram believe it or not. Just easier to get started, lol.

The interface is ugly and also, right now it's a cross platform build system that uses it's own metadata via a custom XML scheme (I designed it). It won't mesh nice with your software at the moment but I am sure it could be adapted. Problem is it relies on Java 1.6 at least. I'm not sure how good Soylatte is, I'm investigating that now. Last time I talked with someone about it, they told me it didn't support swing/GUI functions, which would make the big roadblock being porting OpenJDK 7 first.

While that roadblock might seem more like the Berlin wall right now, it's benefits would be massive. Not only that, but I have a feeling you'd see a performance increase, as it'd be a native 64-bit app (on the G5 at least) and quite frankly, Apple's Java has the suckiest JIT I have ever seen.

----------

California said:
2.3 DC over the 2.7 DP any day. 2.7's very finicky, low ram, older tech.

I agree, when I got the thing it was an unstable basket case. I pretty much redid the liquid cooling loop with some very nice modifications though, I'll have to post it sometime. It now runs cooler (after a thermal recal) and I'm willing to bet more reliably than any 2.7 stock could ever dream of.

wobegong · Jan 17, 2013

2.7 for non SMP aware applications is the fastest PowerPC out there (http://www.barefeats.com/quad02.html)
2.5 Quad is the fastest (by far!) for SMP aware applications

For 2.3 v 2.7 debate I deliberately went for the 2.3 for reasons you mention, bigger CPU cache, Dual Core (not Dual CPU), graphics card options just 'more modern' but my main reason was to avoid the liquid cooling system which can be problematic.

noodle654 · Jan 17, 2013

I bought a DC 2.3GHz (and a DP 1.8GHz) a month back and after lots of use (and a bunch of upgrades), this thing still performs great. I did a lot of reading when I was looking at these, and I decided that the Late 2005 is definitely the model of choice. Combined with an SSD, ample RAM (8GB+), and the 7800GT, the DC 2.3GHz still keeps up with my i7 MBP. It can run youtube/flash with no problems and still runs Logic very well!

As others have mentioned, the liquid cooling is a bit flaky in the DP models (especially the 2.7GHz). The DC is air cooled, and runs pretty cool. My idle temperatures hover around 115-120F. Replacing the stock cooling on the 7800GT helped significantly with keeping temperatures (and noise) down.

rabidz7 · Jan 18, 2013

R-T-B said:
Hello all, I'm RTB, a Java and C# developer who just purchased a pallette at his local state surplus store with two powermacs on it. I'm curious which is more powerful. I wikipedia'd the Late 2005 and it has more L2 Cache and faster DDR2 ram. I'm thinking it might just edge out the higher clocked 2.7Ghz model, but not sure how they compare "clock for clock." Any opinions?

By the way, I revamped the (leaky) liquid cooling in the 2.7 model following a guide, averting any damage and I am confident it will no longer leak, so let that be forgotten in the comparison. I am looking at raw performance. I will be using this as a development box to develop PowerPC software ports for the community, I'm going to start by learning some Objective C.

I'm a Java programmer as I said, so I believe heavily in that technology (that and C# via mono). I believe Java on the PowerPC (an architecture I loved but could never afford until now) has been sadly neglected and I am interested in trying to port the OpenJDK 7 and the Shark JIT to PowerPC, so we can finally have a good Java version in our system with native quartz and all that. Once that is done, I hope to use a "package manager" I have been writing in Java to create a PPC "App store" of sorts to facilitate distribution of software. I'll keep you guys informed.

In the meantime, what's a better performer? I want to fully deck either one out with all the upgrades possible, but will the extra cache really give the 2.3Ghz DC an edge over the 2.7Ghz DP?

Thanks in advance!

-RTB

The 2.3 will be the best because of graphics performance.

Will you recompile java?
If you recompile java for 64bit you will become a PowerPC god you know.
Please allow G5 macs to run at their true speed.

R-T-B · Jan 18, 2013

rabidz7 said:
The 2.3 will be the best because of graphics performance.

Will you recompile java?
If you recompile java for 64bit you will become a PowerPC god you know.
Please allow G5 macs to run at their true speed.

I already ran the IBM JDK in linux, meant for their POWER7 servers but I can tell you from playing with it G5's were wicked fast for their time. IBM really optimized their JDK right, and it shows. Apple did a crap job. Too bad it isn't open source (the IBM JDK/JIT). I'll be porting the OpenJDK, and hopefully it will do better than apples simply being 64-bit and Java 7!

The 2.3 will be the best because of graphics performance.

Yeah, it would be but my 2.7Ghz has a 6800 Ultra in it and isn't doing so bad. I'll see but for right now I'm going with the 2.7 for if no other reason that I've grown attatched to it while working on it's insides.

MisterKeeks · Jan 18, 2013

R-T-B said:
I already ran the IBM JDK in linux, meant for their POWER7 servers but I can tell you from playing with it G5's were wicked fast for their time. IBM really optimized their JDK right, and it shows. Apple did a crap job. Too bad it isn't open source (the IBM JDK/JIT). I'll be porting the OpenJDK, and hopefully it will do better than apples simply being 64-bit and Java 7!

Wow- I'm impressed.

PowerPCMacMan · Jan 18, 2013

Prayers and best wishes!

All I can say to the OP of this thread: Good luck and if you do develop this, I would be glad to pay you for it as a way for you to keep our platform alive!!!

There is no excuse anymore. PowerPC has the ability to keep up.. just Apple cut its life line short.. We need action.. too bad I am not a programmer by trade, otherwise I would be writing nice PowerPC apps myself.

You have my support for the Java application and many more to come!!! Count me in!

PPCMM
:apple:

R-T-B · Jan 18, 2013

Yeah, the real issue will be the browser plugin from my primitive research... But we'll cross that bridge when it comes.

ihuman:D · Jan 19, 2013

Hopefully this will be able to run on my G4s. VERY great work by the way! Your like a saviour to most of us!!!

rabidz7 · Jan 20, 2013

R-T-B said:
I already ran the IBM JDK in linux, meant for their POWER7 servers but I can tell you from playing with it G5's were wicked fast for their time. IBM really optimized their JDK right, and it shows. Apple did a crap job. Too bad it isn't open source (the IBM JDK/JIT). I'll be porting the OpenJDK, and hopefully it will do better than apples simply being 64-bit and Java 7!

Yeah, it would be but my 2.7Ghz has a 6800 Ultra in it and isn't doing so bad. I'll see but for right now I'm going with the 2.7 for if no other reason that I've grown attatched to it while working on it's insides.

Will this jdk port run minecraft and apps like it?

R-T-B · Jan 20, 2013

rabidz7 said:
Will this jdk port run minecraft and apps like it?

The one I'm developing should, at least in concept. The one for Linux won't, as LWJGL for linux-PPC does not exist.

rabidz7 · Jan 21, 2013

R-T-B said:
The one I'm developing should, at least in concept. The one for Linux won't, as LWJGL for linux-PPC does not exist.

When will it be done?
Where will it be downloadable?

R-T-B · Jan 22, 2013

rabidz7 said:
When will it be done?
Where will it be downloadable?

In short, quite a while.

I don't mean to get your hopes downplayed, but I took a look at the macports version of the OpenJDK 6 (yes 6, not 7) and I'm using that as a starting point. It's a mess. This is not to say it cannot be done, only that it's a very involved project.

Cox Orange · Jan 29, 2013

For everyone interested, here is a nice comparison (review, test) of a Quad, a 2GHz DC, 2,3GHz DC and a Dual 2,7GHz. You have to scroll down to the comparison table.

The 2,7GHz beats all (even the Quad) in iMovieHD Rendering! It seems iMovie can't make much use of more than 2 cores...
The rest is as expected.

http://www.macworld.com/article/1048071/quadreview.html

Someone said the 2x 2,3GHz would be fastest graphic wise. Well, if the OP wants to do programming and a webserver that shouldn't make that much of a difference or not? (From my limited experience the only things that need a high end graphics card on a Mac are CAD and Games, I got the feeling).

PowerPCMacMan · Jan 29, 2013

That maybe, but the 2.7 had one of the HIGHEST LCS leak failure rates, 2nd only to its sibling brother from 2004, the Dual 2.5. Unless one had the panasonic LCS, they were immune from soon to be leaking LCS'.

Taken one step further the Quad G5 would then take the place of being more reliable and in some instances, faster. While yes, iMovie HD Rendering would be a tad slower, its not worth the hassle unless the 2.7 has the Panasonic LCS versus Delphi.

The 2,7GHz beats all (even the Quad) in iMovieHD Rendering! It seems iMovie can't make much use of more than 2 cores...
The rest is as expected.

Cox Orange · Jan 29, 2013

I wonder, if there are still so much leaking G5s. I mean it's like, the high PSU failure rate of some PowerMac Models. If it hasn't gone bad by now, it may be a sign that this is one of the good ones. In 2008 there were still reports of Quads leaking, I mean sometime the bad ones should have been naturally "sorted out".
Also, I wonder, if today most leakings come from used ones, that are shipped across the country. (Also, concerning PSU failure rates, I would like to know, if they are higher in the US than in e.g. France and Germany, since the US electricity "system" is said to be not that good, involving lightning conductors.)

G5 2.7Ghz Early 2005 or G5 2.3Ghz Late 2005, which will perform better?

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