Posted by : trraju on Oct 25, 2003 - 01:44 AM General

Having Apple Computer's new Power Mac G5 around the office is like having a superhero assistant.
If you've got lots of graphics or video heavy lifting to do all at once, it's amazing. If you're just moving documents around, there are less muscle-bound machines that are probably more in your price range.
Apple sent me a juiced-up dual-processor 2-gigahertz G5 with AirPort and Bluetooth ($4,500 without monitor) last month. Yes, that machine is better than your average G5. But if you're going to get one, you might as well get one that screams.

First, I solicited opinions from the San Jose Mercury News graphics department, where they do illustrations, 3-D rendering, and the occasional movie for internal use - in other words, most of the grueling computer work.

The consensus was that the G5 is an impressive machine, so much so that I had to wait in line a couple of times before I could run my own tests.

Particularly in tests of a G5-optimized version of Adobe Systems' Photoshop 7, I found the G5 outpaced a 1-GHz 17-inch PowerBook laptop most convincingly when it was either working with huge files, or handling several computation-heavy tasks at once. For example, the G5 managed to resize a 122-megabyte file up to 1.68 gigabytes in three minutes, while also smoothly playing a full-screen movie and compressing an edited DV movie to Quicktime format.

The PowerBook, no slouch by performance standards, took three times as long just to resize the image, without the other tasks running in the background.

Generally speaking, the G5 was about six times faster than the PowerBook doing heavy-duty resizing, and more than twice as fast applying lighting effects and several other filters.

Apple says this machine will change the way people work. I'd have to agree. I sometimes had trouble thinking of realistic tasks trying to slow it down. The same scenario played out again and again in different situations with different programs. Having the G5 was like having three of Apple's most powerful G4 machines in one. The feats the G5 pulled off were the computing equivalent of leaping tall buildings in a single bound.

So yes, Apple's G5 delivers the performance leap the company promised. It not only smoked the 1-GHz PowerBook G4 in image and video editing tests, it just embarrassed my trusty 667-MHz Power Mac G4. And the truth is, Apple's Power Mac sales have been so sluggish lately that a lot more people are probably thinking about upgrading from 667-MHz boxes than 1-GHz ones.

The dual 2-Ghz models are just becoming widely available.

The G5 that I wouldn't recommend is the low-end 1.

6-GHz G5 (starting at $2,000), which uses slower memory, a slower bus and outdated PCI expansion instead of the faster PCI-X. You'd be better off dishing out an extra $400 for the 1.8-GHz machine. And once you consider that the 1.8-GHz G5 has twice the hard-drive space, you realize that the low-end machine only saves you about $275.




Anyone who's ever thought, "I could get so much more done if I didn't have to wait on this stupid computer" should put a G5 on their to-get list. But there are some things you should consider before rushing out to buy or order one:

-Operating system. Apple has said it will introduce OS 10.3, Panther, by the end of the year. It will have a number of enhancements that will be great for graphics professionals, so why not save money and hassle and wait until it's pre-loaded in the G5?

-Creative software. The G5 makes everything at least a little faster, but it makes G5-optimized applications obviously faster. Adobe Systems customers will be pleased to know that new versions of Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign and GoLive, due by year's end, are G5-optimized - but Adobe's are among the few major releases this year that can make that claim.

-Virtual PC 6. Microsoft's popular Windows emulation software for the Mac does not work with the G5, a particular minus for Web developers who like to look at their sites on both platforms.

-Macworld. The G5 is just getting going at the end of the year, and Apple will be eager to stoke demand at Macworld San Francisco in January. If history is a guide - and with Apple it often is - that could mean G5 package deals providing discounts on software or flat-panel displays.

Not only is the G5 easy on the eyes with its glowing exposed aluminum and clean lines, it's easy on the ears. Overall, the G5 was very quiet; when it wasn't working hard on some mammoth task, the nine fans inside were about as loud as a stand-up room fan on a low setting.

When it's working hard though, the fans start to sound more like a wind tunnel. So if you keep your Mac working hard, it will let you know. Also worth noting: Apple says that if one of the fans dies, the G5 will either go to sleep, or shut down entirely. The company says it tested the system rigorously, and it feels confident that fans won't die anytime soon. Still, there are nine fans; so if I were relying on a few of them for my livelihood, I might keep a few replacements in the back closet.

So while I know it's hard for people who have been anticipating this G5 for years, I'd recommend waiting three more months unless your time is money and you just don't want to wait any longer. At the very least, at Macworld, Apple Chief Executive Steve Jobs is likely to invite software company executives onstage to demonstrate how fast their G5-optimized software will be, and tell when it will be ready.

Of course, it's easier for me to say "wait," because I've got one here on the desk in front of me.