System Performance

[Wildy]

Since my eagerly anticipated G5 Quad was dropped by the DHL man, I've decided to get a PowerBook G4 to play with in the meantime. It's got 1GB of RAM installed currently (not sure whether it is PC4200 or not) and OS X 10.5.8.

From my limited Mac experience I seem to remember that whenever you closed a program it would remain open on the dock for quick access. Being fairly OCD about these things I then always right-clicked and 'Quit' manually from the dock too.

Does having things open on the dock affect performance or does OS X have its own memory management built in (like in Android) which means that it will take care of this by itself?



Cheers,
Mike

 

[zen.state]

If it's still running then it's using CPU and RAM so yes it will slow things down. Simply closing the window keeps the app running in a very large majority of Mac apps. If it has a silverish/white dot under it then it's running.

You only have 1GB RAM which is the bare minimum for 10.5. You need to keep all the RAM free you can for the best performance. If you're not currently using something I recommend you close it. After all the most important thing performance wise is how well an app performs when you're actually trying to use it. Not how fast it launches. Having a bunch of other apps running in the background is only going to hinder every thing you try to do.

To check the exact RAM you have just click on the apple menu and click "About this Mac". Then click on more info which will produce a system info window with an index on the left. Click on memory and it will tell you. If it is indeed 4200DDR then I assume you have the G4 1.67? If so you can easily and cheaply double the RAM. I just upgraded a clients 1.67 to 2GB and the 2x 1GB sticks were only $54 shipped. Even cheaper on ebay. 2GB will make a big difference.

 

[Wildy]

Thanks for the advice. It hasn't actually arrived yet (fingers cross this one doesn't get dropped too ) so I can't check the specs. But I know it's a high-res 1.5GHz which means that it should have the faster 4200 RAM. I was planning on upgrading the RAM anyway, although I'm not sure whether it's a 1x1GB or 2x512MB config.

Is there any particular reason why it keeps them open, I mean isn't that what the Minimize button is for?

 

[zen.state]

Is there any particular reason why it keeps them open, I mean isn't that what the Minimize button is for?

You seem to be basing things on how Windows works. The easy answer is it works that way because thats how Macs run. I close apps by just pressing command (apple key) + Q on the keyboard.

By the way.. the 1GHz 15" FW 800 model and on of the PowerBook G4 can hold 2GB RAM so your 1.5GHz can for sure. I strongly recommend the 2GB upgrade as OS X benefits from RAM upgrades more than virtually any other OS out there.

 

[Wildy]

Well, it's not just relevant to Windows, it' the conventional way of ending a process in most operating systems. Anywho, it just struck me as odd that there were two buttons that did the same thing (more or less).

I look forward to getting my Mac and testing some things out. Thanks for your help Also, how hard is it to get a *nix dual boot on there?

 

[zen.state]

Also, how hard is it to get a *nix dual boot on there?

The only current Linux for PowerPC I know of is YellowDog (still developed officially by them) and Ubuntu which themselves stopped PowerPC support but there is a small group of people porting the new builds to PowerPC. As for BSD I have seen rare builds of OpenBSD here and there and of course Darwin which it Apple's BSD. BSD also doesn't have built in GUI installs or even GUI for the OS use itself. You have to add everything you want via command line. Much less user friendly that those 2 Linux I list.

If your intention with Linux is to get better performance then don't bother. I have played with both these on several different PowerPC systems they they are actually slower than 10.3 - 10.5. You already have *nix anyway in the Mac OS. Use X11 on the Mac to help you run non-native *nix apps.

 

[Joshuarocks]

Linux?

So, is Linux a waste of time to run on the PPC macs? I once downloaded Yellow Dog Linux and it ran quite nicely, though I am waiting for MorphOS to come out for G5 and G4 PPC machines.

Seems there are still a lot of developers out there, writing PPC programs and Linux PPC ports.

www.penguinppc.org I think has a list of all the builds currently and even future ones.

 

[zen.state]

So, is Linux a waste of time to run on the PPC macs? I once downloaded Yellow Dog Linux and it ran quite nicely, though I am waiting for MorphOS to come out for G5 and G4 PPC machines.

Seems there are still a lot of developers out there, writing PPC programs and Linux PPC ports.

www.penguinppc.org I think has a list of all the builds currently and even future ones.

It's not that Linux is a waste of time on PowerPC. If someone needs or prefers Linux then they should run it. My point is that a lot of people presume it will be noticeably faster.

An Apple OS will always run better on Apple PowerPC hardware as they have far more developing resources to optimize every aspect of the OS. With intel macs though this isn't the case as they use generic x86 chips and chpsets. When it comes to PowerPC I find 10.4 or 10.5 faster than any *nix. Even when Xubuntu was still developed for PowerPC is was slower. Xubuntu is a very stripped down ubuntu that is meant to run well on old systems.

 

[Joshuarocks]

It's not that Linux is a waste of time on PowerPC. If someone needs or prefers Linux then they should run it. My point is that a lot of people presume it will be noticeably faster.

An Apple OS will always run better on Apple PowerPC hardware as they have far more developing resources to optimize every aspect of the OS. With intel macs though this isn't the case as they use generic x86 chips and chpsets. When it comes to PowerPC I find 10.4 or 10.5 faster than any *nix. Even when Xubuntu was still developed for PowerPC is was slower. Xubuntu is a very stripped down ubuntu that is meant to run well on old systems.

Good to know.. ok, for my newly acquired Power Mac G5 Quad, I take it Leopard will fly on that thing, right? What would be a good OS to run on my Power Book G4 1.67 Hi-Res? I have Leopard, but it seems a little sluggish, not too much though.. I was thinking of getting a faster hard drive to see if that speeds it up. On my external OWC on the go drive, I have Tiger installed and it seems Tiger is much faster and more responsive than Leopard on the PB G4 1.67, though my PB meets and EXCEEDS by a long shot the requirements for Leopard. It also has 2GB DDR2 memory.

 

[zen.state]

Good to know.. ok, for my newly acquired Power Mac G5 Quad, I take it Leopard will fly on that thing, right? What would be a good OS to run on my Power Book G4 1.67 Hi-Res? I have Leopard, but it seems a little sluggish, not too much though.. I was thinking of getting a faster hard drive to see if that speeds it up. On my external OWC on the go drive, I have Tiger installed and it seems Tiger is much faster and more responsive than Leopard on the PB G4 1.67, though my PB meets and EXCEEDS by a long shot the requirements for Leopard. It also has 2GB DDR2 memory.

The 1.67 PowerBook will run 10.5 very well. The only PPC Macs I wouldn't run Leo on is the ones it needs to be shoehorned on ie. sub 867MHz. A client of mine has the same laptop with 2GB and it runs 10.5 like a champ. The Radeon 9700 it has is also one of the better GPU's for core image, opengl and quartz etc.

It goes without saying that 10.5 will scream on a Quad G5.

 

[Joshuarocks]

The 1.67 PowerBook will run 10.5 very well. The only PPC Macs I wouldn't run Leo on is the ones it needs to be shoehorned on ie. sub 867MHz. A client of mine has the same laptop with 2GB and it runs 10.5 like a champ. The Radeon 9700 it has is also one of the better GPU's for core image, opengl and quartz etc.

It goes without saying that 10.5 will scream on a Quad G5.

Yeah, I tried to install Leopard on my G4 Pismo, saw how slow it was and therefore went back to Tiger on it. Besides, it is only used for my OS 9 Nostalgia and since I never had the chance to experience the original Mac OS X when it came out, I now can since I found Public Beta and 10.0, 10.1 + 10.2

 

[Wildy]

The reason I ask about Linux is because I use it for quite a lot of development stuff and it would be nice do to be able to do a little dev work on the move. There would be no point getting a PowerBook if I were just going to wipe it and put Linux on - today I've actually just acquired a cheap and cheerful eMachines laptop from a friend - I'll use that for development.

Thanks all