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iMac 1.8 Ghz G5 Benchmarks

MegaSignal said:
Just curious if anyone's been able to do a non-scientific test with regard to the iMac G5's performance of iDVD encoding: if so,

How long does it take in reference to the length of the movie?

Do the fans spool up and get noisy?

With regard to the displays: Any major problems with burnt or stuck pixels?
Click to expand...

1. I just did a little 8 minute movie of my sons birth. (about 80 pictures with the Ken Burns effect). I burned it in iDVD and it took about 25 minutes from start to finish. I know it is not a full length one, but I wanted to give you an idea.)
2. Yes, the fans spool up and get noisy. Not too bad, but I think it is louder than the old imac.
3. I have a 20" and I did not have any dead or stuck pixels.
 
When you think about it - that seems like a real world comparison, but it's really not that consistent of comparison...

iDVD encodes in the background while you are assembling the movie/DVD, so depending on how long you take, it may be well on the way to finishing encoding before you select "burn." Now if there was a way to force iDVD to only encode after you've selected "burn" then it could be a good comparison.
 
chazmox said:
Now if there was a way to force iDVD to only encode after you've selected "burn" then it could be a good comparison.
Click to expand...


there is, if you open your project in iDVD, then go into preferences in general disable "enable background encoding" :D
 
chazmox said:
When you think about it - that seems like a real world comparison, but it's really not that consistent of comparison...

iDVD encodes in the background while you are assembling the movie/DVD, so depending on how long you take, it may be well on the way to finishing encoding before you select "burn." Now if there was a way to force iDVD to only encode after you've selected "burn" then it could be a good comparison.
Click to expand...

Very true - but in doing this test, I always monitor the "Status" menu after having selected "Best Performance" along with "Background Encoding Enabled"; in this way, differences in actual media burn times (2x, 4x, etc.) will not be included. I time the process from the moment the progress bar indicates progress, to the time when "Done" is displayed. My apologies for not mentioning this earlier. Nonetheless, I appreciate nospleen's input with regard to all of my inquiries with regard to speed, noise, and display. Sounds like a great machine so far!
 
andyblac said:
there is, if you open your project in iDVD, then go into preferences in general disable "enable background encoding" :D
Click to expand...

In addition, "Best Quality" uses Compressor's two-pass system for better quality and up to 2 hours of movie and menu time. I used the "Best Performance" option merely as a comparison test (see above).
 
MegaSignal said:
Just curious if anyone's been able to do a non-scientific test with regard to the iMac G5's performance of iDVD encoding: if so,

How long does it take in reference to the length of the movie?
Click to expand...
For best comparison, I would burn to a disk image--that takes out the burn time as a factor (I personally always burn to a disk image to better figure out if any iDVD jitters are part of the burning or encoding process). The hack to allow burning to disk images (or external DVD burners) can be found (with instructions) at http://homepage.mac.com/geerlingguy/personal_site/mac_guide/pages/15-
burn_idvd-faq/idvd_hack_faq.html
 
fan noise

nospleen says:
2. Yes, the fans spool up and get noisy. Not too bad, but I think it is louder than the old imac.


This is where having Airport Express shines. Simply crank up the music
over there on the stereo.

I have 0db fan noise in my iMac - a Ruby DV. Apple says they have quiet fans but compared to silence nothing beats nothing (when my PC is on-whirr whirr whirr).
I even hate what my dvd player goes through to play a dvd.
I can't wait for solid state.

squeak
 
squeak said:
nospleen says:
2. Yes, the fans spool up and get noisy. Not too bad, but I think it is louder than the old imac.


This is where having Airport Express shines. Simply crank up the music
over there on the stereo.

I have 0db fan noise in my iMac - a Ruby DV. Apple says they have quiet fans but compared to silence nothing beats nothing (when my PC is on-whirr whirr whirr).
I even hate what my dvd player goes through to play a dvd.
I can't wait for solid state.

squeak
Click to expand...

Now I have an excuse to buy the Airport Express. :p The noise is pretty annoying though, but it does not bother me that much. But, I am surprised they advertise it as 'whisper quiet'.
 
How would my old G4 stack up

I'm a newbie, but I've been wondering what kind of a speed bump I'd get from my 1st edition G4 450 to a dual G5 2ghz?
 
Might want to check processor performance in system preferences

My iMac g5 was set to "automatic"; when i turned it to highest GUI performance almost quadrupled. iTunes went from using 14-16% of my CPU to 2-4%.
 
harperb said:
My iMac g5 was set to "automatic"; when i turned it to highest GUI performance almost quadrupled. iTunes went from using 14-16% of my CPU to 2-4%.
Click to expand...
that's what's cool about "automatic" mode. when the processor only has a few things to do, it slows itself down. so you're seeing a single app take more of the processor's time, because there's less time to go around.

to see why "automatic" is cool, turn it on, then turn on activity monitor, and start more apps. have the apps do things. play a movie, import songs in itunes, things like that. as you load it up, when it looks like the processor's going to max out, watch the magic, suddenly everybody's using less processor time, the computer's not going to max out anymore, the CPU's put itself back to full speed to do lots of work...
 
When I upgraded my 400 Mhz G4 Powermac to a single processor 1.4 Ghz, I got a 2.5 X real world speed increase. When I then compared my upgraded Powermac to my sister's 1.5 Ghz G4 Powerbook, hers was approx. 20% faster than mine. If you look on barefeats.com, you'll see benchmarks that compare the dual 2.0 Ghz and dual 2.5 Ghz G5's to, among other things, the 1.5 Ghz Powerbook. I'll leave the math up to you.
 
WHEN ?

kangaroo said:
A few points...

By now, I'm sure, Apple knows you're unbelievably, extraordinarily, upset by this graphics card. They got it, ok?

This card allows Apple to incrementally 'upgrade-to-death' the new iMac so that for the next 3-5 years they can introduce a 'new' model with better specs. Apple is known for this, right?

If you don't like the card, buy a PM and customize to your hearts content.

Now get OVER IT!!!!!!!!!!!
Click to expand...

******************

BTW, about when do you all think we might see the first upgrade to this iMac ?

I am budgeting for right after the X-mas holidays....

Man , would I love a 23" iMac with a faster GPU !!!!


--------

I saw my first 20" G5 iMac
today and played a DVD ( Frida ) ---- ohmygosh :) :) :) !!!!
It was a dead perfect playback with jet black blacks, awesome reds, etc. and not a single frame skip , even though it had only the 256 RAM.

I calculate the dot pitch as equal to the new 20" cinema. The store dude seemed very knowledgeable and said he was very sure the response time for the 20" G5 iMac LCD is the same ( 16ms ) as for the stand alone new cinema 20" display: it is the same LCD.

Does anyone with experience expect that
the 20" / 1.86 GHz / 2GB RAM G5 iMac will be able to generate and render/playback
complex MAYA UNLIMITED for OS X files when this app' streets ?

This is my only GPU concern.

I am not a gamer at all, but would like to try MAYA soon and I don't like the huge clunky PowerMac --- too much : I love the look/feel of the all-in-one iMac G5.

---gooddog
 
gooddog said:
******************

BTW, about when do you all think we might see the first upgrade to this iMac ?

I am budgeting for right after the X-mas holidays....

Man , would I love a 23" iMac with a faster GPU !!!!



---gooddog
Click to expand...

I think Apple would be concerned about the cost limiting sales and/or it bitting into the PowerMac line if they produced a 23". It would be an interesting product to see but can't say it would necessarily increase over all Apple sales and might be a big risk....
 
Barefeats has posted some realworld Benchmarks. http://barefeats.com/imacg5.html

I question the accuracy of the Benchmarking as in the Motion Playback without render seems to show the PowerMac Dual G5 in very bad light while the Dual 2Ghz sprints ahead at more than three times faster. I would have also liked to see some Photoshop Benchmarks as well as Quake III scores, old but still effective.
 
Not bad at all, I knew this thing felt fast. :) I was kind of surprised to see it beat the dual 1.42 in quite a few things.
 
Is this possible?

Results 206.02
System Info
Xbench Version 1.1.3
System Version 10.3.5 (7P35)
Physical RAM 1024 MB
Model PowerMac8,1
Processor PowerPC G5 @ 1.80 GHz
L1 Cache 64K (instruction), 32K (data)
L2 Cache 512K @ 1.15 GHz
Bus Frequency 600 MHz
Video Card GeForce FX 5200
Drive Type ST380013AS
CPU Test 171.21
GCD Loop 102.72 4.01 Mops/sec
Floating Point Basic 284.00 1.03 Gflop/sec
AltiVec Basic 122.58 3.56 Gflop/sec
vecLib FFT 199.07 3.09 Gflop/sec
Floating Point Library 361.50 14.47 Mops/sec
Memory Test 258.61
System 281.25
Allocate 666.97 435.06 Kalloc/sec
Fill 220.96 1758.84 MB/sec
Copy 215.45 1077.24 MB/sec
Stream 239.33
Copy 211.89 1548.89 MB/sec [G5]
Scale 210.54 1553.77 MB/sec [G5]
Add 268.74 1719.93 MB/sec [G5]
Triad 283.88 1734.48 MB/sec [G5]
 
It's been said that 80% of Mac buyers never upgrade their machine beyond adding memory. If that's true, the iMac G5 will be ideal for most Mac desktop buyers.
Click to expand...
I wonder if that's because around 80% of Apple's sales consist of either portables or desktops that resemble portables and as a result aren't that upgradeable or if it isn't just because that number is made up :p
 
Telomar said:
I wonder if that's because around 80% of Apple's sales consist of either portables or desktops that resemble portables and as a result aren't that upgradeable or if it isn't just because that number is made up :p
Click to expand...

No I think 80% not upgrading beyond RAM is relatively accurate however I do believe it is that high due to Portables, imac, and emac sales probably make up nearly 80% of Apple Computer sales. The imac tempts me big time especially with it's nice price point to performance ratio. I will skip an imac this time around and my next machine will be a PowerMac.
 
Little Endian said:
I will skip an imac this time around and my next machine will be a PowerMac.
Click to expand...
yep for those who wait, maybe a dual-dual-core machine is waiting around the corner... quad-PPC... if you wait... a... little... longer...
 
corbin_a2 said:
Results 206.02
System Info
Xbench Version 1.1.3
System Version 10.3.5 (7P35)
Physical RAM 1024 MB
Model PowerMac8,1
Processor PowerPC G5 @ 1.80 GHz
L1 Cache 64K (instruction), 32K (data)
L2 Cache 512K @ 1.15 GHz
Bus Frequency 600 MHz
Video Card GeForce FX 5200
Drive Type ST380013AS
CPU Test 171.21
GCD Loop 102.72 4.01 Mops/sec
Floating Point Basic 284.00 1.03 Gflop/sec
AltiVec Basic 122.58 3.56 Gflop/sec
vecLib FFT 199.07 3.09 Gflop/sec
Floating Point Library 361.50 14.47 Mops/sec
Memory Test 258.61
System 281.25
Allocate 666.97 435.06 Kalloc/sec
Fill 220.96 1758.84 MB/sec
Copy 215.45 1077.24 MB/sec
Stream 239.33
Copy 211.89 1548.89 MB/sec [G5]
Scale 210.54 1553.77 MB/sec [G5]
Add 268.74 1719.93 MB/sec [G5]
Triad 283.88 1734.48 MB/sec [G5]
Click to expand...

This is possible if you don't run the full suite of xbench tests, as this guy did. If there's a "*" next to the score on the xbench site that means it's only a partial test.

If, for example, you only run the cpu test on the iMac you would quite likely get that kind of score.

Too bad -- it would have been nice to see such a high score! I think the upper-threshold for the whole suite of tests is around 165 for G5 iMacs, judging from what I've seen.
 
Performance for a 1.6 G5 iMac

17inch G5 iMac 1.6GHz 1024MB RAM (pair 512/s) set a maximum performance, no HD sleep (cook the chips!)...

CINEBENCH 2003-
rendering 1 cpu- 170
graphics C4D shading 204
OpenGL SW-L 529
OpenGL HW-l 928
Speedup 4.59

XBENCH
Results 146.68
System Info
Xbench Version 1.1.3
System Version 10.3.5 (7P35)
Physical RAM 1024 MB
Model PowerMac8,1
Processor PowerPC G5 @ 1.60 GHz
L1 Cache 64K (instruction), 32K (data)
L2 Cache 512K @ 1.15 GHz
Bus Frequency 534 MHz
Video Card GeForce FX 5200
Drive Type ST3160023AS
CPU Test 152.33
GCD Loop 91.67 3.58 Mops/sec
Floating Point Basic 253.68 917.39 Mflop/sec
AltiVec Basic 109.14 3.17 Gflop/sec
vecLib FFT 175.35 2.72 Gflop/sec
Floating Point Library 321.72 12.88 Mops/sec
Thread Test 93.57
Computation 61.58 831.34 Kops/sec, 4 threads
Lock Contention 194.69 2.44 Mlocks/sec, 4 threads
Memory Test 241.68
System 256.77
Allocate 603.26 393.50 Kalloc/sec
Fill 202.57 1612.48 MB/sec
Copy 196.49 982.46 MB/sec
Stream 228.27
Copy 203.78 1489.62 MB/sec [G5]
Scale 203.62 1502.71 MB/sec [G5]
Add 252.85 1618.24 MB/sec [G5]
Triad 266.67 1629.38 MB/sec [G5]
Quartz Graphics Test 192.20
Line 180.74 4.60 Klines/sec [50% alpha]
Rectangle 167.97 11.82 Krects/sec [50% alpha]
Circle 187.06 4.31 Kcircles/sec [50% alpha]
Bezier 177.26 1.93 Kbeziers/sec [50% alpha]
Text 282.44 4.60 Kchars/sec
OpenGL Graphics Test 175.58
Spinning Squares 175.58 122.87 frames/sec
User Interface Test 233.97
Elements 233.97 75.26 refresh/sec
Disk Test 89.61
Sequential 80.76
Uncached Write 74.68 31.13 MB/sec [4K blocks]
Uncached Write 58.73 24.05 MB/sec [256K blocks]
Uncached Read 88.36 13.99 MB/sec [4K blocks]
Uncached Read 128.34 51.85 MB/sec [256K blocks]
Random 100.65
Uncached Write 95.51 1.43 MB/sec [4K blocks]
Uncached Write 96.80 21.83 MB/sec [256K blocks]
Uncached Read 96.92 0.64 MB/sec [4K blocks]
Uncached Read 115.93 23.86 MB/sec [256K blocks]
 
Latest results of my collaboration with Rob-ART of barefeats.com here:
http://www.macologist.org/viewtopic.php?p=2009#2009

We test at CPU highest, network disabled, all apps closed, all finder windows closed, etc.

We are using my Santaduck benchmark for UT2004, the same that Apple used.

We have tests from 256M through 2G, as well as different UT2k4 patches including versions 3204, 3236, and 3323.

Apple is also helping Rob-ART, with some information on what map, resolution, and detail settings they used.

These results are STILL IN PROGRESS. Nothing is definite yet. Wer're trying to see if we can reproduce Apple's 212% figure for the G5 vs G4 17" iMac.
 
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