PowerMac G4 Dual 1.25 Ghz = pentium 4 2 ghz?

[PeterJun21]

Im planning on getting a power mac since I want to use programs like final cut pro for video editing. Im just wondering if the performance of a dual 1.25 ghz powermac would be about the same as a p4 thats 2 ghz. Please give me some suggestions. thanks.

 

[OneOfTheseDays]

stop right now. use the search button. this thread will automatically become a massive flame war within a short time.

 

[paralazarguer]

Yeah, maybe a willamette. Not a northwood. There are tons of threads about this very topic. If you're buying a system for performance in those applications get a PC. No question. Do a search. The other threads have tons of benchmarks.

 

[glugglug]

The P4 2GHz is in fact faster than the dual CPU powermacs.

In fact Mac software running under Executor on the P4 is faster than on a single CPU powermac. (So just get a dual P4 and its less than 1/3 the price).

 

[EdipisReks]

Originally posted by: glugglug
So just get a dual P4 and its less than 1/3 the price.

except that he would have to get a xeon system, which would be rather expensive.

 

[Goosemaster]

Originally posted by: EdipisReks

Originally posted by: glugglug
So just get a dual P4 and its less than 1/3 the price.

except that he would have to get a xeon system, which would be rather expensive.

Still loads cheaper

 

[paralazarguer]

except that he would have to get a xeon system, which would be rather expensive.

Not as expensive as a dual Mac. Anyway, he doesn't need dual. A single P4 or athlon will b1tch whip a dual g4.

 

[Woody419]

Rob Galbraith did a comparison of a dual 1.25 Mac with a 3.06 P4. He used Photoshop, so I don't know how the numbers would compare with Final Cut Pro, but the Mac got it's tail whopped. The article has been mentioned before, but has disappeared from his site. Fortunately Google still has a copy cached.

 

[Schadenfroh]

if i had the money i would get a mac. but only if they threw in a free windows emulator that worked perfectly. BTW there are HUGE differances in the two chips. you cant really compare them correctly. the mac is a RISC chip and the Pentium is a normal chip. they both have their strengths and their weaknesses. if you want to to photo editing, go for the mac. but poor boys like me cant afford them

 

[EdipisReks]

apples have come down in price considerably lately. the dual 1.25 (in the standard config) is "only" $2k now. granted a nice p4 or athlon would have their way with the Apple, but they aren't quite as expensive as they used to be. if you want to use final cut pro, however, you don't have a choice: you have to get the mac. final cut pro runs fine on an G4 iMac, though, as long as you have plenty of ram. in fact, the New York Film Acadmey uses iMacs with final cut pro for their summer workshops. i would just skip the dual G4, if video editing is what you want to do.

 

[EdipisReks]

Originally posted by: Schadenfroh
the mac is a RISC chip and the Pentium is a normal chip.

that is close to the dumbest thing i have ever read. very, very, very close. Motorola quit making real RISC chips with the g3 was more complex than the Pentium 2. anyway, the back end of x86 and Power PC chips are very similar. the x86 chip simply have to translate simpler RISC style instructions into x86 instructions in the front end.

 

[glugglug]

Originally posted by: Schadenfroh
if i had the money i would get a mac. but only if they threw in a free windows emulator that worked perfectly.

Open source Hammer emulator

Welcome to 286 class peformance.

 

[Mani]

Originally posted by: glugglug
The P4 2GHz is in fact faster than the dual CPU powermacs.

In fact Mac software running under Executor on the P4 is faster than on a single CPU powermac. (So just get a dual P4 and its less than 1/3 the price).

Wow...I knew PCs were faster but I didn't know they were that much faster...

 

[gsiener]

I'm tired of seeing stuff like this...

A p4 might b1tch slap a powermac, but there's one problem. How are you going to run FCP on your pc??

I have both pcs and macs, both serve different purposes. I have a super fast pc that I use for some stuff, but it's hard to edit a full movie in DV (which I've done) without a mac. Yes it's possible, but it's also possible to run games in software mode. It's in a different league.

 

[paralazarguer]

Final cut pro is not the be all and end all of video editing apps. You can get programs in the same class if not better...HUH! Yes! BETTER! For the pc. It's true! No, really! If you can't edit video on a pc the same as you can on a mac, that's because you're incompetent and can't master the point and click interface. There's nothing overly complicated about a ton of PC video editing apps unless you're a retard and they have all the functionality of FCP. Besides, you can run mac software on a pc....only faster as someone pointed out in an earlier post.

 

[gsiener]

Yeah you make a good point, I guess that's why none of the PROFESSIONALS use fcp. Oh wait, most of them do.

 

[paralazarguer]

Most eh? I guess you must have some numbers to back that up, huh?
I didn't think so. I know that some do. I also know of a lot of audio "professionals" who use retarted PC programs just because it's what they're used to.
I also know there are a lot of professionals who do very well without using FCP. Amazing, isn't it?

 

[paralazarguer]

Actually, a review of final cut pro that I just read on cnet indicates that AVID dominates the field but that final cut pro is catching up. So what was it you were saying about FCP being used most? I forget...oh, that's right...BS

 

[mroptimistic]

Originally posted by: gsiener
I'm tired of seeing stuff like this...

A p4 might b1tch slap a powermac, but there's one problem. How are you going to run FCP on your pc??

I have both pcs and macs, both serve different purposes. I have a super fast pc that I use for some stuff, but it's hard to edit a full movie in DV (which I've done) without a mac. Yes it's possible, but it's also possible to run games in software mode. It's in a different league.

besides the fact that you were just owned, i dont think people care that your tired of seeing how a p4 completely trounces even the top of the line dual cpu macs just because of one program that isn't made for PCs. So horror of horrors you might have to learn a different program then the one your used to if you want better performance. :Q

 

[LiekOMG]

Originally posted by: paralazarguer
Final cut pro is not the be all and end all of video editing apps. You can get programs in the same class if not better...HUH! Yes! BETTER! For the pc. It's true! No, really! If you can't edit video on a pc the same as you can on a mac, that's because you're incompetent and can't master the point and click interface. There's nothing overly complicated about a ton of PC video editing apps unless you're a retard and they have all the functionality of FCP. Besides, you can run mac software on a pc....only faster as someone pointed out in an earlier post.

Can you link me to the program that allows me to run mac software on a PC please? I'd like to take a look at it.

 

[paralazarguer]

okay here's that link

Of course, it doesn't matter. If you're running mac programs on a PC, you really need to try to learn some different programs.

 

[LethalWolfe]

Originally posted by: paralazarguer
Final cut pro is not the be all and end all of video editing apps. You can get programs in the same class if not better...HUH! Yes! BETTER! For the pc. It's true! No, really! If you can't edit video on a pc the same as you can on a mac, that's because you're incompetent and can't master the point and click interface. There's nothing overly complicated about a ton of PC video editing apps unless you're a retard and they have all the functionality of FCP. Besides, you can run mac software on a pc....only faster as someone pointed out in an earlier post.

I think you need to layoff the caffine or something before you stroke out paralazarguer.


Avid is still the King of the editing ring (their post NLEs run on both Mac and PCs w/the exception of the DS setups which are currently PC only) but FCP is eating into Avid and taking away market share. There are proprietary NLEs like Media 100 but, IMO, I think those days are number as desktop based rigs get better and better. Premiere is used a lot by corporate and event videographers but not that much by anyone else. I used Premiere for a year and I'd never go back (personal preferences mostly). Vegas Video has a lot of buzz going on the PC side but it still has some major short comings keeping it out of the pro ranks. If I was going to edit on a PC again and couldn't go Avid I'd probably go VV. Pinnacle's got some prosumer stuff floating around but I haven't read up much on it.

That being said FCP isn't the end all, be all of editing but for it's price (and speaking in generalities) it doesn't have an equal. VV 4 is cheaper and will give you more RT and (from what I hear) better compositing and probably the best audio editor of any NLE but it is DV only and it's media managing abilites are lacking (no big problem for short form, but for long form stuff it could get hairy and cumbersome<sp?>). Avid ExpressDV is more expensive than FCP, is DV only, but it does have refinements that other programs don't since Avid has been making editing software for so long. Avid Express is perfect for rough cutting or off-lining a project to be finished/on-lined on another Avid (Symphony for example) but as a stand alone editor it has some shorting comings.

What it comes down to is that software and hardware are merely tools and you need to decide which tool suits your needs.


Lethal

 

[glugglug]

Soft-mac has better compatibility than Executor (linked above) but is a lot slower. Currently it does 68040 emulation (which means it supports System 7.01-8.1, not 9 or OSX) but PowerPC emulation is supposed to be added soon. Actually you can change the settings to accurately emulate the CPU of your choice up to an 040, so you can tell it to do a 68030 and run System 6 stuff. The 040 emu crashes running an old 24-bit OS or non cache-clean code in the same way as a real 040 mac only many times faster.

Basilisk II is an OPEN-SOURCE Mac emulator similar enough to Softmac I suspect they are the same codebase.

 

[LiekOMG]

Originally posted by: paralazarguer
okay here's that link

Of course, it doesn't matter. If you're running mac programs on a PC, you really need to try to learn some different programs.

Uhh, as far as I can tell, thats a Mac 68x00 emulator, which means its like emulating a 486 and below. Of course it'll be faster today! Did you really expect to run anything useful on a Mac from 1994?

 

[glugglug]

Yes, its a 68LC040 emulator (PPC emulating executor is supposed to be out this summer btw), however go grab Speedometer or another mac benchmark util and you'll see it scores higher on a P4 than a G4 does running in PPC native mode.