Mac/PC showdown: and the winner is...
Posted by: Joe Petrik on 15 October 2004
Circumstance has allowed me an opportunity to try an interesting comparison -- well, interesting to me; you may be bored to tears -- putting a current G5 Mac up against a current Xeon-based Dell workstation on exactly the same task.
The comparison is interesting since both machines happen by chance to be the same purchase price (within a few dollars) after education discount, so the comparison is really about how much computing power you get for $x with a Mac vs a name-brand PC. The Mac is my home machine, bought in early August 2004 and the PC is my work machine, bought in early September 2004.
The two computers in question are spec'd as follows:
Entry-level Mac G5
* Dual 1.8 GHz 970fx processors
* 2 GB of RAM
* 160 GB SATA HD
* OS X (10.3.5)
Dell 670 Precision Workstation
* Single 3.2 GHz Xeon processor
* 2 GB of RAM
* 160 GB SATA HD
* Windows XP (SP2)
Both machines have the current "CS" version of Adobe Photoshop installed. The task was to render a 24,000 x 18,000 pixel image (which works out to be 1.2 GB) by rasterizing a PDF file, then apply a filter to that image.
Both computers had their Photoshop memory preference set to 75% of available RAM, so both had enough memory available to render a 1.2 GB image with at least a 100 MB to spare. No other applications, except OSs, were running at the time.
Here are the results for time taken to render a 1.2 GB image file:
Mac -- 10:24 (~10.4 minutes)
PC -- 3:32 (~3.5 minutes)
PC comes out about 3 times faster
Here are the results for time taken to apply a filter:
Mac -- 4:16 (~4.25 minutes)
PC -- 2:40 (~2.7 minutes)
PC comes out about 1.5 times faster
Obviously, this isn't the be-all and end-all of tests, but on at least one application I use regularly a decent PC workstation has a substantial speed edge over a current G5 Mac. Easy of use and the fun factor are clearly and decisively in the Mac's favour -- at least for me -- but that comes at a price that many will not want to pay.
The upshot is that I prefer Macs and will continue to recommend them, but I may back off from boasting how blindingly fast the new G5s are.
Joe
The comparison is interesting since both machines happen by chance to be the same purchase price (within a few dollars) after education discount, so the comparison is really about how much computing power you get for $x with a Mac vs a name-brand PC. The Mac is my home machine, bought in early August 2004 and the PC is my work machine, bought in early September 2004.
The two computers in question are spec'd as follows:
Entry-level Mac G5
* Dual 1.8 GHz 970fx processors
* 2 GB of RAM
* 160 GB SATA HD
* OS X (10.3.5)
Dell 670 Precision Workstation
* Single 3.2 GHz Xeon processor
* 2 GB of RAM
* 160 GB SATA HD
* Windows XP (SP2)
Both machines have the current "CS" version of Adobe Photoshop installed. The task was to render a 24,000 x 18,000 pixel image (which works out to be 1.2 GB) by rasterizing a PDF file, then apply a filter to that image.
Both computers had their Photoshop memory preference set to 75% of available RAM, so both had enough memory available to render a 1.2 GB image with at least a 100 MB to spare. No other applications, except OSs, were running at the time.
Here are the results for time taken to render a 1.2 GB image file:
Mac -- 10:24 (~10.4 minutes)
PC -- 3:32 (~3.5 minutes)
PC comes out about 3 times faster
Here are the results for time taken to apply a filter:
Mac -- 4:16 (~4.25 minutes)
PC -- 2:40 (~2.7 minutes)
PC comes out about 1.5 times faster
Obviously, this isn't the be-all and end-all of tests, but on at least one application I use regularly a decent PC workstation has a substantial speed edge over a current G5 Mac. Easy of use and the fun factor are clearly and decisively in the Mac's favour -- at least for me -- but that comes at a price that many will not want to pay.
The upshot is that I prefer Macs and will continue to recommend them, but I may back off from boasting how blindingly fast the new G5s are.
Joe