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[snowman]

Re: Re: Re: There aren't any there

Most important; Windows is a cheap rip off of macOS itself!
Apple was the first company to make a computer with a graphical interface and a mouse and 3.5 inch floppy.

Originally posted by akuma

Originally posted by nudge

Yup the dock looks suspiciously like a Windows task bar. = mac copies ms

Actually, didn't NeXT have the dock even before the Windows Taskbar?

So therefore

ms copies NeXT

--
Akuma

 

[snowman]

I agree, but again, he might have put in a short wait in the code on both systems to get lower fps for better comparison. Why would an employe at ID lie about this?

Originally posted by whitegold

1. 30fps on that hardware seems too low to be a viable benchmark, and should be looked at with some question, not praised as some sort of evidence.

 

[whitegold]

I'm not referring to him lying or falsifying his results. A good example is my recent experience with Unreal Tournament. I was getting 15 frames a second on my Athlon 1.1 with a GeforceIIMX. That sound right? No... definitely not. So I did some messing round and ended up switching to OpenGL, instead of Direct3D.

Result was that it jumped from 15fps to 65fps, just by changing the graphics mode.

To use that 15fps as a benchmark of my machine's UT performance would be wholely misleading, while not actually inaccurate.

That is what I am saying is the case here. That there's a problem, a mis-setting, somewhere outside the actual performance of the computer. 3d card drivers, direct x version, hardware conflict, bodgy installation of the software, simple beta code issue.

The last seems the most likely.

If software can't get more than 30 frames a second on hardware like that, yet can get 90 fps on a somewhat similar setup (same graphics card) then the programmer for the mac side seems to have been working while the PC guy snorted coke 🙂

Anyway, this is beta code, so there can be major issues. Looking forward to the first full demo, which should be a more reliable indicator of relative performance.

Oh, and snowman, I realized what you mean about the megahtz myth. If you're trying to say that a P3 800 is not as good as a G4 800 you'll certainly get no arguments from me. It's people who tell me that a G4 733 is 14.6 times faster in every way than a Pentium4 2gigahtz... at that point I start to question it.

I'd love to know for sure how MUCH faster than intel hardware the G4 is, and at what point (if at all) and in what circumstances the intel/amd lines draw ahead.

 

[snowman]

Good, I agree with you here too. I do not believe that a 733Mhz G4 is faster than a Pentium4 2 Ghz. But I know this; The G4 is faster than a Pentium4 2Ghz at some tasks. This Apple have already proven in some tests. But if you are to compare these two the Pentium will probably win against the G4 overall. There is simply no way of comparing these two processors in a fair way, they are too different. But still he probably did this test simply to show us that Mhz is not everything, FAAAAR from.
Even different PowerPC-processors are entirely different. If you compare an old 250 Mhz 603-processor (slowest PPC-processor out there) with a 250 Mhz G3-processor, the G3 is probably two or three times faster! It really is! I tested this once too, by upgrading an old 7600 to a G3. The bus speed was only 6 Mhz faster so that did not do much for the G3 and still it was SOOOOO much faster.
But since the PPC-processor stood on the same speed for 18 moths until recently, I do believe that the Mac's got a slight gap to fill before it's comparable to the fastest PC out there. However that gap should be filled when the G5 comes out early next year. I haven't heard about anything groundbreaking taking place on the PC-side so it probably will fill the gap.

Originally posted by whitegold

Oh, and snowman, I realized what you mean about the megahtz myth. If you're trying to say that a P3 800 is not as good as a G4 800 you'll certainly get no arguments from me. It's people who tell me that a G4 733 is 14.6 times faster in every way than a Pentium4 2gigahtz... at that point I start to question it.

I'd love to know for sure how MUCH faster than intel hardware the G4 is, and at what point (if at all) and in what circumstances the intel/amd lines draw ahead.

 

[snowman]

I did not mean to say that the "603 250 Mhz" is the slowest PPC-processor out there but I meant to say that "603" is the slowest PPC-processor when comparing Mhz. And yes the 601 is faster than 603, but Apple was able to puch more Mhz out of the 603.

Originally posted by snowman
old 250 Mhz 603-processor (slowest PPC-processor out there)

 

[whitegold]

yeah, I do agree with most of that. I also agree with what a lot of people are saying that intel are making megahtz mean NOTHING. It never should mean everything, but it shouldn't mean nothing.

I don't agree with AMDs new move to name their chips by comparison with an intel P4. "If this 1.4 athlon is as fast as a 1.8 pentium 4 we'll call it the 1800. That will fool them."

Good marketting, but bad move. Get some coloured men. It worked for intel.

The one issue I do have with your post is where you said: "The G4 is faster than a Pentium4 2Ghz at some tasks. This Apple have already proven in some tests."

While I'm not necessarily saying that that's not true, I'm very hesitant to simply take Apple's word for it. Figures can be very easily adjusted. Even in a live demonstration.

Spec out the apple as much as possible, but run the P4 with minimal ram on an old hard drive... Out of date drivers? What operating system? What file system? Win2K is way faster than WinME. Especially with NTFS, rather than FAT32. And what filters did they run? Some filters run faster on Apple. "Polar Co-ordinates" apparently runs 40 times faster on a Mac. Using demonstrations that feature things present their product in the best possible light, rather than that's actually representative of the hardware, is very easy.

"Apple have already proven" is something that to me (and should to anyone, I feel) be taken with some questioning. They're not exactly an unbiased third party. 🙂

Oh, and finally, I'm not disagreeing necessarily that the G4 is faster at some tasks. Just that I don't believe Apple of all people when they tell me that. When Tom's Hardware, or Ars Technica or Sharky Extreme or someone without bias tells me that, I'll believe it.

Sometimes the source is more important than the data.

 

[snowman]

Okay I understand your point of view here, but your post just proved what I stated;
"Some filters run faster on Apple. Polar Co-ordinates apparently runs 40 times faster on a Mac."
There you have it, one of the tasks the G4 performes better 🙂
One area that the Macintosh is much better in is Java. It seems that the Graphics class for the PC sucks big time. My iMac outperformes PC's which are 500 Mhz faster when using Java! That's just it again, there are so many different things you can compare between a mac and a PC that simply posting some benchmarks proving that one platform is better than the other is just pointless. I think both got their advantages, why not have the best of both worlds? But anyways if you are a really hardcore gamer and nothing else, then by all means go for the PC. I was just a little tired yesterday about everyone talking badly about the platform that I love to use, and I don't want someone else with no experience talking sh*t about something that I truly like. I live in Finland where all kids use PC's just because everyone else does it, and if you bring up the subject Macintosh everyone wants to kill me! And if I ask them what's wrong with Mac I always get the same thing "Eh, ehhh, they are bad, yeah!" Then I always ask; "Have you ever used one" Answer; "Eh he he no"

Originally posted by whitegold

Spec out the apple as much as possible, but run the P4 with minimal ram on an old hard drive... Out of date drivers? What operating system? What file system? Win2K is way faster than WinME. Especially with NTFS, rather than FAT32. And what filters did they run? Some filters run faster on Apple. "Polar Co-ordinates" apparently runs 40 times faster on a Mac. Using demonstrations that feature things present their product in the best possible light, rather than that's actually representative of the hardware, is very easy.

"Apple have already proven" is something that to me (and should to anyone, I feel) be taken with some questioning. They're not exactly an unbiased third party. 🙂

Oh, and finally, I'm not disagreeing necessarily that the G4 is faster at some tasks. Just that I don't believe Apple of all people when they tell me that. When Tom's Hardware, or Ars Technica or Sharky Extreme or someone without bias tells me that, I'll believe it.

Sometimes the source is more important than the data.

 

[whitegold]

My point was actually that that sort of aberrant performance difference is often taken as representative of actual performance. This filter is 40 times faster, therefore apples run 40 times faster than pcs. Ignore the fact that all other filters run slower [for the purposes of illustration only]

My reason for choosing PC over Mac is that FOR ME.. I have to stress that.. for me.. I'm not trying to change anyone else, or convince anyone of PC superiority..

Anyway, for me, there are several reasons to get a PC. The price for performance of an athlon based system is excellent by comparison to a P4, and even more so to a Mac. I got a name brand system (Gateway) hoping to avoid the stability issues of Wintel architecture. I feel that a very large proportion of windows instability is actually caused by cheap, bodgy, no name hardware. For the PC both a blessing and a curse. The gateway has been rock solid. Especially now with XP.

Additionally I use windows because some of the programs I use day to day, are simply not available. Allaire Homesite is my primary program. Even more than Photoshop. That's not available for the Mac.

Many things from ICQ clients to FTP clients, programs, small apps, etc either is not available on Mac, or the versions lag behind in features. ICQ is an excellent example.

Also, I am a professional web designer, and feel it would be silly of me to be working on a platform other than what I design for. I know in this day and age, rendering on a Mac and PC aren't that different, considering IE is the default now, but the principle is there.

As for games, well, yes. That is a factor. I like games. I like them a lot. And even though they might in some way be BETTER games machines, the actual number of releases is sadly limited. Release times lag horrendously behind PC equivalents, and the smaller volume of sales means that Mac Games don't get real cheap in a month or so like PC games do.

Don't get me wrong. I'm not JUST a gamer. But I need a computer to do a wide range of things. Web Design. Programming. Business Communication. Surfing. Games. General Tinkering.

If I was just designing I would consider the Mac at least a viable platform. But I'm not. Sometimes I couldn't be bothered doing PHP programming, and just start playing 4 hours of Vampire the Masquerade, or Shogun instead.

Finally, there is one truly compelling issue here.

Considering the things I lose if I "convert" what do I actually GAIN? To my knowledge, nothing. Sure Mac OSX is good. OSX.1 is even faster. So? "A better operating system" makes no actual difference to my performance or enjoyment, considering the lingering problem of sluggish software support from software makers. I see no actual advantages to Macs, and many disadvantages.

Aside from generally "faster performance" which is in dispute here anyway, I don't see anything macs offer ME.

I'm talking about ME here. Bear that in mind.

"Easier to use and install" even if that was true, isn't relevant to me. I've been using computers for years, so it's not a factor.

"Quicker to get on the internet". the time taken to set up a dial up connection on a Mac can't be all that much different... seriously. I mean, it's like phone number, username, password, go.

"Looks better" I don't neccessarily agree with that. Actually. What the hell. I'll conceed that. It does look better. Assuming we're talking X here. XP goes well to try and look better. The "themes" thing is cool. Pity there's only one new one.

Are there any others anyone can offer? Seriously, here. Not trolling. Just wanting to see if anyone can offer actual serious benefits macs have. I will partially conceed performance and reliability, for the sake of argument. Are there any others?

God damn I write long posts... My apologies...

 

[snowman]

Well if you wrote a list like that, don't mind if I do the same:

This is why I am using a macintosh, note I'm talking about ME not trying to convert anyone here. I have nothing to benefit in switching to a PC.

I use my computer for programing, design and graphics, gaming, surfing, maintaining a server and tinkering.

All the programs I need are available for the Macintosh. When I started out I had to get a Mac since there weren't much software available for the PC.

Westlake is converting more than 10 games a year and since I don't buy 10 games a year and that's only one of the converting companies, I'm totally satisfied there too.

There are over 10.000 known viruses for the PC <--> there are about one hundred known viruses for the macintosh.

The mac is much easier to use. Sure I've been using computers for many years, but why do it the hard way when you can do it the easy way?

Why should I switch to a PC when I have everything I need on the Macintosh?

 

[whitegold]

dumb question

What's the difference?

Mac people often tell me they're "easier to use". How and why?

You mentioned doing things the hard way. I don't really see what's so hard about clicking "Start - programs - Adobe - Photoshop". I find it far more confusing to start Apps on a Mac, as there's no real consistancy in where programs live or how they start.

With things like email... you click the "outlook express" button. Internet explorer likewise is just a click away. Any settings that need to be input (for email etc) use an auto starting wizard that asks very clearly for information.

System settings all live in the control panel, which is likewise wizard based and fairly simple.

What is so much easier on a Mac? Particularly for new users. I think one thing to bear in mind is that a lot of MAC PEOPLE have trouble using a PC, because everything is "wrong". PC people find macs horrendously difficult and cludgy to use.

Aside from this sort of "contrast" issue, what actually makes Macs "easier to use".

 

[whitegold]

viruses

He he he... I find it funny that macs can't even get good support for viruses these days 🙂

You guys are missing out on some great viruses and worms. We'll have to try and get you Outlook Express, then you can catch up to the PC world of viruses, trojans, worms, scripts, etc. 🙂

Seriously, though, I don't consider viruses a major factor. Decent software protects you against them. Basic data protection and backup stops it even being an issue.

Personally, in nearly 10 years of computer ownership, I've NEVER had a virus. I use no software for protection. I never download the required patches. Just use basic common sense. Unusually rare, that common sense. 🙂

 

[snowman]

Re: dumb question

Okay, I haven't got a PC myself so I can't really compare. But however when I got my first mac many years ago we used PC's in school at the same time. And I must say that it was sooo much earsier to learn to use the Mac. However that was many years ago and a very early version of windows (used dos most of the time).
Anyways, alot of my friends got PC's and they have so much problems with their PC's. I have a "guru" PC-friend which is running around fixing my other friends computers all the time. I also have a few macintosh using friends. These on the other hand can fix all their problems themselfes (the few there are). I don't know why this is, but that's they way it is. Also, it seems to be very hard to get an installation right on a PC. My PC-friends always reminds me of how many more games there is for the PC, however many of them doesn't work very often. Also the installers tend to think that it is installing another program many times. One of my PC-friends can't use homeburned CD for more than about 10 times before the CD-player have made the CD unreadable. The CDs become transparent over time. This is probably due to the ridicioulus high speeds of the CD-drives.
Sure enough, for you as an experiences user you can probably get by fine. But because of all these little incidents there is no doubt in my mind that the Mac is more userfriendly. Make of this what you want, you asked.
Also another reason would be of the highter risk of getting infected by a virus on the PC-side. Viruses are not very often that userfriendly.

Originally posted by whitegold
What's the difference?

Mac people often tell me they're "easier to use". How and why?

You mentioned doing things the hard way. I don't really see what's so hard about clicking "Start - programs - Adobe - Photoshop". I find it far more confusing to start Apps on a Mac, as there's no real consistancy in where programs live or how they start.

With things like email... you click the "outlook express" button. Internet explorer likewise is just a click away. Any settings that need to be input (for email etc) use an auto starting wizard that asks very clearly for information.

System settings all live in the control panel, which is likewise wizard based and fairly simple.

What is so much easier on a Mac? Particularly for new users. I think one thing to bear in mind is that a lot of MAC PEOPLE have trouble using a PC, because everything is "wrong". PC people find macs horrendously difficult and cludgy to use.

Aside from this sort of "contrast" issue, what actually makes Macs "easier to use".

 

[snowman]

Re: viruses

I believe you here, but it still seems as if though more PCs get infected by viruses that Macs. There's even been incidents when major PC-based companies have shut down their operations temporarely due to viruses. You can't honestly believe that viruses aren't a bigger problem for PC-users?

Originally posted by whitegold
He he he... I find it funny that macs can't even get good support for viruses these days 🙂

You guys are missing out on some great viruses and worms. We'll have to try and get you Outlook Express, then you can catch up to the PC world of viruses, trojans, worms, scripts, etc. 🙂

Seriously, though, I don't consider viruses a major factor. Decent software protects you against them. Basic data protection and backup stops it even being an issue.

Personally, in nearly 10 years of computer ownership, I've NEVER had a virus. I use no software for protection. I never download the required patches. Just use basic common sense. Unusually rare, that common sense. 🙂

 

[snowman]

Re: viruses

Oh and BTW, Outlook is available for the Macintosh, so is most Microsoft warez, but I never use their crap.

Originally posted by whitegold
We'll have to try and get you Outlook Express, then you can catch up to the PC world of viruses, trojans, worms, scripts, etc. 🙂