Macintosh Sucks

[Grand Admiral Prawn]

Saw an advertisment touting the new iMac's "Pentium Crushing 800mhz processor."

Wow, a whole 800? I'm impressed.

[Grand Admiral Thrawn]

Saw an advertisment touting the new iMac's "Pentium Crushing 800mhz processor."

Wow, a whole 800? I'm impressed.

Other people may be.

[IDMR]

Your... unfortunate nomenclature aside...

Processing power is not measured by clock speed alone. You betray your ignorance by attaching sole importance to them.

[IDMR]

Saw an advertisment touting the new iMac's "Pentium Crushing 800mhz processor."

Wow, a whole 800? I'm impressed.

Other people may be.

Oh good day. Didn't see you there.

[His Divine Shadow]

Your... unfortunate nomenclature aside...

Processing power is not measured by clock speed alone. You betray your ignorance by attaching sole importance to them.

Ignorance is believing apple when they pentium crushing, cause it's not thats a bald faced lie, it's about as untrue as you can get.
Compare it to any other Pentium or AMD in the same price range and it'll get spanked, hard.

I loathe Apple because they are such blatant liars, they disgust me.

[Grand Admiral Thrawn]

I loathe Apple because they are such blatant liars, they disgust me.

Alot of companies are.

[IDMR]

Your... unfortunate nomenclature aside...

Processing power is not measured by clock speed alone. You betray your ignorance by attaching sole importance to them.

Ignorance is believing apple when they pentium crushing, cause it's not thats a bald faced lie, it's about as untrue as you can get.
Compare it to any other Pentium or AMD in the same price range and it'll get spanked, hard.

I loathe Apple because they are such blatant liars, they disgust me.

That as it may be, clockspeed is not the only thing which is important to a processor's performance, or would you suggest that a celeron and a pentium-whatever processor of the same clockspeed have the same performance characteristics?

[His Divine Shadow]

That as it may be, clockspeed is not the only thing which is important to a processor's performance, or would you suggest that a celeron and a pentium-whatever processor of the same clockspeed have the same performance characteristics?

I've heard this plenty enough, so what if clockspeed isn't everything, do you think I am some computer newbie? The pentium still crushes the G4's in the same price range, and probably below too.

It's the price range wich is important here, not the clockspeed.

[His Divine Shadow]

Alot of companies are.

Not to this extent.
Heck even the first time they started that annoying anti-pentium ads they were wrong, they used a 486 version of the benchmark software for the pentium so it couldn't utilize the pentium specific architecture.

[Grand Admiral Thrawn]

Alot of companies are.

Not to this extent.
Heck even the first time they started that annoying anti-pentium ads they were wrong, they used a 486 version of the benchmark software for the pentium so it couldn't utilize the pentium specific architecture.

[Deanna Troi]I sense you have a dislike of them[/Deanna Troi]

[Durandal]

HDS: The G4 at the same clock speed as a Pentium III or 4 will probably come out on top in most tests. A Pentium 4 at the same price as a G4 will have the P4 win in some areas, mainly having to do with floating point operations.

Yes, Apple does deceive about the speed of their chips. The G4 is not hands down faster, but the AltiVec unit sure does a lot to help. For example, the G4 can encode MPEG-2 video faster than the P4, but the P4 can crunch through SETI units faster than the G4. In terms of raw processing power, the dual GHz G4 comes out on top in RC5 encoding tests compared to AMD and Intel dual processor rigs.

A lot of why Apple's machines lag has to do with the fact that they use an ancient bus and memory architecture (still on PC133 SDRAM and a 133MHz FSB), as well as the fact that the G4 has a relatively weak FPU, which Motorola engineers hoped the AltiVec unit would make up for. Sometimes it does. Most of the time, it doesn't.

But, seriously, AMD and Intel are similarly guilty of fraud, just as much as Apple. Intel boasts ridiculously high clockspeeds, but comparatively low performance per clock. AMD has the "1800+, 2000+" naming scheme on their chips, which suggest that they're running at 1.8GHz and 2GHz, respectively, but they're not running that fast; they're just running as fast as that comparatively clocked P4, and even that isn't valid in all tests.

[His Divine Shadow]

But, seriously, AMD and Intel are similarly guilty of fraud, just as much as Apple. Intel boasts ridiculously high clockspeeds, but comparatively low performance per clock. AMD has the "1800+, 2000+" naming scheme on their chips, which suggest that they're running at 1.8GHz and 2GHz, respectively, but they're not running that fast; they're just running as fast as that comparatively clocked P4, and even that isn't valid in all tests.

I know but they don't stoop to throwing crap at the oppostion, wich is what gets me the most.

[SPOOFE]

The fastest G4's are, what, into the ghz range by now? That may not sound impressive, but they do pull more weight per hz than an Intel chip.

However, as HDS pointed out, a direct comparison of performance is a tad dishonest, as the price of an 800 mhz G4 FAR exceeds the price of any other 800 mhz chip. Now, compare a $500 G4 proc to a $500 P4, and then you'll see things even out.

One thing that amazes me, though... how come you never see Apple compare its processors to AMD chips?

[Crayz9000]

The fastest G4's are, what, into the ghz range by now? That may not sound impressive, but they do pull more weight per hz than an Intel chip.

However, as HDS pointed out, a direct comparison of performance is a tad dishonest, as the price of an 800 mhz G4 FAR exceeds the price of any other 800 mhz chip. Now, compare a $500 G4 proc to a $500 P4, and then you'll see things even out.

One thing that amazes me, though... how come you never see Apple compare its processors to AMD chips?

Intel's the big guy on the block. Win the Intel fans, and you gain a good market share.

Anyway, about the clock speeds--

Back in 1984, the Apple ][e manual mentioned that in a single clock cycle of its 1MHz Motorola chip, it would perform 4 operations, while the Intel 8086 would only perform one operation per cycle while its clock frequency was 4MHz. It's the same situation almost; the Motorola (and now AMD) chips are optimized in a different manner than the 'brute-force' Intel chips.

[His Divine Shadow]

How are they supposed to advertise, then? When they are 3% of the market, trying to gain more, why shouldn't they tout the (debatable) advantages of their chips over the competition's?

They don't tout any advantages, they fling mud at the opposition like a crying little kid, so it's faster per MHz, not impressive, considering the price difference, wich is what matters.

[His Divine Shadow]

Note, I have not been saying Macintosh suck in this thread.
I have been saying Apple suck, there is a difference.

[SPOOFE]

Well, I won't be afraid to come right out and say that the iMac is a piece of crap. Looks like a table lamp on acid. The eMac is a bit better (that thing's got a REAL monitor), but neither of 'em beat out a G4 tower.

[Durandal]

For anyone who is a fairly experienced computer user, the iMac is a piece of crap. For the other 90% of the population, it's all right. I own a G4 tower, and I would never think about buying an iMac, ever. It doesn't serve my purposes. However, it does serve the purposes of those that it is marketed toward: people who just want the machine to check E-mail, surf the web and do other nifty computer things without the hassle of Windows. XP is stable and fast, and it does have a number of features that I like, but if something goes wrong, it's a lot more difficult to troubleshoot than OS X.

HDS: Why does Apple suck? Because they're mudslinging? That's what you do to the competition! Does the PineSol lady suck because she she makes fun of Lysol? Apple doesn't have time in a 30 second spot to run a Photoshop demo or do an RC5 encryption! They don't sell detergent! That's why they direct people to their website. The commercial generates the interest; that's what the whole "Switch" campaign is all about.

Now, there are certain areas that Apple sucks in, but marketing is certainly not one of them. Do you really think people would buy an 800MHz machine with 256MB of memory for $1500 if Apple's marketing and design didn't work?

[Mr Bean]

Acutal yes Durandel because as we saddly know

People are morons

I don't even WANT to tell the story of my Grandmother, the fork and the scanner

Most people know LESS than Jack shit about computers

Stamping out the cluelessness on the subject is one of my personal goals in life(Lucky the kids we rase today besides having insane hand, eye cordination have increabile focus, and the ability to sit in chairs for very long times, all of which are vauble abilitys as opposed the the Investment bankers who can bench press 350 and run five miles a day
Not a slam on weak nerdy geeks or anything assoated with the sterotype(As I resalty got back on a diet and starting running 3 miles a day I'm saddly between the two groups ATM )

Just a bit of varity

[IDMR]

That as it may be, clockspeed is not the only thing which is important to a processor's performance, or would you suggest that a celeron and a pentium-whatever processor of the same clockspeed have the same performance characteristics?

I've heard this plenty enough, so what if clockspeed isn't everything, do you think I am some computer newbie? The pentium still crushes the G4's in the same price range, and probably below too.

It's the price range wich is important here, not the clockspeed.

And perhaps you assume I am unable to perform simple mathematics such as a simple price-performance ratio? I never said nor implied anything to that effect. Your strawman operation, it seems, is a resounding success.

[Robert Treder]

In my opinion, Apple is bad, for the same reasons as Microsoft.

The performances of Apples has never bothered me, it's the fact that when you buy a mac, everything must be made by Apple or contracted out to Apple-specific companies.
Apple and Microsoft are two monopolizing peas in a pod. I use Microsoft because I must, and, as many situations call for it, I use Apple as well.

To be honest though, no matter where the corporate ethics lie, my money will continue to go to whichever group game companies deign to make games for. It has also been, in my experience, more difficult to perform and participate in software and other electronic piracy on macs, which is another major strike against them.

[Grand Admiral Prawn]

The kicker is that the model of iMac with the mighty 800mhz processor cost something like three grand. Who are they trying to scam? The average guy who just wants to read email and look at porn can go down to Gateway and get a nice setup for a third of that price.

[AltoidMaster]

I was talking with my dad who's an engineer about the Macitosh vs. PC thing, and I know how Mike Wong loathes when people call on their daddy, but to be quite frank its not like he LIES to me so that i am happy, the worst i do is misrepresent his opinion, which I am not doing right now.

The big thing about modern day processing is a lot about job handling. As said before in the comparison of the Motorola vs. Apple ][e chip, they way the processor handles it is probably the more important question when assessing the chip. But its difficult to assign a numerical value because its a lot about algorithms. Macintosh computers in modern day technology use a very old architecture, something that Intel has only been able to recently overcome with the advent of the Merced/McKinley chip (my dad worked on this in the HP/Intel project, Intel was using one of the most ancient and inefficient architectures, causing the overall performances of their projects to suck like crap.). But with the Intel/HP partnership in the project, they came up with a hybrid of two of more prevalent architectures, RISK, and I forgot the other one. The new one was secret-project titled TAHOE and renamed EPIC for commercial purposes.

This new architecture washes the floor with the Macintosh processor. However Intel with its many political problems can't seem to make a chip without the word Pentium in it (why ever is a big question seeing as how its no longer a 586) so the Merced/McKinley and Medicine modification chips will take a while to get out, they keep announcing it but it gets quashed, and then you'll really see something.

But until then, one has to understand that the P4 is just a slightly larger P3 built for "graphics". And the P3 though decent, was never that impressive anyways. So watch for the next generation and compare those. Comparing G4 which actually is somewhat DIFFERENT to basically a revamped Pentium processor is kind of comparing the N-class to Sun's old refrigerator Super computer. Ingenuity does have its quality.

[SPOOFE]

The kicker is that the model of iMac with the mighty 800mhz processor cost something like three grand.

Two grand, actually. Close to it, anyway. The thing is, just about all that cash is going towards two things... the LCD, and the Superdrive.

I can understand the rationale behind the iMac just fine... the average Joe wants their machine to be small and easy to handle. My problem with it is that it's turned a computer from being seen as a useful tool to being seen as a home decoration, something to put on your coffee table as a conversation piece. With iMac's, it's always seemed like the customer's biggest concern is whether or not it'll match their drapes.

[Nick]

This new architecture washes the floor with the Macintosh processor. However Intel with its many political problems can't seem to make a chip without the word Pentium in it (why ever is a big question seeing as how its no longer a 586) so the Merced/McKinley and Medicine modification chips will take a while to get out, they keep announcing it but it gets quashed, and then you'll really see something.

Two words: "Binary compatibility"

The bane of attempts to radically improve processor and hardware architectures. Why are there so many programs which *don't* take advantage of the features of the Pentium 4? Because if they did, they wouldn't run on P3's (or earlier) anymore. Every additional version of a piece of software adds maintenance costs, so if a company can tolerate a slight performance hit to get a single binary that will run on any Pentium, they will.

A computer is only as useful as the software that runs on it - a new architecture needs to either gain pre-release support (e.g. IA-64), or else it needs to be able to emulate existing processors (e.g. Transmeta's Crusoe).

Neither of those two options is easy to achieve - it's entirely possible that this is where the developmental Intel processors you describe ran into problems (With the marketing push towards IA-64, I can't see any other major architectural changes being pushed by Intel, HP or any of the other major corps)