Apple G3 vs. G4

[iKwak]

Hello guys.

How much of a difference between a 800mhz G4 iBook and a 900mhz G3 iBook?

Which is faster and in what category (faster in games, loading programs, and etc.)?

 

[Eug]

Originally posted by: iKwak
Hello guys.

How much of a difference between a 800mhz G4 iBook and a 900mhz G3 iBook?

Which is faster and in what category (faster in games, loading programs, and etc.)?

For just about anything where speed is important, the G4 800 will be faster. OS X is heavily G4 optimized, and the G4 iBook has a Radeon 9200 in it.

There are a few things where the iBook 900 will win, but overall, it's an inferior machine. Go for the G4 800. Slot load drive too!

 

[InlineFive]

The G4 also can sustain 600MB/s through it's 133Mhz bus where as the G3 can only sustain around 250MB'ish. I can see all the people with the P4 800FSB scoffing.

 

[Erasmus-X]

Spend the few extra bucks and get the G4. The G4 iBook also gets DDR memory, built-in Bluetooth, and an Airport Extreme option.

 

[drag]

DDR realy doesn't help out G4's that much. They have a built in limitation to the design that robs them from the ability to benifit from fast memory speeds.

Probably why they couldn't keep up clock wise. As low end power-frugal chips they work out nicely.

Of course the G5's are much better and have memory bandwidth much higher then x86 offerings. Even the quad pumped new 3.2mhz can't match it.(16GB/s 1ghz (ddr) FSB bandwidth (8GB/s per proccessor) and 6.4GB's memory bandwidth(dual channel 400mhz (ddr) vs 6.4GB's for the quad pumped stuff, and Xeon proccessors would have to share this between them)....

ANYWAYS. (sorry for the diversion. Pentium4's are still a bit faster, but not by much especially compared to G4's)

Get the 12 inch 800MHZ G4 Ibook.

First off, G4's have the altivec stuff that makes them better performers with games and such then G3's
Clock for clock they are a improvement over the G3's
The Ibook is new, it's not going to be beat up and replacements from apple for defects would be easier.
The new Ibook has a 9200 mobility radeon card, which is much faster then the older ibook's stuff.

So the newer Ibook is quite a improvement over the older one, even if it is minus 100mhz...

 

[buleyb]

Originally posted by: drag
DDR realy doesn't help out G4's that much. They have a built in limitation to the design that robs them from the ability to benifit from fast memory speeds.

Probably why they couldn't keep up clock wise. As low end power-frugal chips they work out nicely.

Of course the G5's are much better and have memory bandwidth much higher then x86 offerings. Even the quad pumped new 3.2mhz can't match it.(16GB/s 1ghz (ddr) FSB bandwidth (8GB/s per proccessor) and 6.4GB's memory bandwidth(dual channel 400mhz (ddr) vs 6.4GB's for the quad pumped stuff, and Xeon proccessors would have to share this between them)....

ANYWAYS. (sorry for the diversion. Pentium4's are still a bit faster, but not by much especially compared to G4's)

Get the 12 inch 800MHZ G4 Ibook.

First off, G4's have the altivec stuff that makes them better performers with games and such then G3's
Clock for clock they are a improvement over the G3's
The Ibook is new, it's not going to be beat up and replacements from apple for defects would be easier.
The new Ibook has a 9200 mobility radeon card, which is much faster then the older ibook's stuff.

So the newer Ibook is quite a improvement over the older one, even if it is minus 100mhz...

The AltiVec core isn't some freebie speed boost, it needs to be programmed for. OSX has optimised for it, but that doesn't mean they can use the AltiVec for the majority of stuff. AltiVec operations require proper data and small strides in memory to be efficient (which is why they're great for repetitive vector/matrix math), so it can keep the pipeline full and use all the available units. AltiVec is a great thing, but its not the magic savior of computing.

 

[drag]

So what? The g4 is better in other respects, too.

I never said anything about Altivec being God's gift to computing anyways.

Altivec designed soly for FPU performance, It's got other stuff that's going for it. And if you realy want to know, G4's memory bandwidth limitations don't realy allow you take that much advantage of it anyways, but it WILL give a bit of a boost to some games and that's what he asked about.

Plus the new 10.3 stuff is optimized for altivec anyways, I figure. Since 10.3 is designed to run on mostly G4's and G5's. Apple would be stupid to first make IBM shoehorn the altivec stuff into the power970 design then not take advantage of it.

 

[buleyb]

I'm not saying the G4 is a bad chip, I'm saying it shouldn't be considered the saviour of the modern computer. Altivec can be a raw data bandit, and the memory model can support it given proper caching and feeding the altivec proper strides. Games don't do enough to fully utilize it because they don't have that much data to feed it, and because game devolopers need to understand how to optimize for the chip, and most don't.

Also, it isn't designed for FPU performance, its designed to allow multiple FP data sets to be computed in parallel, it does not translate into faster FPU performance for every FP instruction in the software, that is what the general FPU is for. Only Altivec instructions can utilize altivec units.

The G4 series is a good chip, and is on par with x86 chips to some extent (as in, they aren't outdated, and they are close enough to be great). But pushing this chip based on FLOPS is stupid, because the numbers can be inflated due to the altivec unit.

 

[Yoshi]

Come on people this is just an iBook. If it will be your ONLY means of doing tasks like photo editing, audio encoding, and video encoding then get the G4. If you just want a small laptop to take around with you to do light duty work then get the G3. The local Apple store in Cleveland is clearing out 800Mhz 12" G3 iBooks for $800, I almost bought one just to download photos to from my 10D on the road. I don't like hauling my Powerbook every where.

 

[LethalWolfe]

Originally posted by: drag

First off, G4's have the altivec stuff that makes them better performers with games and such then G3's
Clock for clock they are a improvement over the G3's
The Ibook is new, it's not going to be beat up and replacements from apple for defects would be easier.
The new Ibook has a 9200 mobility radeon card, which is much faster then the older ibook's stuff.

So the newer Ibook is quite a improvement over the older one, even if it is minus 100mhz...

That's incorrect. Clock for clock in non Altivec enhanced tasks the G3 will out perform a G4 at the same clock speed.

That being said I would go for a G4 iBook because of the better video card, and IMO the G4 has longer legs because it does have Altivec is showing up more and more especially in Apple's own software (not just OS X).


Lethal