G5, G4 or P4 Value Comparison..

R

RC23

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Ok, there would be a significant price difference here to deal with.. but honestly.

Would a 3ghz p4, with 1gb ddr400, run Avid $1300
just as well as a 1.8Ghz G5 with 512 DDR400? $2400
OR, a Dual 1.25Ghz... with 512MB DDR333... for $1700

which is the best value?

If the p4 system would run it better.. im not dishing out the cash for a g5... or g4..
 
The only thing that stands out in my mind is: how well is Avid coded for SMP systems? If it's multi-threaded and coded right, the dual G4 would in theory give you the combined power of 2.5 GHz. However you almost never get the exact factor of 2 performance gain becuase of the overhead related to multi-threaded software. General rule of thumb is that a single CPU system whose clockspeed is equal to that of a dual CPU system's combined CPU speed, the single CPU system would win in most speed tests.

So if you take the dual G4 out of the picture, now you have to consider how well the software is designed to take advantage of CPU features, SSE2 for the P4, Altivec on the G5 (it's actually a hybrid of Altivec with added instructions IBM threw in).

Long story short, I don't know :) wait for real life benchmarks!
 
Sorry to be off topic, but I was going to ask why you didn't choose to buy a 1.42 G4, but I just realized that Apple doesn't sell them anymore...

That's odd... why did they do that?
 
I didnt consider a DP 1.42, because they aqrent much better, and its an extra 1k.. infact dual 1.42 is more then dual 2ghz g5 :eek:
 
The 1.42 GHz PowerMacs aren't on Apple Store but you might find them from MacMall, PowerMac, or SmallDog. And if you can find a used/refurbrished one it won't cost you that whole extra $1K.
 
Originally posted by RC23
Ok, there would be a significant price difference here to deal with.. but honestly.

Would a 3ghz p4, with 1gb ddr400, run Avid $1300
just as well as a 1.8Ghz G5 with 512 DDR400? $2400
OR, a Dual 1.25Ghz... with 512MB DDR333... for $1700

which is the best value?

If the p4 system would run it better.. im not dishing out the cash for a g5... or g4..
Click to expand...
first of all why choose G5 1.8 and not G5 1.6 which is faster than the P4 and stands at $2000 ?

and what do u get with that P4 at $1300 ?? do u get an 80GB serial ATA hard drive ? do u get Geforce Fx ? do u get 2 firewire400, 1 firewire800 and 3 USB2 ?
Do u get a superdrive at 4x ?
the only thing u get is a crappy windows system with lame Windows XP :)

and if u add those up. theres no SIGNIFICANT price difference :)
 
Wait a minute here, we're yet to really prove that the G5s are faster than P4s so lets wait for some real world tests by someone who's not making a profit from PowerMac sales or relations to Apple.

Serial ATA hard drives right NOW are only a little faster than IDE hard drives, not enough to change the world... yet. So fine, go ahead and enjoy SATA in the new PowerMacs, you won't see a big difference in performance, and PC users have had SATA available for a while now.

Firewire is more dominant in Macs so of course they're going to put them in Macs but with PCs USB is the dominating standard and quite honestly, not many people care for Firewire. And those that do, like myself, would go out and buy an add on card which is just $50.

My Dell came with a DVDR drive and it was jus over $1000 for the whole system: 2.5 GHz P4, 512 MB DDR RAM 40 GB hard drive.

The GF Fx video cards, ok maybe that's a nice touch, but again, these cards came out for PCs first and there have been systems shipping with them at comparable prices to the G5s if not less. Another thing lacking on Mac is true workstation class video cards like Quadro and FireGL.
 
Originally posted by Lycander
Wait a minute here, we're yet to really prove that the G5s are faster than P4s so lets wait for some real world tests by someone who's not making a profit from PowerMac sales or relations to Apple.

Serial ATA hard drives right NOW are only a little faster than IDE hard drives, not enough to change the world... yet. So fine, go ahead and enjoy SATA in the new PowerMacs, you won't see a big difference in performance, and PC users have had SATA available for a while now.

Firewire is more dominant in Macs so of course they're going to put them in Macs but with PCs USB is the dominating standard and quite honestly, not many people care for Firewire. And those that do, like myself, would go out and buy an add on card which is just $50.

My Dell came with a DVDR drive and it was jus over $1000 for the whole system: 2.5 GHz P4, 512 MB DDR RAM 40 GB hard drive.

The GF Fx video cards, ok maybe that's a nice touch, but again, these cards came out for PCs first and there have been systems shipping with them at comparable prices to the G5s if not less. Another thing lacking on Mac is true workstation class video cards like Quadro and FireGL.
Click to expand...

pls go buy a PC . i wont even waste my time on you :)
 
Originally posted by RC23
Ok, there would be a significant price difference here to deal with.. but honestly.

Would a 3ghz p4, with 1gb ddr400, run Avid $1300
just as well as a 1.8Ghz G5 with 512 DDR400? $2400
OR, a Dual 1.25Ghz... with 512MB DDR333... for $1700

which is the best value?

If the p4 system would run it better.. im not dishing out the cash for a g5... or g4..
Click to expand...

Anti/Pro PC/Mac bigotry aside, why don't you wait until people get their hands on the g5 before asking this question. Right now we can only speculate on what it's performance might be.

One leg up that you have is that you have a specific application in mind. I would STRONGLY suggest that you ignore anyones opinion here unless they've actually used the EXACT app that you want to run. I'm sure others will be quick to purchase G5's to run avid, so ask other professionals that are running it and see what their opinions are. Also, don't pigeon hole yourself as far as PC configs go. You can easily purchase 2-4 cpu xeon systems if your budget allows consideration of higher end mac systems (even dual processor Athlon systems are very inexpensive). So if avid could really benefit from multiple processors, then check out ALL your options.
 
Originally posted by tsizKEIK
pls go buy a PC . i wont even waste my time on you :)
Click to expand...
I have 3 PCs, an iMac flat panel, and an iBook. So no, I won't be buying anything anytime soon.

I'm platform agnostic, I think they all suck and they're all good.
 
All true, I should just wait for real world test's and my personal experience on the new g5..

as for the specs i will get with the PC (I am building it, with all high end hardware)

Radeon 9700 Pro
P4 2.8Ghz 800fsb
Asus P4C800 motherboard
2x 512mb DDR400 Crucial ram
120Gb 8mb Cache Western digital harddrive

cant beat that price wise.. I should just wait to try one out.
 
I wouldn't buy the 1.6GHz G5, it's considerably lower end than the 1.8GHz....it only supports 4GB of ram, not 8GB....No PCI-X....80GB drive instead of 160GB.....256MB ram instead of 512....

Then again, I'd buy the Dual 2.0 myself.
 
Originally posted by RC23
Ok, there would be a significant price difference here to deal with.. but honestly.

Would a 3ghz p4, with 1gb ddr400, run Avid $1300
just as well as a 1.8Ghz G5 with 512 DDR400? $2400
OR, a Dual 1.25Ghz... with 512MB DDR333... for $1700

which is the best value?

If the p4 system would run it better.. im not dishing out the cash for a g5... or g4..
Click to expand...

I would buy the Dual G5/2GHz but that's just me! :p

Anyways, in your case you should go for the Wintel... It fits your character/personality perfect! :D No need to even think about getting a Mac solution near to the ones you ask here...

To put it in Matrix Reloaded way:
You are not here because you don't know what to do! You already made your choice... You are just here in order to understand it! :p :D ;)
 
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