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Kennel · Oct 17, 2003, 08:22 PM

I'm planning on doing my own little G5/Athlon 64 shootout, but since I'm primarily a Windows user, I have little knowledge on what apps would be suitable for such a comparison. What I'm looking for is to test real-world performance. By real-world I mean how the computers perform running apps the average Joe runs. Running spec-tests and the like is fine for techies, but I want to see how they perform in real life. The apps should, of course, be available for both platforms and to make the comparison as fair as possible, the apps should not be bad ports. The only two apps I can think of are Photoshop and Quake3. They both run fine on MacOS X and Windows XP and aren't hindered in any way on one of the platforms. An example of a bad app to test would be Quicktime, which is a complete dog on Windows. Does anyone have any suggestions?

What are the most popular apps for MacOS X that are also available for Windows XP and that can be benchmarked?

RooneyX · Oct 17, 2003, 08:25 PM

It's way to early. Years too early!

Kennel · Oct 18, 2003, 06:31 AM

Thanks, that we helpful

How can it be too early to compare? If we can't compare, what are the selling arguments for the processors? "The G5/Athlon 64 will be the fastest CPU in a few years!". I'm quite aware of the fact that applications aren't optimized for the processors yet, but the processors have rougly equally immature support in applications and a comparison is still interesting.

I got the idea for running the test when I read the tests on PCWorld and noticed how biased they were. In favor of the Athlon that is.

So, does anyone have any suggestions?

Gul Banana · Oct 18, 2003, 06:33 AM

"The G5/Athlon 64 will be the fastest CPU in a few years!" is, in fact, the selling argument for the processors. The 'average joe' software to realise the potential of 64-bit processors simply does not exist yet. Doing such a comparison right now is not very helpful.

Kennel · Oct 18, 2003, 06:52 AM

Gul Banana: Perhaps you haven't read http://www.apple.com/powermac/ ? It clearly states "The Power Mac G5 is the world�s fastest personal computer". Also, Apple apparently didn't think it was years too early to run benchmarks. Why should we?

BTW, why do you even reply to this topic if you don't have anything helpful to say. I'll do the test regardless of what you think. I just want help in selecting applications so that the test can be as fair as possible.

WJMoore · Oct 18, 2003, 09:05 AM

Photoshop and Quake are valid programs, if you watch Steve Jobs' WWDC keynote where the G5 was announced they did a whole heap of live comparisons there, granted they didn't involve an Athlon 64 but the apps used might be of help to you. Another possibility that comes to mind is Mozilla.

I'd be interested to see your tests and results, even if I will be buying a G5 (as soon as I can afford one) no matter how good the Athlon 64 goes... It comes down to the OS alone for me, OS X is my OS of choice, I must have an Apple machine to run it.

rjenkinson · Oct 18, 2003, 09:15 AM

the new versions of itunes?

-r.

Kennel · Oct 18, 2003, 10:48 AM

Originally posted by WJMoore:
Photoshop and Quake are valid programs, if you watch Steve Jobs' WWDC keynote where the G5 was announced they did a whole heap of live comparisons there, granted they didn't involve an Athlon 64 but the apps used might be of help to you. Another possibility that comes to mind is Mozilla.

I've already decided on using Photoshop (probably with PS7Bench) and Quake3. Mozilla would be cool, but how do you run benchmarks using a browser? I would like to avoid sitting by the computer with a stop watch hitting refresh

Another issue is single vs. dual tests. Running single CPU tests only would probably piss off the Mac community and running dual CPU tests would involve Opterons. It's a mess

Originally posted by WJMoore:
I'd be interested to see your tests and results, even if I will be buying a G5 (as soon as I can afford one) no matter how good the Athlon 64 goes... It comes down to the OS alone for me, OS X is my OS of choice, I must have an Apple machine to run it.

True. I like OS X a lot, but I still run Windows, because there are simply too many applications I can't live without (and that I have already payed for). Sure, there are equivalent apps for OS X, but once you really get into an app, it's hard to let go

If I do the benchmarks, the results will be posted on the swedish hardware/overclocking website sweclockers.com. It all boils down to how fast suppliers can send me computers to test on.

Originally posted by rjenkinson:
the new versions of itunes?

-r.

Well, I've only been using it for about an hour on Windows, but it's definately not a fast application. Also, I believe I will avoid running apps from Apple and Microsoft. The reasons are obvious