[Koralatov]

A friend of mine wants a machine with more horsepower than her 12″ PowerBook. Money is extremely tight, which leaves either a dual G4 in the 1 GHz+ range or a single 1.8 GHz G5. Which represents the better buy? I’m leaning strongly toward the G5, since G4s seem so incredibly anæmic nowadays.

As far as I can see, the G5 has the advantage of: faster bus, more RAM slots, SATA hard-disks. However, G5 RAM is pricier than RAM for the G4, and I’m not sure whether a dual G4 would perform better than a single G5.

She’ll mainly be doing light–medium Photoshop work on it, and some iMovie, probably under Leopard.

[ChrisF]

Buying anything that isn't Intel based is simply foolish at this point. A Mac Mini will run circles around either of these and will be able to run newer applications; I strongly recommend she save up for something more modern than the G4/G5.

[macaddict0001]

Processor wise the g4 should best the g5, but the max ram is 2 GB. Not that much by todays standards and if you buy new ram it's not worth the money. The g5 is actually worth upgrading to some degree, and could be a usable machine. A DP G5 would be preferred though.

[Lateralus]

Between the two, I'd definitely favor the Dual G4 - especially if you can land a 1.25 or 1.42.

[imitchellg5]

I would recommend saving up for something that isn't PowerPC as well, but if she absolutely can't save, I'd go for the G5 since you can add a lot more RAM if need be. I do feel as if the 1.8GHz G5 single is crippled though

[Lateralus]

^More RAM isn't going to provide any more 'horsepower'.

[imitchellg5]

With Photoshop and iMovie though under Leopard it will certainly help.

[l008com]

I agree that PPC is not the way to go. Even an old $300 dual 1.66 GHz Mac mini would be way better than either of those computers. C2D even better. 2+ GHz even better than that. Between the two, I'd probably go with the G5. Most apps really don't use MP very well, even now. Basic every day tasks would be much faster on the G5. Now if she did video encoding or serious multi-tasking, then I might change my mind. But it doesn't matter because eve $1 spend on a PPC is a wasted dollar that could have been saved for something better like an intel mac mini.

[hh.blitz]

As others have said, a PPC is not a wise choice. A refurb or old Intel-based Mac Mini will do the trick, and a lot better.
But if money is really such a decisive issue, I guess.
I'm not really sure which of the two processors is faster, dual 1-1.42 or single 1.8. The G5 processor per se is more powerful, but can it compete with two processors? Most importantly, do everyday tasks like Safari, iTunes and Word require multiple processors? Can they even take advantage of them? I'm guessing video editing isn't the key use, otherwise she wouldn't be looking at these ttwo machines. I'd say the G5 would outperform the dualG4.
Also, the G4 maxes out at 2GB of RAM. As of today, that is almost the bare minimum (with Tiger you could get along with 1GB). The G5 will allow you to get more RAM if necessary, although it is more expensive. Both will have more "horsepower" than the 12" PB, but in absolute terms, they lack real horsepower. The cheapest Mac in production today would totally destroy it. More RAM will at least allow her to have more apps open at the same time, very useful.

Yet I still recommend going for an Intel Mac. The Macs you are thinking about must be around $150-250, and apparently a Mini would be 300. (Here in Sweden the second-hand market doesn't have much lower prices. Heck, we don't even have a refurb store).
Today it feels like PPC's should only be bought by collectors and hobbyists, or those who have some specific use for it (OS 9, for example).

[Doc HM]

as above. Look on ebay. Beg, borrow, ste... er no. Whatever, any INtel mini, even the earliest ones will be a far better bet than the G4 or G5. Buying either is realistically, just throwing money away. If you need to pay another $100 dollars to get a mini, then keep on with the 12in PB and save up.

Both the G4 and 5 are dead tech even now, in a year or so's time, even more so.

[Koralatov]

Thanks for all the responses (and sorry for the delay in replying). In the end, she went with a DP 1.25 GHz G4, which she got for £200 with a 20″ Formac TFT, maxed RAM, USB 2 and AirPort-alike PCI cards. Overall, it’s a really good machine for the money, especially with the monitor, and she’s really happy with it. Performance is much better compared to her PB, and that’s what she wanted.

On the more general topic of Intel vs. PowerPC, I completely agree with you guys; my main machine is a last-gen MBP, and it absolutely smokes anything PPC that I’ve ever used (using my friend’s PB is painful in comparison, even just checking email or browsing). Investing anything in old G-machines is a waste of time and money now, and only worthwhile for collectors/enthusiasts. (I have, however, been scooping up some iMac G3s for jukeboxing duties lately since they can now be had for about £25 for the 400 MHz models if you watch eBay; also, I love the design of them.)

However, even second-hand Minis aren’t particularly cheap over here, and whilst she may have got something much more powerful for another £100 or so, she would still have had to buy a monitor, keyboard, and mouse to go with it, pushing it up by probably £60 at least. Realistically, she couldn’t afford that, so she went with what she could afford, and it turned out to be more than enough for her. She knows it’s obsolete, and she knows she can’t upgrade it any more, but the performance is good enough that it’ll do what she needs for the next couple of years and, with that in mind, I think it was a good buy.

[angelmb]

My single 1.25 GHz G4 MDD boots up 10.5.8 under 1 minute as it takes 52 seconds after a clean install. Needless to say it is the slowest Mac I have, being the other ones intel powered. With the exception of being a single CPU model, it is rather similar to what your friend bought. 2 GB RAM, two USB2 PCI cards, a Belkin BT USB dongle, an AirPort-alike PCI card (which one got hers?, mine is some Asus), two optical drives, two internal hard disks plus a Firewire drive (external of course), and a Eye TV compatible USB2 tuner.

Dead tech?, undeniable. Still useful?, undeniable as well. And the ironic thing, I don't have to care about updating most of my software anymore, which saves me money.

[Koralatov]

Originally Posted by angelmb 

My single 1.25 GHz G4 MDD boots up 10.5.8 under 1 minute as it takes 52 seconds after a clean install. Needless to say it is the slowest Mac I have, being the other ones intel powered. With the exception of being a single CPU model, it is rather similar to what your friend bought. 2 GB RAM, two USB2 PCI cards, a Belkin BT USB dongle, an AirPort-alike PCI card (which one got hers?, mine is some Asus), two optical drives, two internal hard disks plus a Firewire drive (external of course), and a Eye TV compatible USB2 tuner.

Your’s sounds almost identical (more hard drives though; her one only has a single 80 GB). I found the performance pretty decent overall, and it walked all over both the PowerBook and my iMac G4 in terms of performance. It’s not as fast as a recent MacIntel running Snow Leopard, but it’s more than usable.

As for the AirPort card, I’m not sure what kind it is. As far as OS X is concerned, it’s an AirPort Extreme, and it’s worked without any problems so far.

Dead tech?, undeniable. Still useful?, undeniable as well. And the ironic thing, I don't have to care about updating most of my software anymore, which saves me money.

That’s the other benefit I forgot to mention: she already owns a copy of iLife ’06 and Photoshop CS (bought under educational discount donkey’s ago), and all the other stuff she uses (IM, email, web browsing, mainly) is either already included or free/open source.

Even when Leopard is no longer supported by any news apps, all the software she has now will continue to function, and the machine will still remain useful. The biggest problem is going to be browser support going forward, but I imagine she has a couple of years yet (Firefox just dropped 10.4 recently, some 2½-ish years after Leopard came out) before it becomes a major issue.

[angelmb]

Originally Posted by Koralatov 

The biggest problem is going to be browser support going forward …

TITLE OVER:

The Hidden Home Within a Melting World.

FADE IN

The computer user is shown nervous as he types "the sky is falling soon and a venerable computer chip is agitated" in the search box on Google Web Search.

Computer User
Amaze Me.

He sits down on the edge of the chair.

A beat.

EXTREMELY CLOSE as he discovers something exquisite.

Computer User
No, it can't be true. I am totally sober… by now.

A bell RINGS

iCab - Internet Taxi for the Mac

Relief.

[is not]

Originally Posted by angelmb 

iCab - Internet Taxi for the Mac

Relief.

And it is only for your Apple hardware

[imitchellg5]

Or just Safari 4... No big deal.

[Eriamjh]

I recommend selling everything you don't need to get something Intel-based.
A 17" iMac can be had for $200-$500 on eBay. Check Craigslist for something local and maybe cheaper.
You can probably still get a little for the powerbook, too.

[SSharon]

Originally Posted by Eriamjh 

I recommend selling everything you don't need to get something Intel-based.
A 17" iMac can be had for $200-$500 on eBay. Check Craigslist for something local and maybe cheaper.
You can probably still get a little for the powerbook, too.

I'm not sure if craigslist is an option in the UK.

My dual G4 is in a box at the moment since I am between apartments, but for basic tasks it still works well (no HD video). Depending on your friend's setup you might also consider a raid array to increase performance. I have 2 of my 4 internal drives mirrored and unscientifically believe that read performance is increased.