Intereseting article

flounder

saw this over at macnn



<a href="http://www.azcentral.com/business/etech/etechmain.html?gannet_story=http://www.gannettonline.com/e/gear/18000324.html"; target="_blank">http://www.azcentral.com/business/etech/etechmain.html?gannet_story=http://www.gannettonline.com/e/gear/18000324.html</a>;



It seems the proflie 4 isn't quite the iMac crusher Gateway would like to make it out to be.



The article seemed pretty fair and balanced to me.

kecksy

Too bad more people will see the Gateway add than this article. I hope Apple strikes back.

rogue27

It does give the megahertz myth a good punch in the nuts. Sure, the gateway came out ~10% faster, but by the numbers it should have been 200% faster.



Of course, the Q3 test was limited on the Gateway by the crappy video card, while the Photoshop test benefited from altivec, but those are still the results. Web browsing benchmarks would probably look pretty sad on the iMac though, but at least it proves that much of what goes into the Gateway is just crap.

hmurchison

[quote] We also applied Apple's own benchmarks, the ones used to show its G4 processor rivals the Pentium 4. The test routines employ nine common Adobe Photoshop functions. Here the huge megahertz gap was mostly surmounted. The iMac's 800-megahertz G4 sprinted through the tests in 49.6 seconds. The Gateway's 2.8-gigahertz Pentium 4 completed the same tasks in 44.7 seconds. <hr></blockquote>



Heeheheh the iMac gives up 350% on the clockspeed and only loses by 5 seconds. "Lucy you have 'splainin to do! " <img src="graemlins/smokin.gif" border="0" alt="[Chilling]" />

zapchud

Now, what if Apple could get it's finger out and update the iMac lineup, just a little, juuuust a little

9 months now



I'm impressed by the iMac here!

matsu

Now imagine a non FSB-crippled G4. But still, restricting ourselves to the realm of the merely possible. 4x AGP (2x really is a crime). DDR, even hacked, it consumes less power. While they're at it they could make both slots into user accessible DIMMS! That's a very annoying trait of the iMac, even the eMac is better here. Do it, and take the opportunity to add DDR. It will be cheaper in the long run. L3 cache! Just a meg, we know from the PB that it makes a big difference. Raise the FSB to 133.



And though everyone here will howl with derisive cries about how unrealistic it is. Speeds to match the DP powermacs. Remember the CPU would still be just one compared to the two in the powermacs, but the prices of the iMac are closer to the high-end than they are to consumer prices. They may not be bad deals, but they're still high end, and they deserve a high-end spec on the top models. 867, 1Ghz, and 1.2! Since not even the DP867 has the 166Mhz FSB, Apple could run a 1.2/133 (9x multiplier) instead of a 1.25/166 (7.5x multiplier). They have an good marketing opportunity to take advantage of "all dual" pros by not intentionally holding back SP consumer machines. They could boast of "pro power" for the consumer. I'd buy. An SP 1.2 iMac might be faster than a DP867 in a few things, but the 867 would be much faster for any truly 'pro' number crunching, and it has much better expansion. They don't need to worry about overlap, different tools for different uses. Let the customer decide: any mac sale is a good one. Only on the top model, mind you, you still have to pay for the speed. And I'd offer a combo 17".



There are fast enough Combo units now (16x CD write) to eliminate a CDrw model. 4 models. 2 15" and 2 17". Combo and superdrive, combo and superdrive. Like this:



15" combo, G4 867. $1399



15" superdrive, G4 1Ghz. $1699

17" combo, G4 1Ghz. $1699



17" superdrive, G4 1.2Ghz. $1899



eMac can take low end from 899-1499. Just a touch of overlap from eMacs on the low end. Cry about costs if you want to but component costs say it's doable and with a decent profit margin to boot.