Mini Mac crunches IMac G5! I'm seriously deluded!

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Level 1

15 points

Mini Mac crunches IMac G5! I'm seriously deluded!

I have a singular story to tell you. Maybe you have some good advice.
I am very surprised about what follows:

A couple of months ago I stepped into MacMondo getting myself a MINI G4, 1.42GHz and upgraded ram to 512 MB. HD is 80GB/4200rpm. Old IBook standards, right?
Today I took my second step into Apple, buying a gorgeous brand new IMac G5 20"display, 2.1GHz cpu and upgraded to of 1.5GB ram. HD is 250GB SATA/7200rpm.

As anybody would expect, the G5 should massively crunch the Mini, right? Wouldn't you?

To my sad surprise here's what happened:

Took a DVD I own and used MacTheRipper to import it to HD.
Mac Mini : took 27 min and 18 sec
IMac : took 32 min and 46 sec

Once the files were on both HDs, I encoded them in MP4, 1650 kbps/720 x 384 size/ audio @44.1KHz 128 kbps...using Hand Brake.
Both machies encoded an MP4 of about 1.3x GB. The MINI was definitely faster, again!

Last test: CD ripping & MP3 encoding:
inserted Marc Johnson latest CD (I own it) in each mac, using the native ITunes. Both machines run OS 10.4.3 and are identically updated to latest Apple software.
Well...the CD lasts exactly 1 hour.
The encoding was to MP3 at 192kbps...the top quality allowed by ITunes.

Here we go again:
MINI : took 3 min and 46 sec
IMac : took 9 min and 57 sec

In all these 3 tests I monitored the Monitor Activities app, checking cpu and ram loads.... the Mini consistently showed less loads than the IMac!!!

????????

This is ridiculous!
Much faster and latest generation cpu/ faster HD/ bigger and faster RAM/same OS and apps..... worst performance!
Not to mention poorer video quality...even though the Imac sports an ATI X600 w/128MB ram on PCI-Xpress....against the MINI ATI 9200 w/32MB ram, previous generation graphic cpu.
The machine is "virgin"...opened the sealed box!

Should I think the G4 is better unless one buys a dual G5 Mac?
Which is want I don't intend to do anyway....it's ridiculous....

BTW, my 2.8GHz Pentium4 kills both units by long measure in these 3 apps.

Maybe I should go back and get a PowerBook 15" w/G4 1.67GHz and 1 GB of Ram...and that'll work at least as good as the Mini if not better.

Any thoughts, folks?

Very appreciated...

best
Italo

Edited by an Apple Host

Imac 20", Mac OS X (10.4.3)

Posted on Nov 22, 2005 4:10 PM

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Answer 1

Dave Stowe

Level 5

5,180 points

Nov 22, 2005 4:48 PM in response to Italoop

Italo...Welcome to the Discussions!...as to my thoughts...

you have too much free time...and watch your language while here

dave

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Answer 2

Italoop Author

Level 1

15 points

Nov 22, 2005 4:57 PM in response to Dave Stowe

That wasn't helpful...but I enjoyed it!
Thanks Dave!

I

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Answer 3

Rod Hagen

Level 7

32,000 points

Nov 22, 2005 5:37 PM in response to Italoop

There are various possible reasons for this, Italo.

Firstly a mac straight out of the box probably won't actually be operating at full speed for disc related tasks. newly installed OS's are actually often pretty heavily fragmented, and Tigers built in defrag and hot spot optimisation routines probably won't have really kicked in. Some of the drives installed in iMacs (Maxtors, for example,) also have a built in write verification process that runs for the first ten times that the Hd is booted up. This can reduce its speed .

Secondly spotlight indexing is likely to be occuring on a brand new HD, and takes up a lot of processor and disk time. Did you notice md importer working overtime when you ran activity monitor? What processes were actually chewing up CPU%?

So your iMac is probably a long way short of being "up to speed".

Make sure there aren't any nasty programesl ike Virex or Nortons Antivirus chewing up CPU time too, and run DiskUtility ver the drive to check for any directory or permissions problems as well, just in case.

Try the same task in a weeks time and see if the performance has improved.

Cheers

Rod

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Answer 4

LJam

Level 1

9 points

Nov 22, 2005 5:40 PM in response to Italoop

Dave,

On the iMac, check to make sure that the processor setting in Power Saver Prefs/Options is set to highest.

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Answer 5

Dave Stowe

Level 5

5,180 points

Nov 22, 2005 5:44 PM in response to LJam

LJam..Thank you for the info...Welcome to the Discussions!

dave

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Answer 6

Italoop Author

Level 1

15 points

Nov 22, 2005 5:59 PM in response to Rod Hagen

Thanks Rod.
I have reformatted the disk and reinstalled the system, as per Apple support. I'm not yet a very expert Mac user.
What do you exactly mean by "working overtime" for md importer?
I have no anti_virus on my macs.
I'll run the disk utility ver right after software and OS update.

Thanks a lot
Italo

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Answer 7

Italoop Author

Level 1

15 points

Nov 22, 2005 6:02 PM in response to Dave Stowe

Good point, Ljam.
It's set on Auto! I'll change to Max and run tests again....
Hopefully my new Ferrari runs...like a Ferrari.

Thanks
Italo

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Answer 8

Rod Hagen

Level 7

32,000 points

Nov 22, 2005 6:46 PM in response to Italoop

Sorry, its proper name is mdimport.

It, and its "relations" , mds and mdsync, become very busy when indexing a volume for Spotlight. They often consume at least 50% of processor time between them in this situation, with a consequent major slowdown of the computer.

Cheers

Rod

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Answer 9

Italoop Author

Level 1

15 points

Nov 22, 2005 6:46 PM in response to Rod Hagen

Reinstalled everything and run system update.
Rebooted
Set cpu at max
Run Disk Ver and turns out everything's fine
Did a first quick test encoding the same CD into hi bitrate MP3.
Took the same exact time as before....sigh!

I guess I'll have to keep this Mac busy for a while and see if anything changes for better....or......

Italo

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Answer 10

Italoop Author

Level 1

15 points

Nov 22, 2005 7:00 PM in response to Rod Hagen

Hi ROD

I checked the system monitor while Itunes encoded mp3s.
Actually mdimport barely moved up to 0.10% of cpu cycles....for very short time.
Itunes is peaking in the 87>94% area, with some 105% bursts...

I'll do more tests...
thanks
Italo

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Answer 11

Nov 22, 2005 7:19 PM in response to Italoop

Sorry, but since every other benchmark I have seen says that the G5 iMac is in an entirely different performance class from the Mac mini, I'll go with those professional testers.

Not only that, but the iMac has the advantage in CPU speed, FSB, faster RAM and faster hard drives. There is no way that a mini can keep up - and yes, I have used both.

There is either something seriously wrong with the iMac's hardware or software or you have a leaked prototype quad Pentium D Mac mini.

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Answer 12

Italoop Author

Level 1

15 points

Nov 22, 2005 7:32 PM in response to Eric Kracinski

Well...Eric

I am not having fun with all these troubles I'm going thru, for this expensice computer.
I had assumed that all those big differences in specs and technology would make a huge difference between the two macs.
Unfortunately it's not so....
Either you believe me or I have not much to add...
Right now the Imac is doing dvd ripping and so far its performance is even slower than before reformatting it.
Mdimport is taking 0% cpu resources. The wole ripping process takes very low cpu cycles...about 2,30%. So I have to assume there is something wrong in the hard drive, maybe....
I have this thing in front of me and it's not what any mac user would expect from it.
It's right here....

Sigh
I

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Answer 13

old kaka

Level 1

45 points

Nov 23, 2005 12:52 AM in response to Italoop

Oh dear. This thread is depressing, I've been concidering of upgrading from Mini to 20" iMac, because I feel the Mini is quite sluggish with stuff like iDVD and iMovie... and also with most of the graphical stuff in the GUI (Exposé, Dashboard transition, Genie effect etc). I really hope this doesn't mean that I should be getting a Power Mac instead, those things cost a fortune in Europe. lol

Mac mini Mac OS X (10.4.3) 1.42 GHz, 1 gb RAM, 250 gb LaCie d2 Extreme

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Answer 14

Nov 23, 2005 2:00 AM in response to old kaka

I have both a Mini and the new G5 Imac isight.

The Imac is almost twice as powerful. I think yu may have a problem with your Imac.

the reason i say 'twice' as powerful, is that certain cpu intensive apps run on the imac at 65% cpu utilisation, were on the mini the cpu is maxed out at 100%

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Answer 15

Rod Hagen

Level 7

32,000 points

Nov 23, 2005 2:18 AM in response to Italoop

Right now the Imac is doing dvd ripping and so far its performance is even slower than before reformatting it.

You would actually expect this to be so, Italo. As I said earlier , a newly installed mac OS usually contains many fragmented files , and various forms of file optimisation won't have been done yet. Caches will have been wiped too. etc etc. Reformatting might SOUND like a good idea to achieve a performance boost, and in some circumstances it can be, but in your case its probably just taken you backl to square one.

Have you turned up your processor speed to "maximum" instead of "automatic" yet.?

I used Mdimport before as simply one example of the sort of background process that can "hog" the processor, Italo. Is anything else showing with a very high processor consumption? Have a look at other things in Activity Monitor. What do the Pageins/outs look like when you click on the system memory tab.

You might also want to check with the manufacturer of your 'ripping" software. Perhaps its isn't fully compatible with Tiger or G5's? Maybe, though, you are simply trying to rip a large, copy-protected disc???

How does it perform on other tasks? Try running one of the benchmark programs, or see how it performs opening some large graphics, instead, perhaps.

Cheers

Rod

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