Mac Pro vs Power Mac G5

Have you looked at the specs?

Are you planning to buy in the near-term?

What do you intend to use one for?

One uses IBM G5 cpu, the other uses Intel 5xxx cpu.
Dual cpu, dual core for now, quad core chips later.

The Mac Pro has 4 SATA II drive sleds (no cables), two optical drive bays, support for later model PCI Express video.

The Mac Pro is based in Intel's Xeon 5100 series processors and is Apple's current flagshpi product. The PowerMac was the previous generation flagship product which was based on the PowerPC G5 series processors. The G5 products are no longer available from Apple except as refurbished products.

Better assembled and manufactured… no. Better designed… most definitely.

PPC applications run under Rosetta, including drivers and other programs or processes which have some effect (keeps getting to be smoother and less with each update, which are for all purposes, over now).

Power Mac G5
(June 2004) (PowerPC G5 (970) @ 2.0GHz x 2) 155.0
(June 2004) (PowerPC G5 (970) @ 2.3GHz x 2) 170.8
(June 2004) (PowerPC G5 (970) @ 2.5GHz x 2) 179.9
(June 2004) (PowerPC G5 (970) @ 2.7GHz x 2) 189.4
(Late 2005) (PowerPC G5 (970) @ 2.5GHz x 4) 279.0

Mac Pro
(Intel Xeon @ 2.00GHz x 4) 263.8
(Intel Xeon @ 2.66GHz x 4) 330.3
(Intel Xeon @ 3.00GHz x 4) 372.3

Comparing Mac models - Dec 2006 - Geek Patrol

I think that sort of says what differences there are. More expensive ECC memory being another. Only the G5 Quad came close.


Mac Pro 2GHz 4GB 10K Raptor 23" Cinema Mac OS X (10.4.9) WD RE RAID Aaxeon FW800 PCIe MDD-G4 APC RS1500 Vista

They might look the same on the outside, but inside, things are very different. Technical specs aside, the Intel chips generate less heat than the G5 chips, so there's less space taken up by heatsinks and more space for things like extra hard drives and a second optical drive. It is also a cable-less design, so adding and removing hard drives is a snap, as is adding new RAM, since the boards the slots sit on are removeable. So yes, a better designed machine.

Better put together? Eh...it's as put together as any other computer really. If you look at the first generation of MacBooks, you'll hear a lot about improperly applied thermal paste. So those weren't necessarily put together as well as they could have been. However, the Mac Pros have been free of any widespread defects.

Anyway, the major difference between the G5 and the Mac Pro is a different type of processor, faster clock speed, bus speed, etc, a new type of RAM, and a more expandable design. They're excellent machines.