Early PowerMac G5 1.6Ghz benchmarks.

http://www.chaosmint.com/powermac-g5-16/

A Mac user's rebuttal:

1. Boxx may well offer Dual opteron systems, but these systems run on Windows (Hello!?). I would NOT trust Windows with my important data. Windows is just a badly designed OS that gained the greater part of the market only because of good marketing, and not because it was the best product out there. And Linux is simply unpleasant to use as a desktop OS. Too amateurish.

Example: the joy of reinstalling Windows XP: http://diveintomark.org/archives/2003/08/04/xp

2. The PowerMac G5 is meant to compete with workstations like those http://www-1.ibm.com/servers/eserver/pseries/hardware/workstations/ . Notice how these 8000$ to 20 000$ workstations do NOT use Windows? And what's the price of the dual 2.0 Ghz G5 again?

Windows is good only for cheap gaming machines that can afford to crash more or less often (Depending on the quality of the hardware and on how much crap the user installs.) As Roger Ebert said: "The PC is a third rate Mac wannabe."

http://www.techtv.com/screensavers/showtell/story/0,24330,3382564,0...

WOW! http://www.tyan.com/products/html/thunderk8w.html
This is going to be my next workstation. The time has come to retire my old 1.2Ghz Athlon MP's.

Well, I'm afraid in the end this debate is purely a subjective matter. If you need to use software that's available only on the Mac, then get a Mac. If your priority is gaming, then get a PC. If you need PC software, then get a PC. And it's obviously not contradictory to own both a PC, a Mac and a Linux box if thats what you need to have.

So saying Macs are worthless makes as much sense as saying PCs are worthless.

Purely subjective matters are annoying, because you cannot come out with any universal truth about them. For example, the statements "PCs are better" and "Macs are better" are contradictory, yet they are both equally valid, depending entirely on who emits them.

Oh god my Powerbook just crashed! Seriously.

Wow, This thread is more lame than usual... (yes, on both sides)

Why ignore AMD?
Few reasons. First, marketing is meant to keep things simple; once you start mentioning more than one processor, it isn't as 'black and white'.
Also, you always target the top of the market, a larger target, and makes it sound like you are in second.
Also, the G3/4 chip has had certain advantages over the Pentium chips at certain applications. The AMD offerings were also strong in these areas, so it would not have made as striking a comparison. And again, it brings in confusion having to detail which areas you are better than Intel, which better than AMD, etc.

What about BOXX?
Again, a few points.
First, I believe BOXX announced these systems about **TWO DAYS** before Apple made the claim; talk about splitting hairs.
Second, the BOXX systems are listed as 'workstations', and the G5 is listed as the 'fastest desktop'. Now you and I know there really isn't a difference. This is what people in *marketing* do. Ever hear those truck commercials about 'best in class' or 'most powerful in class'; guess what, *they* get to define what 'class' they are in. Yes it is marketing, no it isn't the absolute undebatable truth, but to get your panties in a bunch is being a bit anal about it.
Third, BOXX is not really a 'major player'. While they seem to make good boxen, I can't really take Apple to task for missing one company. Sheesh, get over it.

cy_a253, could we please lay off the "MaCs R00L, PeeCees Dr00L" type comments.
However, you are right, MS and Intel both make wacky claims also. (speed up the internet anyone??)

Deth, I don't suppose you want to quantify what you mean by 'delusional' and 'completely absurd'. especially since all reports seem to (basically) back up their claims.

Radioactive, try not to drool on your keyboard when you type.

Dually,. yeah well, my friends brothers boss's wife works with WIndows machines, and they crash twice a day.....

[QUOTE]I know I am just throwing the burden of proof back to you, but name something in Windows that Microsoft created that Apple had not done before... [/QUOTE]

Please. Stardock was doing all that GUI enhancement and much more with Object Desktop when OS X was still in alpha, so save us the perennially fallacious, "Apple continues to reinvent the GUI and M$ continues to copy..." It just doesn't fly.

{QUOTE]Yes, but SPEC is a very synthetic benchmark, so like the CTP test, it may not be appropriate as a way to compare different CPU architectures.[/QUOTE]

I know this would never occur to you as an Apple user that is woefully ignorant about all things hardware, but SPEC benchmarks are application-based, not synthetic. A cursory glance at the composition of the benchmark would tell you that, but the power of the RDF must be too great to let Apple users see something so seditious.

WTF?
First, where are you spending $4000 for a G5. The dual is only $3K.

Second, the G4 laptops were comparable to the intel offerings in both price, features, and speed. (I believe Centrino may be changing things) but for the time when you bought the PBook, I doubt you could have gotten much better with PC.

.

I got a hyperthreaded intel chip and the net doesn't seem any smarter... Oh well, back to AMD

;-)

I think most PC buyers looking at small form factors forget about Apple's cube & lamp. I think they were small first.

I think most people around here want to like Apple, but just get fed up with them.

For a site that doesn't review anything Apple, the peanut gallery sure comes out of the woodwork anytime even remotely fruity is mentioned.

The poor saps that run dual G4 machines here at work crash at least once or twice a week. I haven't crashed yet on my "lowly" P4/WinXP system.*

So...stability? My arse.

*Results as of November 2002. :)

Well to mention the competition would be to legitamize the competition. Apply has what 3% of the Computer / CPU market, AMD 18-20%, Intel about 80%. I think Apple is playing on the fact that most Americans are stupid and have think of Intel when it comes to PCs. Intel certainly has the 64 bit Itanium and I2 but it does not have a 64 bit desktop machine (at least officially).

I also want to see some benchmarks vs the Opteron machines

Hey look what I found. Composite Theoretical Performance (CTP) in Millions of Theoretical Operations per Second (MTOPS) benchmarks.

Opteron vs G5 baby! Finally!

http://www.amd.com/us-en/Processors/TechnicalResources/0,,30_182_86...

Opterons

Single processor configurations:
AMD Opteron Model 140 5017 MTOPS
AMD Opteron Model 142 5734 MTOPS
AMD Opteron Model 144 6451 MTOPS
AMD Opteron Model 146 7168 MTOPS

Dual processor configurations:
AMD Opteron Model 240 9567 MTOPS
AMD Opteron Model 242 10933 MTOPS
AMD Opteron Model 244 12300 MTOPS
AMD Opteron Model 246 13667 MTOPS

Quad processor configurations:
AMD Opteron Model 840 18667 MTOPS
AMD Opteron Model 842 21333 MTOPS
AMD Opteron Model 844 24000 MTOPS
AMD Opteron Model 846 26667 MTOPS

http://www.info.apple.com/support/export.html

G5

Power Mac G5
(Single Processor)
@ 1.6 GHz 19,336 MTOPS

Power Mac G5
(Single Processor)
@ 1.8 GHz 21,753 MTOPS

Power Mac G5
(Dual Processor)
@ 2 GHz 45,000 MTOPS

45,000 vs 13,667 for a Dual Opteron?!
45,000 vs 26,667 for a Quad Opteron?!!

Can anyone confirm these numbers? Because if they are a reliable mesure of performance, we have to wonder how the hell did IBM and Apple came up with something so far ahead than the competition!! woooh :0

I was in the Philadelphia airport a few days ago, looking at those monitors that show you the flight arrival and departure times, when I noticed one of the monitors had the OS X kernel panic box up. So (1) the Philly airport uses OS X and (2) OS X sometimes crashes. But I thought (1) was more interesting.

Awesome!!

I wonder if I'll be able to upgrade the mobo in my Powerbook G4 to a g5 one when it comes. I hope they don't change the form factor too much.

Wake me up when they start tossing these into laptops.

Say it with me:
A $2,000 - $3,000 machine is NOT a desktop machine; it's a workstation.

Kurlon : Given Apple doesn't want anyone to touch this machine untill shipping, I doubt we'll see any usefull comparison numbers for awhile.

Where do you get *that* from? Apple has been sending these machines around, and people have been running tests and demos on them and reporting around the net. They also had some at recent trade shows, and others ran tests there too.
No, they have not let any out of their hands, but your statement is patently false.

.

Ugh, misreplied....

As a Mac user, I'm more excited about AMD64 than I am about the G5.

Yeah, I know, I should be whooping it up, but quite frankly, I don't do anything on my Macs that would benefit from the speed increase. While I'd like to have a G5 system, I'd rather have an AMD 64.

The reason is that I'm a gamer and while games for the Mac have gotten much better in the past few years, they still don't come out as quickly. Very few are released in the same time frame and some titles never make it at all (Counter Strike, for example).

Eventually, I'll have both, but the AMD64 will be first, without a doubt.

#19;

"The Calculations are stated in Millions of Theoretical Operations Per Second (MTOPS) and are based upon a formula in the United States Department of Commerce Export Administration Regulations 15 CFR 774 (Advisory Note 4 for Category 4)."

Those are not actual Benchmarks, they are for actuarial analysis for export purposes, considering Apple doesn't actually have an Export market, they are more then useless...

Apple wouldn't exist without the help of a small herd of sheep with credit cards that fall for slick advertising, and wanna be part of something, without actually learning anything about much of anything. Their clientle remind me of that particulary stupid variety women who buy overpriced, low quality shoes, that fall apart after a few hours of wear... poor Apple cant sell more then a couple million units a year to these poor SOBs, nothing like selling everything you can produce and still losing market share, they just fell below 2% :p

'Selling idiots underperforming, overpriced crap for 15 years, and they still havn't noticed.' Probably not their next marketing meme, but it certainly should be :)

"DMN: Now, you're saying it's the first 64-bit desktop machine. But isn't there an Opteron dual-processor machine? It shipped on June 4th. BOXX Technologies shipped it. It has an Opteron 244 in it.

Rubinstein: Uh...

Akrout: It's not a desktop.

DMN: That's a desktop unit.

Akrout: It depends on what you call a desktop, now. These… From a full desktop per se, this is the first one. I don't know how you really distinguish the other one as a desktop.

DMN: Well, it's a dual processor desktop machine, just like that one.

Akrout: It's not 64, then.

DMN: Yes, it's a 64-bit machine with two Opteron chips in it. It started shipping June 4th.

Akrout: That we'll double check, but in my mind, it wasn't."

Almost as good as the NextGen interview with the CEO of Atari circa 1996 ;) ("The PSX is a little more powerful than the Jaguar" "actually, can I take that back? The Jaguar is better in more important areas" "No no no, this is final: The Jaguar is the superior machine, for $149")

When it comes to the PC world Apple has no clue. They chose to not look and not care, which results in very stupid remarks. All in all i would not pay for a MAC unless i can get the newest one for under a grand.

It must be said for Apple that $3000 for a dual-proc machine with good performance and 400 MHz DDR with a pretty good graphics card is a lot better than what they have been offering until now.

It's not easy being Apple technician. ;D

hahahhah that interview made me laugh. poor apple folk dont seem to keep up with whats going on in the tech. world.

See the Press Release:

http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2003/aug/18pmg5.html