17" G5 iMac - Better performance then this notebook? + other questions

[Passive101]

She's not looking for a big performance increase. She wants a mac, bigger screen, and some performance increase would be nice. She's not looking for less performance though.

Acer 5100

Processor Type Turion 64 - 2Ghz
2GB RAM (I don't think this should matter as the G5 can also take 2GB)
Ati Radeon Xpress 1100


My g/f wants a mac and she plays wow. Her current notebook Acer 5100 does not play wow very good. She doesn't need a notebook either.


I had another question as well. Are all the G5 iMacs that have a dvd burner work with DVD/RW and DVD dual layers?

 

[quill17]

A G5 iMac is not going to run that game very good. Plus you might not be able to run that game on a PPC Mac.

 

[Passive101]

Would any of the G5's that are larger such as the 20" run it better?

 

[mkrishnan]

FWIW, there are (plenty of) reports out there of people's experiences with WoW on an iMac G5, but you might want to search for some benchmarks -- fps or something like that. I have no idea if it would be better than that PC. However, I'd generally agree, if she wants to play games, she should get an Intel mac.

I had another question as well. Are all the G5 iMacs that have a dvd burner work with DVD/RW and DVD dual layers?

No -- the very first generation did not. Ways to tell the first generation of iMac G5 (there were two generations without an iSight and a third generation with an iSight)...

- Any model that has a 64MB video card (they are all 128 or larger starting in the second generation)
- Any 17" model that had a 1.6GHz G5 (but at 1.8GHz it could be first or second generation)
- Any model that has an 80GB HD.

This is the first gen iMac, that does NOT burn DL DVD's.

http://apple-history.com/?page=gallery&model=imac_g5&performa=off&sort=family&order=ASC&range=

 

[Passive101]

We're going to get her the 17" G5.

 

[QCassidy352]

just to clear something up, the game certainly DOES run on PPC macs.

That said, any intel imac will run the game better than any G5 imac. Even the original core duos will do pretty well.

 

[Passive101]

I think we're actually going to get the 17" G5 iMac. I searched the web and it looks like it should run about 25-40FPS which is better then her notebook.