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Multitasking: Intel vs PPC
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Mac Elite
Join Date: Oct 2000
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Anyone move from a G5 yo a Mac Pro and find background processes run less well?
Yes, the Mac Pro is snappier™ and faster, but background processes seem less reliable. I find movies, eyeTV and audio app's often glitch in the background, even though individual CPU meters rarely exceed 30%.
I wonder if Apple changed process priority in OSX-intel?
Or maybe it's just a case that some app's are a little less well optimized for Intel, or is no-one else experiencing this?
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Mac Pro 2.66, 2GB RAM | 4 x 250 GB HD's | MOTO 424e/2408-II
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Professional Poster
Join Date: Mar 2003
Location: Down by the river
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No. I doubt Apple changes priorities. Apps probably are slightly less Intel-optimized but I doubt that's your problem. My MacPro sits idle at 0.5% to 2.0% CPU Utilization. Open Activity Monitor and see what's using all your CPU.
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Moderator  Join Date: Apr 2000
Location: Gothenburg, Sweden
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More likely it is either Rosetta playing games with you, or you're running running out of RAM. Intelmacs eat RAM because the PPC libs have to be loaded alongside the x86 ones if you're running apps under Rosetta.
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Clinically Insane
Join Date: Oct 2001
Location: San Diego, CA, USA
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They "glitch"? Neither set of hardware should be causing apps to malfunction.
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Chuck
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"Instead of either 'multi-talented' or 'multitalented' use 'bisexual'."
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Mac Elite
Join Date: Oct 2000
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When I say glitch - I mean I lose frames in video playback, or audio stutters.
I have 2 GB of RAM on my MP2.66. The app's that suffer are native. VLC, eyeTV, iTunes. . . .
My point was, in moving from a G5 (2.0GHz DC, with 0.5GB less RAM) I notice my MP handles background tasks less smoothly than its predecessor. . . .
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Mac Pro 2.66, 2GB RAM | 4 x 250 GB HD's | MOTO 424e/2408-II
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Posting Junkie
Join Date: May 2001
Location: Portland, OR
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My audio doesn't stutter on my MBP.
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8 Core 2.8 ghz Mac Pro/GF8800/2 23" Cinema Displays, 3.06 ghz Macbook Pro
Once you wanted revolution, now you're the institution, how's it feel to be the man?
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Addicted to MacNN
Join Date: Nov 1999
Location: Madison, WI
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Originally Posted by Chuckit 
They "glitch"? Neither set of hardware should be causing apps to malfunction.
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Forum Regular
Join Date: Dec 2001
Location: MD
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Originally Posted by booboo
My point was, in moving from a G5 (2.0GHz DC, with 0.5GB less RAM) I notice my MP handles background tasks less smoothly than its predecessor. . . .
I've had no problem like stutters on my MB C2D 2Ghz w/ 2GB, BUT...
sometimes when I switch to one application by bringing it to the foreground, the application freezes (esp. Firefox and iTunes), which NEVER happened on my G5. I wonder if it's related to the Universal/Intel versions of the software?
--Chris
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Current: iMac 20" 2.4/4/320 / iMac G4 800
Portable: iPhone 3G White/16 / 12" PowerBook 1.5/1.25/80
Former: PowerMac G5 Dual 1.8 / iBook G3 700 / PM 7500, 3G iPod 10GB, 5.5G iPod 30GB
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Posting Junkie
Join Date: Feb 2005
Location: 888500128
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Originally Posted by booboo
When I say glitch - I mean I lose frames in video playback, or audio stutters.
I have 2 GB of RAM on my MP2.66. The app's that suffer are native. VLC, eyeTV, iTunes. . . .
My point was, in moving from a G5 (2.0GHz DC, with 0.5GB less RAM) I notice my MP handles background tasks less smoothly than its predecessor. . . .
Note that Safari still has that nasty memory leak, even in the Intel versions.
This means that Safari, specifically, will eat up HUGE amounts of real and virtual memory over time.
If you spend a long time surfing the web, virtual memory page-outs may cause nasty stuttering in media playback.
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Posting Junkie
Join Date: Nov 2000
Location: in front of my Mac
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Haven't ever seen those leaks. All I observe is that Safari fills up 'inactive memory' and reduces 'free' memory. Nothing to be worried about. Inactive memory is available to other apps if they need it. It's only once all inactive memory is used up and more active memory is needed that you'll get page-outs. Until that happens there's nothing to be worried about.
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Clinically Insane
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Los Angeles
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Safari does often end up hogging a large amount of real memory until it's closed and reopened, but I think that happens in most every browser.
As for performance differences between Macs and Mactels, the truth is that the PPC will always be superior.  (I know I'll get reported for this one.)
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"The natural progress of things is for liberty to yield and government to gain ground." TJ
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Clinically Insane
Join Date: Oct 2001
Location: San Diego, CA, USA
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Originally Posted by Big Mac
As for performance differences between Macs and Mactels, the truth is that the PPC will always be superior. (I know I'll get reported for this one.)
Is supporting a dead architecture actually a reportable offense? I thought it was just futile.
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Chuck
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"Instead of either 'multi-talented' or 'multitalented' use 'bisexual'."
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Posting Junkie
Join Date: Nov 2000
Location: in front of my Mac
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Originally Posted by Big Mac
Safari does often end up hogging a large amount of real memory until it's closed and reopened, but I think that happens in most every browser.
Yeah, I've seen Firefox do a similar thing. In my experience this isn't a real problem though, since it's just filling up 'inactive' memory w/o creating swap files. It's the same behavior you see when you copy large files in the Finder (disk cache). As long as apps can can take over 'inactive' memory space for stuff they need to put in 'active' memory you won't get any swap files. Also, as you say the browser's memory cache is flushed when you quit it and OS X recovers the used up 'inactive' memory so this really can't be considered a "leak".
For those of you concerned with memory consumption I suggest taking a look at Memory Monitor. It's free, simple and uses only very few resources. At any moment it'll tell you at a glance how much of which kind of memory is being used and how many page-ins/page-outs you're experiencing. And check out it's tutorial on OS X memory management in the help menu. It's a very interesting summary of the most important things to know about how OS X handles and informs about memory consumption.
Originally Posted by Big Mac
As for performance differences between Macs and Mactels, the truth is that the PPC will always be superior. (I know I'll get reported for this one.)
Originally Posted by Chuckit
Is supporting a dead architecture actually a reportable offense? I thought it was just futile.
  You guys crack me up.
(
Last edited by Simon; May 7, 2007 at 03:38 AM.
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