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Originally
posted February 5th, 2002
Updated February 7th, 2002 with Quake3 results from
a G4/733 with GeForce4 MX
(courtesy of Daniel Carvajal of U.C. Berkeley)
Updated February 11th with new "low end" G4/800
Power Mac results
main tester: rob
ART morgan,
Bare Feats Mad Scientist
Mahalo to Honolulu CompUSA for providing the iMac
G4 and G4/800 Power Mac
Let's
get right to it. How fast is the new iMac G4/800
compared to similar Macs running OS X and OS X
apps? And is a Dual G4/800 that much faster than a
single G4/800?
CLICK
HERE TO SEE
3D
GAME AND 2D SCROLLING RESULTS
PERFORMANCE
ANALYSIS
The
new iMac is impressive. Is it the best performing
Power Mac under $2000? Of the currently shipping
models, "Yes."
But
if you can get one, I say the "closeout" G4/733
Power Mac is a better buy from a performance and
upgrade standpoint. If you equip it just like the
iMac G4/800, it would cost you $500 more (see chart
below). But the G4/733 lets you add upgrades like
up to four fast
internal Ultra ATA hard
drive(s),*
or GeForce4 Titanium graphics kit, or Radeon 8500,
and up to 1.5GB of RAM. And if you are willing to
start off with a smaller hard drive (40GB) and no
SuperDrive, you would spend about the same as the
iMac G4/800.
(*
Some of you have pointed out that you can add an
external FireWire drive to the iMac but it won't
be as fast as a second internal Ultra ATA drive
and it will add desk clutter, which defeats the
purpose of the compact design.)
If
the SuperDrive is a biggie to you, then the iMac
G4/800 is a super buy. (But being an upgrade freak,
I'm not a big fan of "all-in-one" Macs. They make
me feel... claustrophobic.)
The
NEW G4/800 Power Mac is faster even though it has
the same clock speed as the G4/800 iMac. This is
mainly do to the faster memory bus (133MHz versus
100MHz). And, of course, the GeForce4 MX graphics
adapter doesn't hurt either.
Are
two 800Mhz G4's better than one? Definitely. And
when you consider that you can add a GeForce4 or
Radeon 8500, the hard core performance freaks
looking for a bargain should strongly consider the
closeout Dual G4/800 ($2199 not including display
at Apple
Online Store
-- see SPECIALS).
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iMac
G4/800
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"closeout"
G4/733 Power Mac
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G4/800
Power Mac
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Optical
Drive
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SuperDrive
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CD-RW
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CD-RW
(Combo optional)
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Memory
Bus Speed
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100MHz
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133MHz
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133MHz
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Graphics
Accelerator
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GeForce2
MX "hard wired" to 15" LCD
display
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GeForce2
MX in AGP 4X slot with ADC and VGA
connector
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Radeon
7500 in AGP 4X slot with ADC and VGA
connector
(GeForce4 MX or GeForce4 Titanium
optional)
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Displays
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15"
LCD only
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optional
Apple displays from 15" to
22"
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optional
Apple displays from 15" to
22"
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Max
Memory
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1
GB
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1.5
GB
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1.5
GB
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PCI
slots
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none
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4
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4
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Hard
Drive
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60
GB
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40
GB
(user can add up to three more drives from
third parties)
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40
GB
(optional Ultra ATA 60GB, 80GB, dual 80GB,
and SCSI Ultra160 too.)
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Price
with 15" display, 256MB RAM, 60GB hard
drive
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$1799
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$1898
(price includes $50 128M upgrade, $50 for
60GB upgrade minus $100 rebate on
display)
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$2148
( including $100 rebate on
display)
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Price
with SuperDrive
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$1799
(included)
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$2298
(user upgrade from
NewEgg.com)
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$2548
(user upgrade from
NewEgg.com)
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WHERE
TO BUY
Thanks
again to CompUSA
for letting me test their new iMacs and Power Macs.
CompUSA offers discounts to members of Mac User
Groups. If you are in Honolulu,
stop by the CompUSA
there.
It's the number one retailing store in the world
for Apple thanks to "Mac friendly" management and
the "missionary work" of guys like Kimo Sutton,
yours truly, and many others in the local
HMAUS
(Hawaii Apple and Macintosh Users
Society).
Visit
the Apple
Online Store
to pricing on the new iMacs and Power Mac G4's. HOT
new graphic card BTO option for Power Macs:
GeForce Titanium.
Want
to know just how fast the new GeForce4 Titanium
is? Anandtech.com has a great
chart
that shows how the GeForce4 MX, GeForce3, Radeon
8500, and GeForce4 Titanium compare running
Quake 3 1.30 at 1024 x 768 High Quality. Bottom
line? If you are a hard core 3D gamer, you MUST
get the GeForce4 Titanium.
Already
bought your G4 Power Mac? Hang tight. Apple will
soon offer the GeForce4 Titanium as a kit for
anyone with $399 and an AGP slot.
Small
Dog Electronics also
does "build-to-order" on new Power Macs and doesn't
charge you state sales tax.
Add
a SuperDrive (CD-RW, DVD-RW) to your existing Power
Mac from NewEgg.com
for $400. (Search on "DVR-A03SPK")
Need
a big, fast, second drive? Take a look at the
recent
Ultra ATA drive
test
for a comparison of the newest, fastest drives.
You'll pay a premium for bigger or added drives
from Apple. I'd rather buy from places like
GoogleGear
or OWC
and install it myself.
TEST
HARDWARE
The
iMac G4/800, Power Mac G4/733, Power Mac G4/800,
and Power Mac G4/800MP had 256M of RAM and ran Mac
OS 10.1.2.
The
graphics cards are abbreviated in the graphs to
save space:
GeF2
MX = GeForce2 MX
GeF3 = GeForce3
GeF4 MX = GeForce4 MX
Rad7500 = Radeon 7500
TEST
SOFTWARE
All test applications were the OS X release or beta
versions of OSX release.
The
new Final Cut Pro 3.0 test consists of two clips
from iMovie Tutorial (Clip01 and Clip02) with a 6
word crawling title (Arial Black 65pt), two Cross
Dissolve transitions (2sec & 1 sec), and a 2
pixel Gaussian Blur filter on the two video
clips.
For
details on the other tests, visit my
HOW
I TEST
page.
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