Megahertz Myth...

i don't think anyone here has missed the point that this guy took his computers and ran somebenchmarks on some straightforward tasks and the macs lost.

but once you quickly figure out that a lot of things that would add to the validity of the tests are missing, it comes down to questioning just what he wanted to prove in the first place.

most of us have been using os x long enough to know that pure speed was never it's strength, no matter how big your mhz. the memory management is built for stability at this point. it's a trade off. i would love to see the same macs compete in os 9. they would undoubtibly pick up speed but then fall victim to the same issues of stability and multitasking as the pc's. He isn't just comparing hardware here, he is comparing os'es. also, notice the contradiction between the main headline and his subheader

Headline -
In pro digital photography, megahertz matters

subheader -
If RAW photo and Photoshop batch processing are important in your workflow, then speed is what you need
Click to expand...

one is a very broad baiting claim, the other is a very specific question. one doesn't have to read past this to figure this guy has an agenda. and basically what most of us here are doing is answering his question with a "no, RAW speed doesn't count for much." it's only one of a number of factors that matter.
 
Originally posted by kendall
OS X is very poor at multitasking without more than 512MB of RAM.

XP doesn't have this problem. It handles virtual memory a lot better.

I have a SMP P3 1GHz PC and haven't used a UP PC for awhile but I don't consider multitasking one of OS X's strong suits. At least not with a UP Mac.
Click to expand...

How come an iBook G3/800 compared to a P3/1GHz desktop, both with 256MB RAM the Mac running OS X and the P3 running XP, do the following:
-DVD playback
-MP3 playback
-CD Recording
the Mac handles the jobs with almost no drop of frames on the DVD or NOT a hitch with the MP3s while the PC loses both in DVD and MP3 playback? And that from a CPU running 200MHz less AND a slower hard disk?

Then again it may be that the OS X REALLY multitasks while the XP fakes it :D
 
Originally posted by kendall
OS X is very poor at multitasking without more than 512MB of RAM.

XP doesn't have this problem. It handles virtual memory a lot better.

I have a SMP P3 1GHz PC and haven't used a UP PC for awhile but I don't consider multitasking one of OS X's strong suits. At least not with a UP Mac compared to a UP PC.

In Windows XP I am simultaneously transcoding four 2hr+ DivX files to MPEG2. I'm using 90% of two CPUs but less than 300MB of RAM. I can't even run Jaguar with a few apps open with less than 300MB of RAM. My box doesn't crash, my MPEGs encode fine and I am able to do this and anything else I need without any problems.

I use Windows everyday and know it works. I love OS X to but when people bash Windows, I can't help but feel its out of ignorance, because I know it works.
Click to expand...

In a PowerMac G4/933 with 1GB of RAM I can do the following AT THE SAME TIME with NO problem whatsoever:
-DivX a FULL DVD (movie+subtitles) with Mencoder
-Play MP3s
-Run Word, Excel, TextEdit, AppleWorks, Internet Explorer, Safari, OmniWeb, AddressBook, Calculator, iCal, iPhoto, Mail, QuickTime playing a trailer, System Preferences, DVD Player, Chimera, Toast, Stickies, iSync, Clock and here is the best part: iMovie and do Video Editing while all the previous stuff is loaded with the MP3s playing and the Mencoder doing its charm WITH NO PROBLEMS!!!!!!

One CPU @ 933 against your Dual 1GHz which I would like to see you even try the above stuff... Give it a shot... I'll be around to help you recover your PC from crashing again and again...
 
i've searched his site a couple of times and found nothing to indicate he is a mac head. where do you get that from?
 
i have been using windows pcs for a while and it doesnt matter how fast it is, it is still going to crash. it will only crash faster now. I have NEVER used a windows pc that didnt crash, let alone heard of anyone who has had a flawless windows experience. So for my money, id rather spend a little extra on a system that is rock solid, than on the fastest system from dell. I dont have time to reinstall windows every week. I shouldnt have to. When i buy something, like a car or a TV, i want it to work, i dont want to have to make it work. And just because everyone else is using it, doesnt mean that i should use it. That makes for a very boring world. And as for compatability with other windows users, i have not run into any problems. They can read the cds i burn, and can open the files i send them. No problem. </rant> anyways. i dont see MHZ as an imprtant factor when buying a computer.
 
Originally posted by edX
i've searched his site a couple of times and found nothing to indicate he is a mac head. where do you get that from?
Click to expand...

Erm, his front page being full of reports of new mac apps, MacWorld product reports, etc. perhaps?

/GulGnu

-Stabil som fan!
 
gulgnu - his front page is just filled with all sorts of stories and links about photo and digital media software and hardware. it includes all platforms and manufacturers as far as i can tell. since apple is such a big player in this field, he would be leaving out a considerable number of potential viewers if he laeft macs out. the front page offers proof of nothing except that he runs a digital image web site.
 
Directly pulled from the article...

When the idea for this report was conceived, I'd assumed there would be more performance give and take across Mac and PC. Since the Mac is currently my primary computing platform, I'd certainly hoped this would be the case. But, the overall speed superiority of the PC is impossible to ignore...
Click to expand...
 
Originally posted by hulkaros
In a PowerMac G4/933 with 1GB of RAM I can do the following AT THE SAME TIME with NO problem whatsoever:
-DivX a FULL DVD (movie+subtitles) with Mencoder
-Play MP3s
-Run Word, Excel, TextEdit, AppleWorks, Internet Explorer, Safari, OmniWeb, AddressBook, Calculator, iCal, iPhoto, Mail, QuickTime playing a trailer, System Preferences, DVD Player, Chimera, Toast, Stickies, iSync, Clock and here is the best part: iMovie and do Video Editing while all the previous stuff is loaded with the MP3s playing and the Mencoder doing its charm WITH NO PROBLEMS!!!!!!

One CPU @ 933 against your Dual 1GHz which I would like to see you even try the above stuff... Give it a shot... I'll be around to help you recover your PC from crashing again and again...
Click to expand...

I had a iBook 800MHz with 128MB of RAM. I couldn't open two apps without poor OS X grinding to a halt. I upped the RAM to 640MB and everything was fine as long as I kept less than 10 apps running at a time. Anything over seven and things slowed down quite a bit. This was the same on my PowerBook 667 DVI with 786MB of RAM.

Anyway, what part of transcoding four 2hr+ DivX files to MPEG2 while doing everything else I need, (watch DivX movies, Office, Mozilla, WMP, etc) without any problems? XP doesn't crash. It's rock solid. So is OS X but it can't multitask like XP. Not even close.

Now this is just one person's opinion. Maybe I'm lucky not having any trouble with Windows but I know Windows is just as capable as OS X.
 
i have an 800mhz G4, 896mb ram, OSX 10.2.3
When i burn a cd, everything else slows to a snails pace, i can barely use proteus to talk to friends while burning a cd. I cant imagine decoding, encoding, watching dvds, listening to music, checking my email and all that at the same time.

I have a 700mhz Athlon Windows XP SP1. When i burn a cd, everything slows to a snails pace. I can barely use MSN messanger and AIM when burning a cd. I cant imagine decoding, encoding, watching dvds, listening to music, checking my email etc all at the same time.

I guess im the only one who has a computer that takes a hit in performance while doing cpu intensive tasks such as burning a cd.

on the subject of Windows having too many updates etc... Since the introduction of OSX how many total system updates have their been? Since the introduction of Win XP how many total system updates have their been?

IMO i think its pretty damned close.
 
no they are not, windowupdate has always a update, almost each week, as compared to apple's softwareupdate. and most of the time they are security updates!!! it kinda gets annoying.
 
i use xp as my web development server, for playing games, surfing, mysql db server. it has crashed on me a couple of time. while my mac does the same things. has not crashed yet.

xp sp1: P4 2ghz
osx 10.2.3: PowerPC G4 400MHz
 
just because somebody says their primary computer is a mac doesn't mean that he is a mac head. however i finally broke down and read some of his own forum's discussion of the article. he explains a few things he left out of the article. in fact his first post there is almost as long as the article.
let me quote one or two things from it -
Apple's claims, and similar claims in the Mac press, that the Mac is faster than a PC drives me nuts.
Click to expand...
so here he admits that his original intention was to show that PC's are faster. however, i think part of why he did this was for a good reason, even if his way of doing it was questioanble
If, as Mac user, that makes you mad, contact Apple, contact the software developers, and convince them that this is a problem to be dealt with asap.
Click to expand...
basically, he wants what all pro mac users want, some better top end hardware. i've long since admitted that this particular group of mac users has a point to some extent. and i see nothing wrong with them telling apple about it. and trying to convince everyone else to tell apple about it.
there's other points to be made from his post that the article misses, primarily that he admits that much of the software used for these tasks is not well coded for macs, but rather poorly ported. only in photoshop did the macs come consistently close, even winning a few,and we all know how long it took adobe to even figure out how to port to os x. there is no doubt that it still needs some fine tuning that is nobody's fault but adobe's.

but despite all this, he'll still be booting the mac everyday because 2 of his main programs are mac only. i guess the macs kicked ass in those side by side comparisons. :D

oh, and kendall, read the specs carefully - the dell didn't beat the powermac. it did in some of the first tests, but overall did slightly better.
 
Here's a question since i didn't have the time to respond to this eight page rant:

why wasn't this drawn out debate put in the cross platform forum? If it's expected that there will be plenty of mac bashing it should go there.

I'm sick of these articles about the mac being the wrong platform and these dang benchmarks tests. Who cares?! I'm starting to see the same one's here as i see on macnn. Are there any positive reviews someone could browse the newspapers for? Obviously there are some people who enjoy mac's in their jobs.
 
ed, i can tell you one of the programs that is horribly ported to OSX is the nikon programs, as a "photographer" who has taken about 4000 pictures in the last year, its quite the pain in the ass to deal with nikons crap software on osx... it was definately ported from windows and not optimized at all....

its no secret that most programs could be faster with some better coding

and my point with this whole thing was about the "professional" lineup... as a consumer i have no problem with the speed of my macs, but as a professional, its horrid, my machine quite frankly cannot keep up with the demands of large files, i just hope that apple comes up with something for the small niche of pros that need speed and power from their macs
 
another quote for ed...

First, it's important to understand that I'm a Mac guy. This is the platform I would prefer to use. That's primarily because I'm familiar with it after many years of the Mac being my primary computing platform. So, my familiarity with the Mac is a factor in the computer selection process, alongside RAW photo processing, Photoshop batch processing, image cataloging and card to computer transfer speed.
Click to expand...

seems to be a mac guy ;)
 
I have been considering switching now for about 3 years...... And I worry if my move will be enough an increase in speed. I am looking to replace my sony laptop (it is about ibook size, but it is super slow at this point, being 5 years old and no upgrades) Primarily I use a pc desktop w/ 800 p3 and 500mb ram. I can burn cds and check email at the same time, and i am using win 98. What causes my hesitation, speed. My next computer has to be smaller than my sony (no problem here) and significantly faster, and it doesn't seem as if it will be the case, so i am deciding to be patient. But I imagine of I was a pro user and saw that artice. Well if a $400 system beat the dual G4 and I could save $3200, I would be pretty willing to sacrafice a few things considering it is pretty easy to upgrade the hd and add firewire. And that is why lots of other potential switchers are sticking with microsoft. It is a lot cheaper to stay where you are, and the macs seem a bit expensive. (especially when you consider the costs of porting your info and applications. Hopefully in the next few months apple finds a way to catch up. Then cost won't be much of an issue.




PS: my first computer was an apple IIe, then we went DOS and never went back....besides of course those old school macs always floating around in school..... I think that is where a lot of people got turned off by macs. My high school had win 95 computers and those old school 1984 apples with the first mouse and grayscale screen in the computer lab. (i finished in the mid 90s)
 
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