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The Mighty Powermac G5
- Thread starter Dronecatcher
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Finally. a good review of a PPC mac.
I hated 8bit guy's review of the PowerMac G5 quad from 2016. 1, he was using an old version of TenFourFox. 2, he was spitting out incorrect facts ''can't really run YouTube on a G4 at all these days'', and kept making the G5 seem like a giant waste of power sucking, slow, obsolete, unsupported, hunk of loud office heater. Old version of TFF, not trying to use any other browsers or YouTube alternatives, but thats all those ''using this machine in the year 201x'' videos do anyways, make these machines seem much less capable then they actually are. For example, using TenFourFox to play YouTube on a 1.33ghz Powerbook, not bothering to research other browser options (leopard webkit) before they record the video.
EXAMPLE:
(go to 23:00)
Many of @Dronecatchers YouTube playback options on the G3 or G4 Macs could have been shown in those reviews, but no, its time to upgrade your hardware.
Pretty much almost mocking the people who use these machines ''why don't you upgrade your Mac or PC, why do you still use those old machines?''
I hated 8bit guy's review of the PowerMac G5 quad from 2016. 1, he was using an old version of TenFourFox. 2, he was spitting out incorrect facts ''can't really run YouTube on a G4 at all these days'', and kept making the G5 seem like a giant waste of power sucking, slow, obsolete, unsupported, hunk of loud office heater. Old version of TFF, not trying to use any other browsers or YouTube alternatives, but thats all those ''using this machine in the year 201x'' videos do anyways, make these machines seem much less capable then they actually are. For example, using TenFourFox to play YouTube on a 1.33ghz Powerbook, not bothering to research other browser options (leopard webkit) before they record the video.
EXAMPLE:
Many of @Dronecatchers YouTube playback options on the G3 or G4 Macs could have been shown in those reviews, but no, its time to upgrade your hardware.
Pretty much almost mocking the people who use these machines ''why don't you upgrade your Mac or PC, why do you still use those old machines?''
I must admit, the Linux Wiki has been out long enough by now where several "Linux on PPC" videos have since been made, and it always seems that nobody ever did the research to stumble across it, where they would have then had a guaranteed better experience.
No, instead they conclude with "Linux on PPC sucks and doesn't work", meanwhile there are resources online that directly counteract this, time and again...
Just more easy clicks for Pro-Tubers and their army of "Cool video bro!" fans...
If Linux sucks so much it must be because it can easily play 1080p 60fps video on YouTube with little to no stutter. Oh also, a bigger variety of modern browsers maybe.
Luke Miani posted a video about the Mac Mini G4, and how worthless it is these days. If I were a "oh yeah?!?" kind of person, I'd post a response video showing 720p video playback, browsing modern websites, and other "modern" things that one can do with the machine... and all of this on a SATA SSD connected via Firewire (my internal drive is an SD card running OS 9.2.2 unsupported, and running it well).
I'm just not that kind of person. Let them hate on these machines so that the "vintage" madness, $200 broken machines and $1,500 17" Powerbooks disappear...
To be fair it's his beefy GPU that lifts performance here - 2Gb VRAM and fully accelerated under Linux.
Ah yes, Luigi Burdo. Another guy who pushes his machines to their limits, but he does some crazy things like flash expensive, high memory video cards and spend tons of cash on upgrades. I definitely admire what he's done, but we haven't heard from him in a while.
Not just that, The 8-Bit Guy's PowerMac G5 Quad was broken. He lent it from a family member, who was (maybe still is) in the Low End Mac Facebook Group, where he himself said the Quad he lent to him had coolant leakage. This was also visible in the video (dried up residue on the bottom of the case). So the system's air cooling was going in full force to compensate for the lost coolant. He never bothered to update the video, leave a pinned comment, or anything like that. Only on his Facebook, but he ranted about "all the hatemail" he got about the video mostly, not really admitting the video was misleading due to the Mac being defective.
If I'm not mistaken, that 2GB VRAM GPU he used isn't flashed at all. I have read modern-ish GPUs "just work" on G5s under GNU/Linux. Although, in his case, he still relied on a Mac-compatible GPU in order to boot (a flashed 512MB VRAM GeForce card IIRC, which is a popular, "regular" flashing option for PCIe G5s), and then inserted his 2GB VRAM card on a separate slot to accompany it (meaning only 1 PCIe slot was left).
Edit: Oh, although all this is not to say you ever said or necessarily implied otherwise.
Oh no, I wasn’t aware of that at all. Very interesting, and an experiment I’d like to try in the near future. Thanks for enlightening me. I guess I wasn’t paying close enough attention to his videos.
I wonder if the flashed 512mb card he’s using is a Quadro FX4500, like mine
From this forum post from Luigi, it appears some work is necessary to get the AMD cards to properly work in PowerPC Linux: https://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=2274612
This is what we see on another video of his:I wonder if the flashed 512mb card he’s using is a Quadro FX4500, like mine
NVidia GeForce 7800 GTX 512MB VRAM version (as opposed to 256MB). Its best-functioning modified ROM is based on the Quadro's (near identical, in fact. Personally compared the two myself). It's slightly faster/better-performing, but it's not a better card in every way. For instance, the Quadro supports 2 dual-link DVI instead of just 1. I think there was more. (And honestly, the Quadro is already "too good" as is.)
That "supporting" card he has... I wonder if combining cards that way has any chance to work under OS X. I figure probably not, but if I ever get my hands on more modern cards not meant for the G5, it's worth testing. Owners of early Mac Pros can try doing this sort of coupling with its GPUs for a higher chance of success (since Leopard has, apparently, drivers for those, although they could be Intel-only).
For reference, here are the used cards' specs:
https://www.techpowerup.com/gpu-specs/radeon-hd-6570.c277
https://www.techpowerup.com/gpu-specs/geforce-7800-gtx-512.c144
So he got working a PCIe Gen 2 card specifically. A lot more "believable" than doing the same with a Gen 3 card.
Incidentally, here's a card with a higher processing clock and faster VRAM (despite half the VRAM) that is nowhere near as hard to find online, compared to the GeForce 7800 GTX (512MB VRAM version):
https://www.techpowerup.com/gpu-specs/radeon-x1950-xt.c190
Vast VRAM difference aside, it's near-identical in processing clock when compared with that Radeon HD 6570. Not so sure what "x MHz effective" memory clock means, though.
https://www.techpowerup.com/gpu-specs/radeon-hd-6570.c277
https://www.techpowerup.com/gpu-specs/geforce-7800-gtx-512.c144
So he got working a PCIe Gen 2 card specifically. A lot more "believable" than doing the same with a Gen 3 card.
Incidentally, here's a card with a higher processing clock and faster VRAM (despite half the VRAM) that is nowhere near as hard to find online, compared to the GeForce 7800 GTX (512MB VRAM version):
https://www.techpowerup.com/gpu-specs/radeon-x1950-xt.c190
Vast VRAM difference aside, it's near-identical in processing clock when compared with that Radeon HD 6570. Not so sure what "x MHz effective" memory clock means, though.
Luke Miani is a modern Apple customer.
Either way, you can't help the willfully ignorant.
I'm glad someone finally challenged that stupid video that the 8bit guy uploaded. It seemed like he didn't even use that G5 for anything other than a chair when making that video. I'm pretty sure he claimed his was a quad. A quad G5 should blow away any of the C2D Minis in processing power. I've got the same G5 used in this video, a dual 1.8Ghz. Only mine has 6GB of ram and a Geforce 6800 Ultra GPU installed. I haven't found one thing I can't do with it. My Mac Pros are faster, but the G5 is still a blast to use.
This is a hilariously good (truthful) statement. You have my seal of approval.
This is a commonly agreed upon sentiment, I expect with good reason.
How are these machines so widely fun to simply use? What is it about them, it can't solely be the software...
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For one thing, they aren't just another everyday IBM PC compatible like every Mac that came after the G5 Quad. The bare metal had meaning beyond the software.
Another thing that I only have a basic notion of is that given the same processor clock, PowerPC handled some operations better than Intel/AMD, and vice-versa. Some true processor guru might be able to nicely elaborate further on that.
What that means, for example, is that some tasks done in 2.5 GHz PPC accomplished the same as, say, 3.1GHz Intel, and vice-versa. Something to that effect. Those numbers are 100% made up, but not the concept.
The G5 Quad is indeed super good. If that "mere" (read: still incredibly good) 1.8 Dual-Processor kicked the @ss of an Intel Core Duo Mac mini, I cannot even begin to imagine how devilishly the 2.5 Dual-Core Dual-Processor G5 Quad smokes it into oblivion: Faster expansion slots (PCIe versus AGP, PCI or PCI-X), double the L2 cache per core (quadruple per processor, and per machine), faster RAM (533MHz), more RAM (16 GB) and graphics cards with up to 512 VRAM and, with flashing, 625 MHz of GPU Clock wth 900 MHz Memory Clock (1800 MHz effective, whatever that difference is).
It's a machine that by no means is underpowered for today's standards. Very usable, very much not loud, does not use up as much energy as rumored, and is really upgradeable and maintainable. Amazingly modular. Aesthetically beautiful inside and outside, like every G5.
I don't understand why everyone always says G5s are loud.
My G5s (count 3) are all quieter than any G4 tower that I have; which is every G4 generation they made. Hell I'm fairly certain my PowerBook G4s are louder under load.
My Mac mini G4 is louder sometimes. Sometimes.
The only instance a working G5 is loud is when running hardware tests in ASD (Apple Service Diagnostic) in Open Firmware. Or when Mac OS X crashes (once every blue moon when all the right planets align), and even then only if you still leave it on for no reason instead of restarting.
The only instance a working G5 is loud is when running hardware tests in ASD (Apple Service Diagnostic) in Open Firmware. Or when Mac OS X crashes (once every blue moon when all the right planets align), and even then only if you still leave it on for no reason instead of restarting.
I did at the time - even posted a video of my own Quad playing 1080P Youtube in silence...but of course, no repsonse from him.
That's true, but lets also not forget he was using the Firefox browser. Not even the new style faster Quantum Firefox (which I don't think ever ran on PPC) , but the old style Firefox. Video acceleration or not, it's also a known fact that Google slows down sites like YouTube on Firefox and reduces performance because they want everyone to switch to their chrome browser. If he used a lighter browser, if one should exist for that flavor of linux, he could have probably achieved higher 1440p video playback.
[doublepost=1566472431][/doublepost]
Unfortunately it can no longer... (everything is HTML 5 now) not in OS X anyways, as webkit never allows higher than 720p. TenFourFox couldn't push past 480p I'd imagine.
[doublepost=1566472776][/doublepost]
Anyone that uses a G5 as a chair or makes an iMac G3 cat house can't be trusted anyways, to him that G5 is nothing more than a joke, a big chunk of aluminum cheese grater. He gave up on PPC years ago anyways.
In most tasks my Quad appeared no faster than my Dual 2.3 - only on transcoding did it have the extra horsepower.
I have been contemplating in getting a PowerMac G5 either for free from a recycling facility where I volunteer or for a small fee including the G5 Quad and I had watched the 8bit guy video, PowerPC hub, It'sMyNaturalColour etc to get some ideas on usage and I found the 8bit guy video presentation to be well balanced. There are always uses for any computer of any lineage and I don't think there is a rule that you need to upgrade to the latest computers as long as you are happy with your applications. Now, if you need to access banking and government financial social assistance websites then you may be required to use the latest browsers or use the latest tax software where the G5 could not run. And most people watching Youtube these days are with their phones and tablets, meaning no fan noise. So if you bring everything I mentioned from people who have modern day expectations buy a PowerMac G5 today, I believe 8bit guy's video provided that balanced viewpoint.
I think it's quite impressive to see a community of G5 users who are being creative in pushing their machines further and sometimes making them their daily driver. But while you may be happy with your needs, not everyone have similar needs as you do, so I think it's prudent to bring transparency of what a G5 can and can not do and a balanced viewpoint, a viewpoint which sometimes you may not always want to agree with nor support with.
That is what I look for in any computer review (positive and negative qualities).
I think it's quite impressive to see a community of G5 users who are being creative in pushing their machines further and sometimes making them their daily driver. But while you may be happy with your needs, not everyone have similar needs as you do, so I think it's prudent to bring transparency of what a G5 can and can not do and a balanced viewpoint, a viewpoint which sometimes you may not always want to agree with nor support with.
That is what I look for in any computer review (positive and negative qualities).
Couldn't disagree more. How could his viewpoint be balanced when he was reviewing a computer that had a damaged cooling system? At the time of his video, the machine he used bore no resemblance to mine - his viewpoint was from a user with a broken computer with no intention of fixing it nor spending a few hours finding all the right software for it.