Megahertz Myth...

[Jason]

Isnt a myth after all

http://www.robgalbraith.com/diginews..._07_macpc.html

I think its time apple looks into a new processor and quick... sorry apple, you just arent cutting it anymore

[binaryDigit]

Well yes and no. It is sorta a myth, but the difference has simply gotten too great. If the top P4 was at 2ghz, a 1.25ghz G4 based machine could give it a run for it's money. But a 3ghz machine is way too much for the lowly G4 to possibly keep up with.

Look at the benchmarks, the G4 will easily keep up with and beat the 1.8ghz Dell, and even though it is only 40% of the clock rate as the 3ghz, it is not nearly that slow in the benchmarks, some even come out fairly close.

Now there are some things to consider. The G$ IS a DUAL G4, so that does help SOME of the benchmarks, so it's not just a 3ghz vs 1.25ghz battle. One area that the G4 _should_ shine in is what if you want to browse some websites while your filters are being applied. On the Dell, this can be either A) painfully slow, B) have a major impact on performance, or C) both. The Apple should suffer less if you're doing more than one thing, since it can truely multitask. Another area is how efficient the OS is at multitasking, either in single or dual processor configurations. NT/2K/XP is not known for having the best multitasking around, so it will suffer when forced to do something other than a single major task. Don't know about OSX, haven't seen any benchmarks/comparisons (everyone wants to focus on single task benchmarks).

[Jason]

i would love to see a dual vs dual bench mark...

the myth is true you are right, but up to a certain point, a pentium 1.0ghz probably wont keep up against a g4 1ghz, but ive never seen the tests, so i wont assume.. ive never noticed big differences between my 700mhz pc and my 800mhz g4 and 800mhz g3 O_o

and as far as multitasking, i have no problems multitasking on my pc and its only a 700mhz athlon O_o, in the win9x days yeah it was an issue, but with xp its not a whole lot different than osx as far as sharing power between processes...

[mac-blog]

I'm sorry, but I think I heard some where that that benchmarking thing was fixed. When I compared my lowly iMac against my friends PC I couldn't get the PC to do anything using Mac OS X. Even if he had an 8 GHz PC system it wouldn't make any difference because when running in Mac OS X, Macs... run, and PCs don't even boot. If someone gave me the fastest super computer around today for free, I would end up just using my iMac because nothing I do now would most likely run on that type of system.

Now if I was someone who used Linux on a Mac, then maybe the whole comparing a Mac with a PC thing would make some sorta difference, but I run Mac OS X, so no matter how faster "other" computers are in the world, if they don't run on Mac OS X, why would I care.



Then again, I don't even usually buy the higher end Macs, so all this MHz/GHz stuff is sorta wasted on me anyways.

[edX]

you said it as well as i ever could mac-blog. right down to the last line!!

[UtaTr3y]

Apple needs to just discontinue their hardware line, the hardware is no longer inovative, its yesturdays technologies with a different form factor. They would make alot more money if they just competed with Microsoft on Intel.

Everyone hates Microsoft, apple would own the Desktop in under 5 years if they would just start using X86 hardware!

People say that hardware is the primary way Apple makes money, but look at microsoft, seems to me you can make a pretty penny with just selling software.

This is of course only my opinion. You may disagree, and many of you will likely be a little biased concidering you got ripped off paying for Apple hardware, but I truly beleive that if MacOS X was on X86 it would be easily the most popular OS in the world within a short time.

Apple has THE best OS in the world -> OSX, they simply can't compete in the hardware field however, and they need to stop trying!

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On a side note: Mac-Blog, you are aware that OS X runs ON hardware, not the other way around right? :-/

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You know, the reason so many people use Windows is because of its hardware. The reason people use Linux is because it runs on X86 (and its open source). The hardware is cheap, and powerful, neither of which Apple hardware can claim. People complain about both Linux and Windows, Apple lets you do everything both of these can perform however, but noone wants that damn hardware, its a rip off.

#1 Operating System = Mac OS X
#1 Hardware = X86

Doesn't it seem like a good marriage to you?

/me dreams of the day.........

I would go out and buy OSX tomorrow if it ran on an Intel architechture, untill then I have to go without however.

I probably know more about OSX then half the people on these boards, but I cannot use it because I refuse to be ripped off on the hardware side, MANY other people I know are the way... OSX would be an instant success on Intel based hardware if Apple would just wise up!!

/me shuts up on this matter...

[edX]

given the success of the iMac and apple's desktop line, i find that opinion to be just a little naive. no doubt you are one of these people who won't be happy til they have a big mhz mac. i still don't see this being an issue to the average consumer. it's not the mhz myth that people are worried about today, it's the office myth or windows myth - that you need a pc to be compatible. relatively few people actually buy the big mhz models in either platform.

[Jason]

i think apples design is absolutely great too, the iLamp and the laptops are both great exercises in design... they just need to catch up with the innards i suppose... i mean for most people it doesnt really matter, any consumer that just surfs the net does normal things etc wont care... but someone such as a graphic designer etc this is starting to matter that our hardware is falling behind, and to me thats scary, i just wonder whats going to happen

hopefully, the consumer models will sell enough to keep apple in business long enough for us to catch up