Comparison article in MaxPC this month---

thekingofpain · February 19th, 2003, 02:55 PM

It was called "Speed trials" and compared a few things we scrutinize side by side on a regular basis with some interesting results---

First was a dual processor showdown with the Mac g4, AMD MP, and P4 Xeon with the much more powerful Xeon winning out---

They next tested CAS settings on some Corsair PC2700ddr using 3dMark, Sysmark and Q3 demo running 1.5/2.0/3.0 settings with CAS2 winning out performancewise but only by a couple fps with a 135 point better 3dMark score overall---

Next was a 533/400 Mhz bus comparison of P4's---the 533 bus winning out by 2-9% using 3dMark/UT'03 demo/Q3 demo/Sysmark'02---

The AGP 8x versus 4x was interesting with 4x winning out and in some cases 8x was SLOWER with 4x being 2% faster using the same demo group---

Does serial ATA provide a performance boost?
In all synthetic tests traditional ATA wins out over SATA so save your $$$ till 300-600MB/sec drives show up---

IDE hdd VS SCSI (Cheetah 15.3k vs IBM180GXP)
SCSI spanked it by a 30% margin---

CD burning speed was next 12x 7:22 mins---24x 4:16 mins---40x 3:42 mins---48x 2:53 mins
Swapping from a 12x to a 48x machine will yield a 4:31 min reduction in a full burn---

Next was a Barton 3000+ VS P43.06 comparison with no convincing winner---if AMD would have put a 400mhz bus on Barton it would most likely trounce the 3.06 P4---

MaximumPC is a great mag with lots of informative articles--- get it if you havnt...

jkrohn · February 19th, 2003, 03:21 PM

Was always a big fan of Maximum PC. Too bad its so expensive

I wish they would sell a No-CD version that is cheaper.

Jkrohn

davidamarkley · February 19th, 2003, 03:22 PM

I get MaxPC

I loved being able to show all the Mac fans around town, that the PCs beat the Mac in EVERYTHING!! Inlcuding what the Macs are supposedly 'the best' at... Graphics!

Excerpt from MaxPC:

"We came to one conclusion very quickly after reviewing the numbers: Mac people who scream that their Apples are faster than PCs are simply so full of crap, they could double as septic tanks."

For those of you who didn't get the mag, here are the results for the Dual Mac/Dual AMD/Dual Intel test.

Dual Mac:
PowerPC G4s @ 1.25GHz
DDR266 2GB RAM
FSB - 167MHz

Dual AMD:
Athlon MPs @ 2.0GHz
DDR266 2GB RAM
FSB - 266MHz

Dual Intel:
Xeon P4s @ 2.8GHz
DDR266 2GB RAM
FSB - 533MHz

Here are the benchmarking results:

Mac AMD Intel

Quake3 1.32 @ 1024x768 135 fps 186 fps 290 fps

Quake3 1.32 @ 640x480 152 fps 193 fps 327 fps

Jedi Outcast 1.04 @ 1024x768 40 fps 69.8 fps 101 fps

Jedi Outcast 1.04 @ 640x480 41 fps 68.9 fps 101 fps

Photoshop 7.0 MPC script 60 sec 35 sec 34 sec

Premiere 6.5 export to QT 430 sec 335 sec 328 sec

LightWave 7.5 RayTrace 8 threads 105.3 sec 88.3 sec 55 sec

(Best scores are bolded)

Enjoy!!

David

[Source: Maximum PC March 2003 Pg. 25]

davidamarkley · February 19th, 2003, 03:25 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by jkrohn
Was always a big fan of Maximum PC. Too bad its so expensive

I wish they would sell a No-CD version that is cheaper.

Jkrohn

Was that supposed to be sarcastic? Because they DO! I get the $12 a year subscription and they don't send me a cd. All I want is the mag anyway...

jkrohn · February 19th, 2003, 03:29 PM

Really? Where did you get this from?

Jkrohn

thekingofpain · February 19th, 2003, 03:38 PM

It was difficult to quantify that dual processor comparison---the machines varied so dramatically in processing power:
Mac = 2.5g
AMD = 4.0g
Xeon = 5.6g

davidamarkley · February 19th, 2003, 03:53 PM

I know, but they said it was the fastest Dual proc machine from each company.

Not to mention that even though the PCs were alot better than the Macs, the PCs still cost less!!

That's why I can't understand it when these 'mac addicts' swear by their macs, and what do they get? The only positive I see for a mac is they are unix-based!!

People say they like them for 'aesthetics' too. I think all the plastic makes them look like a cheap chinese yo-yo...

I mean, they cost more, have proprietary parts, are slower...

One quote I will never forget, is about macs...

"If you build a computer an idiot can use, only idiots will use it."

It's not that I hate Mac users, I just don't understand at all the reason behind them wanting to use them...

BTW, jkrohn, they are postcard sized and come in every issue that I get. Maybe they don't put them into the 'regular' issues. If you want, PM me your address, and I'll send one of the forms to you.

thekingofpain · February 19th, 2003, 04:00 PM

12$ subscription
http://magazines.3dmarketplace.com/i...ode.magazines/

29$ with cd
https://w1.buysub.com/pubs/IM/MAX/MA...s_mag_code=MAX

thekingofpain · February 19th, 2003, 04:03 PM

Cheap Chinese yo-yo!!! ahhahhaha!!!

That made me spitlaugh coffee on my monitor!!!

jkrohn · February 19th, 2003, 09:29 PM

Sweet, thanks TKOP.

Jkrohn