Equivalent computer that will run Photoshop CS2 as fast as an Intel Mac?

[car]

Hey everybody. I've been trying to figure out how fast Photoshop is on the new Intel iMacs, but I could never find a decent answer. I've read about some benchmarks, but I don't really know how to interpret those, so I would need something super simple to understand.


Does anybody know an equivalent Windows computer (its specs) that would run Photoshop with the same speed as the new Inter iMacs, with photoshop running under Rosetta.

Would it be similar to my current computer that is:

512 Ram
60 GB hardrive
2.4 GH
?

 

[CanadaRAM]

Impossible to say, Car, we don't know how your present machine is configured. Certainly 512 Mb RAM is just enough for Win XP, and not enough to do serious Photoshop work with (and if you are not doing serious work, why are we having this conversation at all?)

The conventional wisdom is that the intel iMacs are approximately equal to or a little less powerful than the top of the line G4 and mid-level G5 Mac machines, although this is highly variable accrording to what actions you are using in PS.

Also, when Adobe gets their Universal Binary act together, you can expect a speed up - probably a doubling in speed in the intel code compared to performance under Rosetta with PPC code. So performance is a moving target.

IME, my dual 1.25 GHz G4 with 1.5 Gb RAM is a better Photoshop performer than my Pentium 2.4c Win XP with 2 Gb RAM. But the Pentium is bettter with web browsers. It all depends on the code you are using.

 

[MRU]

Must agree.

The PC I had P4 3.2ghz HT, 1.5gb DDR ,ATI X800XT was noticeably slower to use with photoshop CS2 than my Powermac Dual 1.8 (in my sig)..

 

[superbovine]

I'd also like to note all benchmarks scripts on photoshop can be used to compare Mac and PC. x86 and PPC (not counting the mactels) handle different jobs in photoshop faster do to their architecture. So trying to find actually benchmarks that are fair between Mac and PC that are actually fair is a bit hard cause you will have to look at the overall picture and specific jobs you do a lot to know the time saving difference rather than speed difference. I remember with a magazine called Maximum PC ran benchmarks between a the then new dual processor PPC and and amd 64, after running benchmarks scripts for photoshop the amd won. However, the they ask their sister magazine which was a Mac magazine to run their independent benchmarks and the Mac won that round using the same hardware, but different benchmark scripts.

What I am getting at is if you find benchmarks you will have to look at them objectively and figure out what specific task you actually care about doing a lot of.

 

[gnasher729]

I remember with a magazine called Maximum PC ran benchmarks between a the then new dual processor PPC and and amd 64, after running benchmarks scripts for photoshop the amd won. However, the they ask their sister magazine which was a Mac magazine to run their independent benchmarks and the Mac won that round using the same hardware, but different benchmark scripts.

A good explanation would be that PC users would tend to use Photoshop functions that run fast on a PC and avoid those that are slow, while Macintosh users would tend to use functions that run particularly fast on a Macintosh.

So each side would tend to put functions into a benchmark that favour their side, quite innocently.

 

[cplusd]

CS2(Mainly Photoshop) on my 1.83Ghz MacBook Pro with 512mb ram runs pretty decent. I came from a 1.5GHz 15 PowerBook with 2gb rams and to tell you the truth I can't tell a difference. If anything somethings seem a tad bit faster on my MBP. Then again most of the files I work with in Photoshop are web based. I will test again when I receieve the 2gb's of ram I'm going to order.

ADDED: I use Photoshop and Flash about 8-10 hours a day and I've been extremely impressed how Rosetta's holding its own. When Adobe releases UB apps, man that's going to be like Christmas!

 

[arcobb]

More then happy with the performance of Photoshop in my powerbook 1.67 GHz (Early spring addition)... and I would consider myself to be doing heavy Photoshop work. Heck... I'm even listing to iTunes to boot!

If you really get down to it... My powerbook is faster then the fastest G4 Powermac ever produced (without the dually of course). And Photoshop performance was great then too!