SPEED
We ran our usual speed comparisons on the D-2 G5 and our D-1.42 G4, the fastest Power Mac G4 Apple is ever likely to manufacture. Our speed tests consist of several routine "canned" benchmarks and several so-called "real world" benchmarks. The tests are described in our review of a 1.2-GHz G4 Cube upgrade. The speed comparisons were conducted on the standard configurations of both Power Macs, i.e. with 512 MB of RAM, no CTO options and Mac OS X 10.2.8. The Power Mac G5 was set to "Highest" processor performance in the Energy Saver preference pane.
| Test | D-2 G5 | D-1.42 G4 |
|---|---|---|
| "Canned" Benchmarks: | ||
| Altivec Fractal 1.1.3 (GFLOPS) |
10.3
|
9.9
|
|
Cinebench 2003 - Rendering
|
517*
|
244
|
|
- OpenGL Hardware Lighting
|
1317
|
572
|
| Let1kWindowsBloom 1.0 (sec) |
20
|
26
|
| Xbench 1.1.3 - CPU |
194
|
177
|
| - Threading |
205
|
172
|
| - Memory |
300
|
162
|
| - Quartz Graphics |
203
|
156
|
| - OpenGL Graphics |
170
|
128
|
| - User Interface Graphics |
215
|
168
|
| - Hard Disk |
111
|
96
|
| "Real World" Tests: | ||
| Startup (sec) |
43
|
54
|
| Shutdown (sec) |
9
|
10
|
| Launch Classic Mode (sec) |
16
|
16
|
| Duplicate 160 MB File (sec) |
11
|
12
|
| Duplicate 700 MB Folder 3600 Files (sec) |
81
|
81
|
| Scroll 142p Acrobat Reader File (sec) |
15
|
24
|
| Encode MP3 in iTunes 3.0.1 (sec) |
51
|
66
|
| Export QT Movie to DV in iMovie 3.0.3 (sec) |
24
|
23
|
| Quake III Arena 1.32 (frames/sec) |
223
|
143
|
*Using Cinebench 2003 beta optimized for the G5 yielded 517 vs 402.
Surprisingly, it's not a clean sweep for the Dual 2-GHz Power Mac G5. The D-2 G5 is much faster according to the "canned" benchmarks. However, in the "real world" benchmarks the D-2 G5 really shines in only four tests: startup, scrolling in Acrobat reader, encoding in iTunes and frame rate in the game Quake III Arena. The G4 and G5 are within a second of each other on the remaining five tests. We especially wonder why exporting an iMovie (the 6 merged iMovie tutorial clips) to QuickTime Full Quality Digital Video format is not faster on the G5 than the G4.
Our guess is that Mac OS X 10.2.8(G5) and application codes are not yet fully optimized for the G5 and with subsequent releases the G5's speed will improve relatively. This hypothesis is supported by the recent release of a beta version of Cinebench 2003 that is more optimized for the G5. It's Rendering score for the D-2 G5 is 517 versus the non-optimized version's score of 402, a significant 29% increase. And, those with the real need for speed, i.e. professionals who work with graphics and 3D gamers, should see an immediate great speed boost from the D-2 G5.
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