Powermac dual G4 1ghz vs Mac Mini
- Thread starter Paul C
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Lt Major Burns
"Dicky" Charlteston-Burns
the architecture would definately be faster, the hardrives faster, the pipelines bigger.
there is the added expandability, the fact that it was a pro machine, not a budget machine.
however, the mini is very small and sleek. the G4 tower... isnt.
(apple a few years ago, at the keynote introducing dual processing, showed a dual processor 500mhz G4 beat a 1ghz Pentium in half the time at a full photoshop job (done using actions), so, by calculation, 2 500mhz G4's were the equivalent of a 2Ghz Pentium. but don't take that as gospel.)
there is the added expandability, the fact that it was a pro machine, not a budget machine.
however, the mini is very small and sleek. the G4 tower... isnt.
(apple a few years ago, at the keynote introducing dual processing, showed a dual processor 500mhz G4 beat a 1ghz Pentium in half the time at a full photoshop job (done using actions), so, by calculation, 2 500mhz G4's were the equivalent of a 2Ghz Pentium. but don't take that as gospel.)
Paul C
Registered
I used to have a G4 AGP with a Sonnet 1ghz upgrade, 16x Pioneer DVD writer, 64mb graphics card, 120gb HDD and 764mb RAM but cos I'm a sucker for new things and wanted to save space I sold the powermac and bought a mac mini when they were first released. I have now released that I was stupid and want another Powermac for the upgradability 
Lt Major Burns
"Dicky" Charlteston-Burns
swap.
Definitely swap...for one the street value on the DP 1GHz is still in the $1000 (US) range. Speed wise, if the app is multi-processor aware then you'll notice a difference.
A good way to estimate roughly is a dual processor system is the equivalent of 160% to 170% of the single processor.
A good way to estimate roughly is a dual processor system is the equivalent of 160% to 170% of the single processor.
Lt Major Burns
"Dicky" Charlteston-Burns
no point, in that case. your mini is a very good computer, i would instead start saving now for a new powermac, say for buying in about a year/18 months from now.
Mikuro
Crotchety UI Nitpicker
One thing to keep in mind is that even the low-end machines of today have some faster components than the old high-end G4s. IIRC, the QuickSilvers used PC133 RAM, not PC2700 like the Mac mini, and had slower bus speeds to match.
Whether you'd benefit from the two processors depends a lot on what you do. Extra processors are always good, don't me wrong, but when each is running 20% slower than your Mac mini...it would probably be slower for anything not really optimized for multiple processors.
Whether you'd benefit from the two processors depends a lot on what you do. Extra processors are always good, don't me wrong, but when each is running 20% slower than your Mac mini...it would probably be slower for anything not really optimized for multiple processors.