Although I am a long-time Mac User, I recently bought a Wintel
machine as a supplement to my Power Mac 7300, since the Eastern
Michigan University Computer Science department recently decided to
switch to a slower, larger, newer Microsoft C++ compiler that doesn't
work well under RealPC. Pretty soon, we'll be switching to Java as
well, but I will hopefully have graduated.
I've stripped various 7x00 series machines down to the bones several
times, so I'm comfortable inside a computer. After consulting with some
friends, I decided that the build-it-yourself approach was the best and
potentially the least expensive way of acquiring a PC. Some problems
arose when I failed to realize that a PC floppy drive, unlike a Mac,
requires a seperate power cable. Otherwise, the assembly was simple
enough. After recieving two largeish boxes from the UPS guy, I was
playing MechWarrior4 quite happily within three hours. Admittedly, it
took me a while to get the Windows CD booting right, since I was a tad
confused by the hard drive format utility. Gladly, I should never have
to do that again.
Since I had some spare time and have both machines sitting next to
each other, I decided to run some benchmarks. I admit freely that these
are not scientific by any stretch - the machines are configured
differently, and I wasn't about to go spending money so that the PC had
the same software as the Mac. I simply compared the time it took for
the two computers to perform the same tasks using the software that was
available. Since I had always thought of PCs as the brute-force
machines and Macs as "slower" but more elegant, the results surprised
me somewhat.
The Winner
Working strictly by points, the Wintel box won 3-2. (Assuming both
machines got a point for the Web browsing test, which was a draw by any
measure.)
In terms of price/performance, however, I think the machines are a
wash. Macs have historically cost about 25% more than equivalent PCs.
Adjusting for that, the Mac was actually $40 less expensive than the
Wintel box. Even without the adjustment, the prices were pretty
similar, and it is difficult to say that a price/performance winner
emerged, since the two machines hand off superiority at different
tasks.
On the other hand, I didn't do any tests where the extra $170 I
spent on the Mac's video card might come into play, such as Unreal
Tournament of Quake III. While I have demos of these and other 3D
programs for the Mac, I am not about to download the Win9x versions
over a 56k modem.
Also, the Mac is a hot-rodded version of an entry level business
computer from 1997 which, if it was lucky, might be considered
almost-kinda cutting edge for 1999. (Except for the Radeon.) The
Wintel, on the other hand, is all new components, some of which didn't
exist a year ago.
Consider what these results imply about my machines potential
performance vs. a 1999 vintage Pentium II or III at 500 Mhz.
Finally, it should tell you something that I am writing this on the
Mac. The AMD is sitting here as well, crunching a SETI work unit. A $4
keybord, in short, sucks and a $6 mouse isn't much better. Adding
components of the same quality as the Apple keyboard and mouse would
have cost me another $100. Finally, Office XP for Windows is really,
really expensive - and I already have AppleWorks. Each according to
ability, right?
Technical Information
|
7300/G4
|
1.0 GHz AMD
|
|
CPU
|
PPC 7400 (G4)
|
AMD Athlon
|
|
Speed
|
350 MHz
|
1 GHz
|
|
CPU Bus
|
50 MHz
|
133/266 MHz
|
|
Storage
|
Fast SCSI (10 MB/s)
|
ATA/100 (Running @ ATA/66)
|
|
Main hard drive
|
9 GB 7200 rpm IBM
|
15 GB 7200 rpm Seagate
|
|
Secondary hard drive
|
2 GB 7200 rpm Seagate
|
none
|
|
CD-ROM
|
12x CD
|
52x CD
|
|
RAM
|
160 MB DRAM
|
128 MB DDR-RAM
|
|
Max RAM
|
512 MB
|
3 GB
|
|
RAM Speed
|
50 MHz
|
133 MHz (266 MHz)
|
|
Video Card
|
ATI Radeon PCI
|
Generic TNT2 M64 AGP4x
|
|
VRAM
|
32 MB DDR
|
32 MB SDRAM
|
|
Expansion
|
3 PCI - 1 Free
|
5 PCI - 3 Free, 1 CNR / AMR (shared, free), 1 4x AGP (used)
|
|
Price As Configured (approx):
|
7300 - $1000
|
AMD - $840
|
Both machines have 56k modems, 2 USB ports, 17" VGA monitors,
ethernet, and floppy drives.
Tests
MP3 Encoding
A 07.10 duration audio CD track was encoded directly from the
computer's internal 12x SCSI CD-ROM.
7300/G4, SoundJam 2.5.2, Faster, 128 kbps, Joint Stereo, 66 Seconds
(6.5x)
A 06.28 duration audio CD track was encoded directly from the
computer's internal 52x ATA/33 CD-ROM.
1.0 GHz AMD, FreeRIP MP3 1.0.0.1, 128 kbps, 84 seconds (4.6x)
Conclusions: I selected FreeRIP because it was free and because the
archived download was about 700k. However, there were no options for
adjusting quality settings, except for bitrate.
In addition to being slower than the Mac, the Wintel-produced MP3
file was quite a bit muddier sounding than the original - a problem I
don't generally have with SoundJam.
SoundJam would be my preferred method of ripping because of sound
quality, even if the Wintel box was faster.
SETI@Home
- 7300/G4: WU1 = 17hrs 55min 04.4s, WU2 = 18 hrs, 38 min, 00.5s, WU3
= 19 hrs, 10 min, 30.1s, WU4 = 22 hrs, 28 min, 59.3s, Average = 19
hrs, 33 min, 8.575s
- 1.0 GHz AMD: WU1 = 9hrs, 08min, 52s, WU2 = 7hrs, 55min, 45s, WU3 =
12hrs, 16min, 26s, WU4 = 7hrs, 31min, 00s, Average = 9hrs, 13min,
0.75s
Conclusions: Obviously, since these weren't the same work units, I
can't guarantee more than an approximate measure of relative
performance. Still, the numbers are such that you probably have a good
idea of the relationship between the two machines. This new AMD box,
besides playing a mean game of MechWarrior4, is going to vastly improve
my average SETI crunch times. (Team MacAddict!)
Web Browsing
Given a blank browser window, the URL is typed in and the enter key
is pressed. Time is taken from the final key press until "Done" message
appears or "Stop" button is greyed out.
7300/G4:
http://www.yahoo.com =
- Netscape 4.7: 8s
- IE 05. 7s
- IE 2.1: 12s
http://eshop.macsales.com =
- Netscape 4.7: 25s
- IE 05. 22s
- IE 2.1: 30s
http://www.lowendmac.com =
- Netscape 4.7: 19s
- IE 05. 17s
- IE 2.1: N/A
http://www.macromedia.com =
- Netscape 4.7: 19s
- IE 05. 18s
- IE 2.1: 25s
1.0 GHz AMD:
- http://www.yahoo.com = IE 05. 6s
- http://eshop.macsales.com = IE 05. 41s
- http://www.lowendmac.com = IE 05. 8s
- http://www.macromedia.com = IE 05. 30s
Conclusions: Considering the mighty reputation of Wintel machines
when it comes to HTML rendering, I was honestly expecting better.
I was, however, using a stopwatch - I couldn't tell you exactly how
many clock cycles or processor ticks were used, or if components other
than the CPU affected performance.
The stopwatch merely told me what my eyes had been saying for a long
time: the machines are too close for it to matter which one is
faster.
RealVideo/Audio Encoding
Unfortunately, SoundJam is the only program I have which uses
AltiVec, so it's the only program I have which would grant the 7300 any
kind of edge (or, perhaps, any kind of chance) here.
Convert 11.32.06 Sorensen Encoded Quicktime Video to RealVideo:
Convert 12.26 Duration (125.6 MB) WAV file to RealAudio:
Quicktime Movie - Normal Motion Video, Voice Only, 56k Single Rate
Stream
- 7300/G4 - RealProducer G2 - 59 min, 15 sec
- 1.0 GHz AMD - (Windows version of RealProducer 8.5 does not support
compressed Quicktime.)
WAV File - No Video, Stereo Audio, 56k Single Rate Stream
- 7300/G4 - RealProducer G2 - 3 min, 12 sec
- 1.0 GHz AMD - RealProducer 8.5 - 37 sec.
Given the results of the MP3 tests, the similarity in the web
browsing tests, and the relatively modest 125% speed boost in
SETI@Home, I was expecting a slightly closer finish.
On the other hand, while Quicktime 4 for Windows played the video
just fine, the Windows version of RealProducer 8.5 couldn't make heads
or tails of the Sorenson video (an old Macaddict staff video.) so I
guess the Mac gets an honorable mention here.
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