G5 vs. Intel

peabody120 · January 17, 2006 8:31PM

I have an opportunity to upgrade an existing order on an iMac, although it will cost me the 200 dollar rebate I was to receive. I am a casual user--mostly just MS Office, cd burning, web surfing, email. I do have a disability that inhibits mouse and keyboard use and PC software is much better at addressing my needs--I think the software I have been recommended is Dragon[??] www.nuance.com/

I'm getting a Mac regardless. My question as a loyal user is, should I purchase the G5 and save 200 bucks or take the opportunity to upgrade and hope I will be able to run PC software one day? Are there any other benefits I'm overlooking? Also I'm upgrading from a six yr. old 266 mhz iMac, so I will be much faster than before no matter what. Price is definitely an issue as I'm on a limited income--I think I know what I want to do, but am looking for some intelligent advice. Thanks

anders · January 17, 2006 8:43PM

I would upgrade.

The speed increase of the cpu and gpu will become importent if you hold on to your computer for more than two years.

lundy · January 17, 2006 8:45PM

Definitely swap for the Intel model.

The G5 has NO hope of running native Dragon software, and the Intel Mac definitely has some possibility. Most people think Windows will run on the new Macs, and even Apple has said that people "probably will" run Windows on it.

Plus, if you are not running OS X at present on the 233, you'll be pleased with OS X's full accessibility features.

spinnetti · January 27, 2006 9:04AM

Quote:

Originally posted by peabody120

I have an opportunity to upgrade an existing order on an iMac, although it will cost me the 200 dollar rebate I was to receive. I am a casual user--mostly just MS Office, cd burning, web surfing, email. I do have a disability that inhibits mouse and keyboard use and PC software is much better at addressing my needs--I think the software I have been recommended is Dragon[??] www.nuance.com/

I'm getting a Mac regardless. My question as a loyal user is, should I purchase the G5 and save 200 bucks or take the opportunity to upgrade and hope I will be able to run PC software one day? Are there any other benefits I'm overlooking? Also I'm upgrading from a six yr. old 266 mhz iMac, so I will be much faster than before no matter what. Price is definitely an issue as I'm on a limited income--I think I know what I want to do, but am looking for some intelligent advice. Thanks

Hard to say.. Most folks are going to say "Upgrade!" because they want to.

Based on the needs you outlined, I'm not so sure I wouldn't just save the $200. For the near term, the new box isn't noticably faster surfing, or email, is probably a bit faster burning a cd, and is definately slower in office (but not too much). I traded in (up?) from a 20" G5 iMac to at 20" Macintel (same config), and am not blown away by the difference.. For the day to day stuff its no better, and my new box has been giving me a number of problems and crashes. Unless you are going to keep it 5 years or so, I'd say get the G5 and save the money. Otherwise, somebody will probably get windows to run on the mac, and if they do it gives you more flexibility in the future.

zab the fab · January 27, 2006 9:12AM

It's definately faster than G5. The press shot from the hips when they called Jobs presentation "disinfo". Take a look at this :

http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=176161

[quote]MacSpeedZone posts their benchmarks for the Dual Core Intel iMac and claims that Macworld's initial test were misleading:

Quote:

This is where the Macworld "First Lab Tests" article falls a little flat ... obscuring the processor capacity vs processor usage problem inherent with mutiprocessor machines (or multi-core ... same difference). Using Macworld's logic we could argue, given the data above, the Quad G5 Power Mac is only 14% faster when running some of Apple's own applications. We think that this is misleading, as we pointed out.

They post a comparison chart, taking into account percentage of processor usage as a guide.

Sincerely

Zab the Fab

spinnetti · January 27, 2006 9:20AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Zab The Fab

It's definately faster than G5. The press shot from the hips when they called Jobs presentation "disinfo". Take a look at this :

http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=176161

Sincerely

Zab the Fab

There is no question that it is "faster", but its also slower on non-native apps. Problem is, everybody has some axe to grind, coloring these comments. I set up both of my machines, configured them identically, from prefs, to apps, to desktop photos etc. I set them up side by side and used my nano to time the my 'benchmarks' which are simply the things I do every day: Surf the web, read email, play tunes, work in iphoto (4000+ pictures), and use MS office. Since 99% of my time is spent in these apps, they are the only things relavant to my usage. I'm not knocking the new box - I bought one after all, but an intelligent reasoning person should not be swayed by anything except what will match their usage pattern. In my case, some things were slower, and some faster. No doubt in time things will speed up which is great, but today, in these apps, there is no significant difference.

splinemodel · January 27, 2006 10:31AM

If you have legacy apps, keep the G5. Otherwise, get the Intel one. It's really as simple as that.

zab the fab · January 27, 2006 7:27PM

Guys guys guys.... just read the article please

The new test sheds light to the fact that the first speedtest from MacWorld was plain wrong but more importantly WHY it was wrong. When you read why you'll also see why some of you experience more speed but nothing great. You are seeing nothing about Apple's speed claims (because they are true and has now been confirmed) but you are seeing the effects of having more lanes on the road and a small speed increase of your "car" = Multi processor / Core Dual.

Please read, it explains it all. The new iMac is KING !

Sincerely

Zab the Fab

lundy · January 27, 2006 8:23PM

Here are the benchmarks that we ran over at All Things Macintosh, using the Monty Hall Paradox ( http://forums.appleinsider.com/showt...threadid=60684 ).

kwsanders · January 30, 2006 12:40PM

Lundy... your benchmarks did not come through, because it is asking for a name and password for your link on your .Mac page.

pb · January 30, 2006 2:11PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Zab The Fab

Guys guys guys.... just read the article please The new test sheds light to the fact that the first speedtest from MacWorld was plain wrong but more importantly WHY it was wrong.

The MacSpeedZone article just repeats the evident that, amazingly enough, was overlooked in the MacWorld tests. Strange that are our times.

And given peabody120's needs and budget, I would suggest to go with the G5 model. It will still be around 8-10 times faster than the machine (s)he has now.

lundy · January 31, 2006 10:22PM

Quote:

Originally posted by kwsanders

Lundy... your benchmarks did not come through, because it is asking for a name and password for your link on your .Mac page.

Thanks. After 10 or 20 more years I will figure out how to get a valid iDisk URL.

It was in the Sites folder, which is supposed to be readable, I thought. I use that because of the crazy URLs in the Filesharing folder ("Public").

Anyway it's on Old Faithful (johnnylundy.com) now.

G5 vs. Intel

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