G5 Benchmark Roundup

"The G5 is the fastest PC in the world." "Yes, it is." "No, it's not!" Whatever. Read on for more on the subject, if you really want to.

Matt Johnson writes "Well it looks like we finally have our first comparison of G5 vs. AMD Opteron, completed by none other than Charlie White, the individual which gained much oh his fame by publishing misleading benchmarks to make Apple's Final Cut Pro Software look like a bad performer. Mr. White's latest comparison shows the Opteron operating roughly 50% faster but what he doesn't say is which compiler was used to generate those SPEC scores. When Apple declared its benchmarks I feared that whoever made the first comparison would likely make this mistake. It seems only appropriate that Charlie White would be first."

An anonymous reader writes "In an ironic twist to the recent benchmark wars, Intel referred the Mac site MacFixIt to an analyst at Gartner Group who actually backed the PowerPC G5 platform with this assertion: 'These models certainly equal Intel's advanced 875 platform and should allow Apple to go until 2005 without a major platform refresh.'"

Another anonymous user writes, "While browsing the Xbench benchmark comparison site, I discovered some G5 benchmarks! The 'G5 Lab Machine at WWDC' got an overall score of 164.78, but much higher scores in certain areas. All of the tests are calibrated to give 100 on an 800MHz DP Quicksilver G4."

vitaboy writes "Sound Technology, one of the "leading UK distributors specialising in musical instruments, music software and pro-audio equipment," seems to have some data regarding the real-world performance of the G5 compared to the high-end PC. They state, 'The dual 2GHz Power Mac G5 with Logic Platinum 6.1 can play 115 tracks, compared with a maximum of 35 tracks on the Dell Dimension 8300 and 81 tracks on the Dell Precision 650 each with Cubase SX 1.051 ... More impressively, the 1.6GHz single-processor Power Mac G5 played 50 percent more tracks than the 3GHz Pentium 4-based system.'"

Re:Can't find SPEC results at spec.org for Apple??

[Anonymous Coward]

Because the first thing my Mom does when she buys a new computer is to run over to the SPEC website and check their numbers.

Re:Not Only Deadlier...

[presearch]

if you can't build it yourself why bother?

I feel the same way about cars, major home appliances, and especially consumer electronics.
Does anyone else smell wire burning?

I gotta go....

Re:Useless article

[drsmithy]

Nothing like the innovation of Apple. First they redefine "supercomputer", now they redefine "personal".

THIS JUST IN!

[TheRaven64]

I have just obtained benchmark results that the G5 is 1000% faster than an Opteron at the same clock speed! Using the highly scientific method of picking random numbers that fit my own agenda I can conclusively say that the G5 is the fastest computer ever made, ever. In fact, it is so fast that you will never need to buy a computer ever again.

To proove this, I draw your attention to the number 13821. As you can see, this number is over 10 times larger than the number 1259. That's right, a difference of over an order of magnitude between these two numbers clearly show that the G5 is faster.

Next week, I will be showing that black and white clearly infringe SCO's copyright on the colour grey.

Re:Can't find SPEC results at spec.org for Apple??

[bruddahmax]

i don't know what planet you are on, but here on earth i'm pretty sure 1 Apple G5 is much cheaper than 100 x86 systems...

Re:It's important to know...

[Paradise Pete]

I build my own systems and I sure as hell can build a screaming system for much less than any Mac out there.

That's like dropping a crate full of automobile parts next to your neighbor's new sports car and saying "see how much cheaper mine is?"

Re:It's important to know...

[cosmo7]

Never trust a company that is trying to sell you something.

Hey, give those companies a break. Remember how before these fast chips came along they all used to advertise their computers as "hopelessly slow", "utterly inadequate" and (my favorite, from a Data General ad), "retarded to the extent of inducing migraines".

Re:Perspective - my 25MHz NeXTstation

[Anonymous Coward]

a Mac Powerbook 5300, admittedly the slowest and lamest PPC Mac ever built.

I do not think you have ever used a Powerbook Duo 2300c before...