The SpeedZone: The Performance Of The New 12 Inch PowerBook Compared To 13 Other Laptops
Wed Feb 26, 2003
This page war retired 5/15/03 ... For current page click here
Have
questions? Comments? Give us your feedback on these performance
numbers
Below you will find performance results for most of the currently
shipping portable machines, and a few from previous generations.
This will hopefully give you an impression of relative performances.
We will be adding new machines on an on-going basis ... so
check back once in a while. All the machines below were tested
when running OS X and the scores are relative to the Dual
G4/1GHz Tower released in the Winter of 2002.
The tests below are from our suite of real world application
tests. These tests feature a diverse selection of applications
commonly used by the Mac community. The test suite was designed
to render an Accurate and well rounded picture of a machine's
performance. All of the tests below (with the exception of
the game tests) were timed with a stopwatch. The times were
then converted to percentages relative to the Dual
G4/1GHz Power Mac, which is set to 100%. For all scores
higher numbers are better. For our testing philosophyclick
here
Desktop Tests
The copy folder test not only stresses drive
performance but also takes advantage of faster processing
capability & caching schemes.
In the single file test the the processor &
caching capability of the machine is less of a factor. As
you can see, one area where portables have a lot of ground
to make up, when compared to desktop computers, is in the
area of drive performance
Import file into iMovie
Only those machines with CD burning capability
could be tested. CD burning only uses a fraction of the processor
to get the work done.
Large Document & Database
Type Tests
A Macro (series of complex actions) was run
in Microsoft's Excel spreadsheet program. Excel is part of
Office
X
This test takes place in a large AppleWorks
document. Machines with larger chip caches do better in this
test
OS X's new File Search function relies on
both processor and drive performance
Number Crunching & Rendering Tests
BareFeats
Photoshop Test Suite - mimics a production type workflow in
Photoshop.
A iMovie Effect
is applied to an movie.
The Fractal
program has been highly tuned to take advantage of the G4
and is precisely the type of work that the G4 was made for.
It will also gobble up whatever processing capability is present.
This is a good test for assessing the fundamental processing
potential of each machine. Really highlights the processing
advantage of a dual processor machine, and the G4
processor. Specialty applications that can be written
to take advantage of these attributes will really shine.
Encoding/Decoding Tests
A QuickTime
encode compresses a QuickTime movie for streaming on the Web
Converting QuickTime
movies to DV allows you to import them into iMovie.
During the encode 65% of the processing capacity of the dual
processor machine was used. In the G4/1GHz PowerBook 100%
was used. Both machines read CDs at up to 24X
Multitasking
[Note: the test results above for the iBook G3/700 Spring 2002, the PowerBook 550 and the iBook G3/600 we consider to be innaccurate]
MP3 Encode, AppleWorks search & replace
and folder copy are all carried out at the same time. In a
production type environment the Dual Processor Towers make
a lot of sense ... if you do some planning.
QuickTime Sorenson encode and Fractal render
are both carried out at the same time.
Gaming
The PowerBook G4/867 turned in 18.3 fps, and the Dual Processor Tower 45 fps (Giants)
4x4 EVO2
is a demanding racing game. The Dual Processor Tower turned
in 30 fps
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and product names may be trademarks or registered trademarks and are hereby
acknowledged.
Wed Feb 26, 2003 
