tech4all said:
I think to compare a PC processor to a Mac process you have to almost double the speed. Like a 1Ghz G4 would be about a 1.8Ghz P4. I know in a Keynote Steve Jobs calls it the "MHz myth". I think they compared a 867Mhz G4 to a 1.8 Ghz P4, and said that the G4 was about 50% than the P4 at the same task.
Any speed comparisons out of Apple should be taken with not one, but many grains of salt. Especially the pre-G5 ones, when Apple were desperate to show that they were not lagging behind even as Moto was failing to deliver better chips. Usually, the MacWorld Steve-demos consisted of :
a) running hand-picked photoshop filters
b) sometimes using a crippled (PC) version of Photoshop. (It had a bug in it that slowed rendering times)
c) Not disclosing the configuration and settings of the PC used, beyond processor speed
and so on... So in short, don't use Apple processor testing of pre G5 hardware for your purchasing descisions