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350MHz G4 vs. 450MHz G3- Which is Faster?

A

applefan1997

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Sep 2, 2005
423
2
Koreatown, Los Angeles, California
350MHz G4 (Tower)
10GB HD
384MB RAM
Will load OS X (some version)
vs.
450MHz G3 (B/W)
9GB HD
256MB RAM
Tiger 10.4.7

I own the B/W, which I finally decided to try and replace, but the cheapest G4 I can find is the above, but how will it stack up? The G3 runs Tiger like a charm, but the G4 velocity engine suppiosedly is faster. Will I notice speed drops in tasks such iTunes, iMovie, etc....?
 
If you want to do web browsing and email + office stuff bith will do fine but if your thinking of doing anythign else just get a new mac.
 
I have a 350Mhz G4 and a 400mhz G3. Both have 512MB RAM and are running Tiger. The G4 is definitely faster, without a doubt.

Don't buy a G4...spend $30 on a G4 ZIF processor and just stick it in your b&w.
 
crazycat said:
If you want to do web browsing and email + office stuff bith will do fine but if your thinking of doing anythign else just get a new mac.
Click to expand...

in your signature it says you have a mac pro 3GHz dual.....i hope you mean quad or you have a computer apple is not telling us about...........

and by the way thats a SWEET set up you have there... a 3GHz QUAD mac pro, a 20" imac, a 17" macbook pro, AND to top it all of a mac mini....crap i wish i were you, and ye the way what to you do to need all that Hard core machinery, like Extreme Photo editing, or movie editer or something?
 
For 'media' apps like iTunes and iMovie, the G4 will be faster. AltiVec is heavily used in such tasks, and more than makes up for a 100 MHz speed drop. The extra RAM will help, too.
 
In OS9, the G3 will be slightly faster on anything non-altivec based (i.e., anything but Photoshop 6 or higher, Cubase 5, etc.). In OSX, the G4 will definitely be faster.

The RAM from your G3 should work in your G4, btw. I would stick the RAM and HD from the G3 into the G4 (or vice versa).
 
That extra GB of space on the G4 will help a tiny bit.

But either way, they'll handle a good amount of stuff you throw at them. I used a 400 MHz iMac with 256 MB of RAM and it handled things fairly well.
 
Warbrain said:
That extra GB of space on the G4 will help a tiny bit.

But either way, they'll handle a good amount of stuff you throw at them. I used a 400 MHz iMac with 256 MB of RAM and it handled things fairly well.
Click to expand...

Actually, comparing them and thinking back... The 9 GB drive is probably a SCSI hard drive, whereas the 10 GB drive is probably ATA (or IDE, if you prefer that name.) From that timeframe, the 9 GB SCSI drive would probably be faster; but it would mean moving the SCSI card from the G3 to the G4. (The 9 GB drive is probably a 7200 RPM SCSI drive, whereas the 10 GB drive is probably a 5300 RPM ATA, assuming they are the original drives.)

Since the G4 is 350 MHz, that means it is probably the 'Yikes' motherboard, which is essentially identical to the B&W G3's 'Yosemite' motherboard. If you want a real comparison, run some benchmarks on both, then swap their processors, then run the benchmarks again. (The G3 will work in the PMG4 just fine, the G4 will need a firmware hack that can be found via Google to run in the PMG3.)
 
If you want a real upgrade, get a G4 Sawtooth, because it has tons more upgrade options, and would definitely be faster than your G3 B&W.
 
The G4 will be significantly faster in video editing and other graphics things due to AltiVec.

Also, G4s generally get a better FPU score than similarly clocked G3s, even without AltiVec.
 
steamboat26 said:
If you want a real upgrade, get a G4 Sawtooth, because it has tons more upgrade options, and would definitely be faster than your G3 B&W.
Click to expand...

Is the sawtooth the 733MHz SuperDrive model? It might be somewhat pricey. I've never gone farther than a 500MHz iBook G3. BTW, The internal sound stopped working on the mobo and functions through headphones only, whats wrong?I checked the connectors, tried different speakers, to no avail. Any help would be appreciated.
 
Sawtooths start at 350mhz.

They're often referred to as "AGP" models - because they were the first to have an AGP slot.

Everything from the AGP Sawtooths up through the Quicksilvers use more or less the same upgrades from Sonnet (for example).

Mirror Drive Doors are not upgradeable at this time as far as I know.
 
When looking at processors, it is usually quite dependent on what type of stuff you plan on doing.

While not exact, I tend to compare G3 and G4 processors using the following math...
  • For 4 out of 5 tasks the G4 runs at about 15% faster per clock cycle than the G3.
  • For 1 out of 5 tasks the G4 runs at twice the speed of the G3.
So using that with just the processors we are talking about here, in 4 out of 5 tasks the G4/350 would run like a G3/400 and in 1 out of 5 task it would run like a G3/700... and averaging all that out, the G4/350 is ruffly equivalent to a G3/466.

As that puts the G4 and G3 processors in this case at almost equal footing, things like AGP graphics and memory start to become the deciding factors.


:rolleyes:

And I have to emphasize the fact that this 4:1 ratio is something that is very generalized. When I was looking at processor upgrades I was comparing a G4/533 with a G3/1.0, and went with the G4/533 (which by what I listed above is like a G3/700)... Why? Because I do a lot of video and audio editing on that system which increased the amount of Altivec aided tasks that I do.
 
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