[Rational Dreamer]

So I bought a 700mhz g3 graphite imac about three weeks ago because a drunk broad spilled liquor on my old Athlon xp pc (how did the liquor actually make it inside is beyond me). So I needed a quick replacement to check email and browse the net. That’s where the imac comes in. I always liked how OS X looks but always wondered how it performed. So I picked up the imac for a measly $220 to test-drive os x.

Personally I think it’s ok but it doesn’t beat Xp… and I’m sure vista will stomp it to the ground. Why is the OS so unresponsive? And I know it’s not my hardware because I went to the Apple store and the same thing happens on EXPENSIVE hardware. I’m so use to the snappy feeling of XP that I just can’t get use to this sluggish mac os x thing. Could it be that the lack of “snappiness” is due to me using panther instead of tiger. I have a copy of tiger but I need to get an external dvd enclosure before installing it. Is it REALLY worth the extra $30 to install tiger and will it make a difference on snappiness (for lack of a better word)?

Anyway I’m currently thinking of reverting to windows/athlon. Building a dual core athlon 64 system for Christmas sounds like a good idea right about now. However the mactels are coming out next year… hmmm should I just wait so I can have the best of both worlds? Decisions, decisions.

PS:
I produce music . Currently using a hardware setup (mpc, akai recorder etc.) I want a dual core system to move completely to software based production and sell my hardware.

[torifile]

RAM? You need more of it. And for music, you'll need something more powerful.

[Brad]

That iMac is going to feel sluggish no matter how much RAM you put in it for lack of a decent video card and no altivec unit on the G3. RAM will help things from stalling under the load of a couple applications, but it certainly won't make the UI "snappy" like your Athlon.

If you're going to make a fair judgment on Mac OS X, you'd better do it on something that's a little bit newer. Mac OS X wasn't even the primary OS when that machine was introduced.

[chucker]

Originally Posted by Rational Dreamer [..] 700mhz g3 graphite imac [..] dual core athlon 64 system

Oh yeah, sure sounds like a fair comparison.

What Brad said. Even with lots of RAM, that above system is way on the low end.

[Brad]

Yeah. In fact, I'll expand on that a bit.

Mac OS X appears to perform poorly on older hardware primarily because of the updated graphics subsystem. Take note of this because Vista's Aero should be doing the same thing. Mac OS X introduced system-wide double-buffering on all contexts which are then composited with their full 8-bit alpha channels into what you see on the screen. This requires vastly more memory and processing power than older graphics systems required (such as Windows XP and Mac OS 9). Apple's biggest optimization here is with Quartz Extreme, a method of offloading most of the compositing work to the GPU (again, Vista will do the same). However, QE requires a minimum of a 32 MB ATI Radeon and your iMac has the much more primitive 16 MB ATI Rage. Much of the UI's performance also relies on the altivec unit that is available only on the G4 and G5 chips.

You may not think that simple window compositing requires a lot of work, but it does. Let's look at a very simple no-optimization example for simply moving a window on the screen.

In older graphics systems, a message is sent to the graphics card to simply copy and move a rectangular block of memory. Anything behind it has to wait until the OS and background applications can refresh their data. This is what causes the occasional "eraser effect" on Windows systems that are older, under heavy load, or have an unresponsive application. The eraser effect visually occurs when you see an old block of the screen where it shouldn't be. This still happens on the fastest of Windows PCs, but the delay is short enough that you generally can't see it happen. Throwing faster CPUs at the problem doesn't solve it, though, as Microsoft has finally realized.


The eraser effect. Click for a video.

That's a thing of the past with Mac OS X (and soon Windows Vista). Double-buffering makes the system remember what windows look like even when the application is completely unresponsive. It allows the screen to always properly redraw without any eraser effect.

What's the cost of this great feature, though? Well, a lot. Let's say you have a simple 800x600 pixel window and move it 10 pixels to the right. That requires about 4.8 million compositing operations because it has to be recomposited with every pixel moved. Now, say you have two windows behind it. You've now tripled that to 14.4 million operations. Okay, now you open a menu from the top of the screen that's 200x250 in size. Just to display the menu, it takes 200,000 compositing operations (remember the windows behind it!) and to fade out assuming it takes ten frames, another 2 million operations. Keep in kind that an operation requires several instructions and could take several clock cycles.

All this is done by the CPU in pre-Quartz Extreme systems. That causes a huge performance hit and can slow down the UI dramatically. With Quartz Extreme? Nearly all of those operations are handled "for free" by the GPU instead of the CPU. Of course, my example uses a very primitive implementation for counting operations, but the general theory and Big-O still applies.

What about memory? A typical window structure in the older graphics systems only require a mere bytes or kilobytes of memory, usually the size, location, and some other OS-specific meta information. When you double-buffer things, that size inflates greatly. That single 800x600 pixel window just went from a few kilobyte to 1.9 megabytes. Now, remember that this applies to everything the operating system treats as a "window." That includes regular windows, the desktop, shadows, menus, anything in a drag operation, icons (in some cases), and so forth. Suddenly lots of memory is getting used just to draw the screen.

Throw in a small amount of physical RAM and a slow hard drive (read: your iMac) and suddenly even updating the screen becomes sluggish as the operating system has to page the drive for virtual memory.

So, the moral of this story? Mac OS X was not meant for older computers. It will run on them, but it will not run well and the experience is not indicative of Mac OS X's performance on modern systems.

[p-trick]

G3 iMacs are on the other hand a very good way to start playing with Linux.

Not because it's better than OS X, but for the possibility to build an OS which fits your machine's power...

[AWR]

I wonder if you would be similarly frustrated with my Dell 1.3 mhz, 128MB running Windows ME? Snappy? I'd like to see it run XP.

Fast and affordable and excellent with huge numbers of pictures and music? I can suggest a 20" iMac G5 with 2GB of RAM. Everyday I am amazed at its speed and stability. And as it won't be slowed down with virus protection running (or the results of not running), it should stay that way for nice long time. Edit. Oh, but NOW I see you want a dual core system. Nevermind.

[Koodari]

Windows 2000 Professional on a Duron 800, original ATi Radeon, 256MB memory felt snappier than 10.3 on a 1.25 (1.33? I forget) GHz 15" Powerbook with Radeon 9700 and 768MB memory. Not much, but still. Granted I leave more stuff open on the Mac, but according to Process Viewer and top, apps in the background have near-zero processor load as they should.

It's just a matter of polishing code. If you make immediate response a high priority, you'll have immediate response. I hear BeOS is an example of this in practice, but I have never used it.

It isn't in Apple's interest to do this, after all they are a hardware company, and if they can leave the system a tad slow and by that get people to buy dualcore G5's, they probably will.

[PB PM]

Originally Posted by chucker Oh yeah, sure sounds like a fair comparison. What Brad said. Even with lots of RAM, that above system is way on the low end.

Haha, yeah no kidding. Even 700Mhz G4 would give you preformance boost.

[_Ω_]

I love these threads as I type away on my 667Mhz TiBook with a GB of RAM running 10.3.9.

I also use a 3+ Ghz HP machine at work, also with I think a GB of RAM running XP (notice how I don't care what it is). Guess which I am more productive on, and which I prefer to use.

[ast3r3x]

I guess it'll be like this with Vista, but I love that I got my computer with 10.2.7 on it. It was awesome and I loved it.

10.3 comes out, and not only was OS X significantly better, but as long as that OS X supported your machine properly (you had the hardware it needed for acceleration) it was a speed increase.

10.4 comes out, and not only was OS X significantly better, but as long as that OS X supported your machine properly (you had the hardware it needed for acceleration) it was a speed increase.

I think Apple always meant it when they said they set out to make a modern advanced OS. <paraphrasing>

When OS X first came out I liked it because it allowed me to do many things at a decent speed instead of only one thing at a fast speed. Since 10.3, and more noticeably 10.4 pushing GUI aspects off to the GPU, you can really see what Apple was envisioning with OS X.

You can only dress up a pinto so much, but you can have a filthy Bentley and polish it up to be something pretty spectacular.

The fastest PC will still run XP faster than the fastest Mac runs OS X. Will the same be true for Vista? Not sure, but it doesn't really matter because OS X will be better.

I agree, OS X has always been sluggish compared to other OS's, but I've always thought it's perks greatly outweigh that.

[chung123]

I dunno, I've slaved on an 700mhz iMac G3 at work from 2002 - 2004 with 512 megs ram, running first 9.2.2, than 10.1, then Jaguar, and finally Panther. [Doing simple Photoshop everyday too!]

Panther made the most difference on that iMac G3 and OS X finally felt "snappy".

If all yer doing is browsing the web and emailing, the iMac G3 is still very usuable--epecially a 700mhz one.

As long as you have enough ram[at least 512], and turn off animate opening applications and scale intead of genie effect when minimizing windows---Panther should run great on that thing.

Tiger, in my experience, did not give any dramatic speed increases like it was from Jaguar to Panther on the G3.

Besides, Windows XP may seem "snappier" but in my experience at work, you waste a ton of time you just "saved" dealing with all the other crap XP users have to put up with..."Take a tour of XP" "Would you like to hide unused icons?" "Updates are ready for you to download"...aaaarrrgggh!

[daftgem]

Windows is snappier than OSX, hands down in my opinion. A Dual 2.0 G5 can't beat the snappiness of my AMD 3000XP, with the OS customized with services tweaked and what not. I don't know why it is, maybe its a Mac thing. OSX is more appealing to me, but certainly no where near as zippy as XP when tweaked well.

[joebells]

I have to agree osx is just somewhat sluggish. My girlfriends 2.0 20" imac with 2 gigs of ram is just a bit sluggish. Nothing crazy but not super instantaneous like xp. But I think the useability of osx outweighs that but still its a bit annoying

[oldmacfan]

Ok, going old school with a Rev C iMac that is almost seven years old with Panther and 512 MB of ram. What my machine can't handle is QT 7 and the new H264. It feels as good as my 3 year old PC running XP with a Gig of Ram. Thing is my iMac still gets work done and will be productive for me and my family till it dies and then I still might have to claw it away from my wifes cold dead hands. She might never let it go.

[Rational Dreamer]

In my short acquaintance with OS X I can easily see why it’s considered an “advance” OS. It just works, as it should. However all I need computers for is to browse the net from time to time and to produce music. I know a 700 g3 is not capable of the music task so I did not buy it for that reason. I’ve looked further into currently available technology and it seems like one way or the other Apple is always a step behind. Which sucks since they make kick ass products. At the end of the day though Apple loses in the sense that functionality does not justify the cost. Sure, no viruses or spy ware... but that’s not enough to pay a premium for a computer.

My next pc:
-Dual Core Athlon 3800+ (2.0ghz) 1ghz FSB *overclocked to 2.6ghz: $332
-2GB Corsair XMS DDR 400 Ram (1GB x 2): $221
-250gb 7200 SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive: $101
-M-Audio Audiophile 96/24 Audio Card: $90
-Sony 16x DVD burner: $38
-ThermalTake Case and Power supply: $96
- ASUS A8N-E NVIDIA nForce4 Ultra motherboard: $115
-MSI Radeon 128mb PCI Express x16 Video Card: 49.50

Total of $1,004 + $22 ground shipping. Grand total of: 1,063.59

I want a dual core system since I am always running Reason 3 and Cubase simultaneously and I’ll feel like a real sucker if I give apple $2,000+ for a similarly configuered pc. So I decided to keep this little imac as an internet only pc and use my athlon for serious work with no internet connection hence no viruses or spyware. If only Apple would make cheaper hardware they would steal the marketshatr since they have a great OS. I sure hope that as soon as that x86 os x hits the streets it’s cracked so that I can use it on my pc. Or even better I hope it's released for ALL x86 pc and not just apple made. I live by one rule I shall not lose and buying new apple hardware is definetly a lose in my book.

[PB PM]

I'm guessing that the cost issues you talk about is one of the reasons Apple is switching to Intel chips, they are cheaper and more readly available and PPC chips.

[holbox]

I just came back from a week at our Kids house.

First time I've touched a Windows computer for 2 years.

My Son has the latest & greatest Windows machine and my Mac is so superior to it that I don't know where to start. All I did was goof around the net for an hour, but I couldn't believe how much better the Mac behaves.

I do have a Power Mac though, but my wife has my old iMac. I fooled with it a little while & wouldn't trade it for 10 Windows machines.

No contest!

[screensaver400]

I'd trade one Mac for 10 Windows machines. Then sell the Windows machines, as they're worth much more monetarily than they are useful, and buy a bunch of Apple gear.

[Robo]

I think it's funny that Microsoft is looking back at OS X so much with Windows Vista. I mean, come on..."Aero?" Couldn't possibly be inspired by that other heavily marketed four letter GUI name that also starts with "A"?

It's funnier still when you realize that no more than five years later, just when Mac OS X starts running out of steam (and, uh, Vista starts hitting its stride), Apple will introduce Mac OS XI, and Microsoft will, again, spend five years ripping it off to introduce Vista 2.0...and Apple will launch 11.5, reminding the world once again that Microsoft is five years behind.

[PB PM]

Yup, got to love people who compare OS7 to Windows 3.1 I think there is a five to six year difference right there. Now its OSX 10.4.2 to XP SP2 or whatever it is they call it.

[shell]

I was reading an article about Vista and what's it's new features will be. Funny thing is every one of them was something that we already have and have been using for years. Then I finally understood why Vista was being delayed so long, they're waiting for Leopard to come out so that they know what features to copy.

[PB PM]

You bet they are, and they have been doing it since day one.

[shell]

What's really disgusting is the "new" interface for IE with a slim greyish navigation bar and an MSN search field in the right corner. It's not a copy though, IE has rounded buttons and a squared search field - nothing like Safari's Square buttons and rounded search field.

Who wants to bet they get sued for including a default MSN search feature?

[Brad]

Originally Posted by PB PM Yup, got to love people who compare OS7 to Windows 3.1 I think there is a five to six year difference right there.

Huh?

System 7 (not called "Mac OS" at the time) was released May 1991.
Windows 3.1 was released April 1992.

Even if you had the right dates, I have no idea what you're trying to say.

[PB PM]

I didn't know the release dates, nore think its that important, I was just making point that Windows has always been behind Apple in terms of the OS, simple as that. I was still using a SE with 96k RAM! And you thought your old G3 was slow! (b&w screen with two floppy drives) till 99 when we got a Blue and White G3 tower 300Mhz (gasp) so I am a little short of my Apple history in between those dates.

[Rational Dreamer]

Originally Posted by PB PM I didn't know the release dates, nore think its that important, I was just making point that Windows has always been behind Apple in terms of the OS, simple as that. I was still using a SE with 96k RAM! And you thought your old G3 was slow! (b&w screen with two floppy drives) till 99 when we got a Blue and White G3 tower 300Mhz (gasp) so I am a little short of my Apple history in between those dates.

IN 99?! Damn that's torture.

[PB PM]

I didn't really notice it that much since all I did till then was writing papers on it with Mircrosoft Works version 1! Once we got the G3 300Mhz I really got into computers, since then I have owned Five Macs, First a G4 400Mhz tower (upgraded a lot since I got it in 2002), which I am typing on now, then a Wallstreet Powerbook 266Mhz G3, Lombard Powerbook 400Mhz G3 and finally my new ibook G4 1.42Ghz.

[Coheebuzz]

Originally Posted by Rational Dreamer I want a dual core system since I am always running Reason 3 and Cubase simultaneously and I’ll feel like a real sucker if I give apple $2,000+ for a similarly configuered pc. So I decided to keep this little imac as an internet only pc and use my athlon for serious work with no internet connection hence no viruses or spyware. If only Apple would make cheaper hardware they would steal the marketshatr since they have a great OS. I sure hope that as soon as that x86 os x hits the streets it’s cracked so that I can use it on my pc. Or even better I hope it's released for ALL x86 pc and not just apple made. I live by one rule I shall not lose and buying new apple hardware is definetly a lose in my book.

A dual PM bundled with LogicPro 7 is by far the most amazing experience for software based music production that excists planet earth!! I learned LP7 in a week without opening any manuals and i just do it as a hobby. Don't try to compare the Athlon setup you posted with any Pro Mac setup especially when it comes to music as Macs are proven in this field as much as any other - including the design field. So its not fair saying that Apple is over-pricing just because they are greedy. You just pay more for something that will work better - makes sense! I was a sucker and gave apple $4000+ for my design-oriented setup but my *investment* has payed off itself many times and this is how you should look at it since you produce music for a living.

But don't try using LP7 on your vintage G3, the only sound your are getting out of it is your CPU blowing to pieces :smokey:

[eye.surgeon]

This is a really strange thread. This guy is unhappy because his completely outdated museum-piece computer is slow? Well, I've got a brilliant solution for you. Buy a mac built in this century.