Entered CNET Catalog: 06/11/2004
SKU: 0718908624654
Manufacturer: Apple Inc.
Manufacturer description
The creative class needs superior tools to produce designs, music, high-definition video or the next scientific breakthrough. The new Power Mac G5 line spans as far as you require. Its dual 64-bit G5 processors, room for up to 8GB of main memory, 8X SuperDrive and ultrahigh-bandwidth system architecture will give you more results than systems costing twice as much.Product summary
The good: Fast; silent; elegant design.
The bad: Minimal internal expansion; expensive; lackluster warranty.
The bottom line: Creative pros and power users will salivate over the speed and the design of Apple's top-of-the-line Power Mac G5, but we wish it offered more expansion and better support.
CNET editors' review
- Editors' Choice: No
- Reviewed on: 11/06/2004
Flipping an elegant but sturdy latch opens the Power Mac G5's side panel, which slides off and on so smoothly, other case designers must envy it. The inside has an austere, extremely efficient layout that makes gaming PCs, with their flashing lights and glowing cables, seem as cheesy as the Caesar's Palace casino. There's nary a cable to be seen, brushed metal conceals the liquid coolant running through the heat sinks, fans spin silently, and the cavernous case has wide open spaces to enhance cooling and proper airflow.
As expected, the Power Mac G5 outperformed every other system in Apple's stable; it took top honors on our iTunes and Quake III tests. And it operated sufficiently fast while we worked with apps such as Final Cut Pro HD, Adobe Photoshop CS, and Sorenson Squeeze 4.0, as well as while performing routine tasks, such as calibrating the display with the ColorVision Spyder2Pro and burning discs. We did crash once while downloading video from a MiniDV tape and a few times with Squeeze, but the system recovered well, and it earns high marks for stability.
Apple's use of a last-generation memory bus and relatively low clock-speed chips, however, constrains its performance on these types of specialized apps. For instance, single-processor PCs with faster CPUs, such as the Velocity Micro ProMagix PCX and the Bully Computers Tyrant, handily outperformed the Power Mac dual 2.5GHz on our new Photoshop test, which is memory-bandwidth intensive: the Velocity Micro's 533MHz DDR SDRAM gives it a significant advantage over the Mac's 400MHz DDR SDRAM. The same holds true for our new, CPU-intensive video-encoding test, where a large gap in raw processing speed ultimately overwhelms the advantages of a second processor. The Power Mac G5 took 5.4 minutes to encode our test clip, 20 percent slower than the Velocity Micro ProMagix PCX's time of 4.5 minutes; the results don't look too bad, however, when you consider that the ProMagix's overclocked 3.7GHz CPU is 48 percent faster than the G5's 2.5GHz CPU.
Unfortunately, the Power Mac G5's design often opts for elegance over expedience. It has only a single bay suitable for an optical drive, which comes equipped with either a CD-RW/DVD-ROM or a DVD-R/CD-RW drive. We'd appreciate the option of having at least two optical drive bays, even if it meant losing some of the Power Mac G5's visual appeal. Though the system supports speedy Serial ATA hard drives, it can take only two internally, maxing out at 500GB. So if you're a creative professional--and especially if you work with video--you'll likely have to add a raft of devices externally.
The scarcity of external expansion made sense when we had daisy-chainable SCSI for the job: one port could support up to 16 devices. But this system supplies only three USB 2.0 ports and three FireWire ports (one FW800 and two FW400). On the upside, Apple sprinkles these hubs liberally around the work space. Another two USB 2.0 ports are available on the Apple Cinema Display, should you choose to bundle it with your Mac (ours came with the 23-inch model) and two USB 1.1 ports on the wired keyboard. If you decide to opt for a wireless keyboard and mouse, which Apple really should include for the price to begin with, you're down two USB ports; if you go with a less expensive display option, you're down another two ports. And regardless of which peripherals you choose, you won't find an option for adding a media-card reader to the system, a feature increasingly found as a standard option on PCs of all varieties these days. The Power Mac G5 includes dedicated ports for Bluetooth and Airport Extreme antennas (modules optional), however, and built-in Gigabit Ethernet and 56Kbps modem.
Nor does the Power Mac G5 allow for more powerful preconfigured options--and it should. The current maximum of 500GB (two 250GB drives) may seem like a lot of storage space, but you can use that up quickly working with media files. And while it's great that Apple supplies optical audio in/out ports, we think that for the money it charges, Apple should ship the system with a decent 2- or 2.1-channel speaker system, not just the internal speaker, and that it should offer more than just 5.1-channel speaker options.
The Power Mac's motherboard supplies three PCI-X slots, two 133MHz and one 100MHz, but at least three of the four graphics cards that Apple offers, including the 256MB ATI Radeon 9800 XT in our test system, have heat sinks that block the adjacent slot. Our test system also came with 4GB of memory configured in eight 512MB modules that occupied all the Power Mac's DDR400 memory slots. The baseline configuration for the Power Mac G5 dual 2.5GHz is $2,999, but the price for our test system quickly jumped to more than $6,300 with just the memory upgrade ($1,050), the bundled 23-inch Cinema Display ($1,999), and the 9800 XT graphics card ($300).
And for all that, you get a piddling 90 days of toll-free phone support and a one-year warranty. Given Apple's reputation for generally indifferent service, spending another $249 to upgrade to AppleCare Protection for a one-year tech support/three-year warranty combo seems like adding insult to injury. We are happy to report, however, that Apple has redesigned its Web support, making it much easier to find help in the FAQs and the knowledge base. The printed manual also supplies some useful info, from installation procedures to installing new drives and troubleshooting problems.
(Shorter bars indicate better performance)
CNET Labs uses Adobe Photoshop to evaluate a Mac's performance as an integrated whole--the CPU, the memory, the hard disk, and the graphics card. We run an automated suite of operations that simultaneously stresses a variety of the machine's subsystems and simulates a real-world Web-production work flow. The suite includes launching the application; converting between color spaces and bit depths; applying a variety of filters; working with layers, selection areas, and alpha channels; and resizing and compressing images. We time how long it takes to run the suite on 15 files that range from 1.8MB to 49.2MB, in 8- and 16-bit color.
(Shorter bars indicate better performance)
In order to evaluate a Mac's performance on CPU-intensive operations, CNET Labs encodes and compresses a 54-second, 1GB video clip using Sorenson Squeeze 4.0, a multithreaded video-encoding application. We create an MPEG-4 data stream with a target data rate of 1Kbps and apply settings such as streaming hints, 2-pass VBR, and global motion compensation to increase the stress on the CPU.
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Time in seconds |
CNET Labs uses Apple iTunes as another indicator of a system's performance. This test times how long it takes to convert a 107MB AIFF audio file to MP3.
|
Frames per second |
To measure 3D gaming performance, CNET Labs uses Quake III Arena for OS X. Although Quake III is an older game, it is still widely used as an industry-standard tool.
Find out more about how we test desktop systems.
System configurations:
Apple eMac
Mac OS X 10.3.3; 1.25GHz PowerPC G4; 256MB DDR SDRAM 333MHz; 32MB ATI Radeon 9200; 80GB 7,200rpm Ultra ATA/100
Apple iMac G5
Mac OS X 10.3.5; 1.8GHz PowerPC G5; 512MB DDR SDRAM 400MHz; 64MB Nvidia GeForce FX 5200; 80GB 7,200rpm Serial ATA
Apple Power Mac G5 dual 2.0GHz
Mac OS X 10.2.7; Dual 2.0GHz PowerPC G5; 2048MB DDR SDRAM 400MHz; 128MB ATI Radeon 9600 Pro; 160GB 7,200rpm Serial ATA
Apple Power Mac G5 dual 2.5GHz
Mac OS X 10.3.5; Dual 2.5GHz PowerPC G5; 4,096MB DDR SDRAM 400MHz; 256MB ATI Radeon 9800; 160GB 7,200rpm Serial ATA
Bully Computers Tyrant
Windows XP Professional SP2; 3.2GHz Intel P4 Extreme; Intel 875P chipset; 1,024MB DDR SDRAM 400MHz; 256MB Nvidia GeForce 6800 GT (AGP); two WDC WD740GD-00FLX0 74GB 10,000rpm Serial ATA; WDC WD2000JD-00HBB0 200GB Serial ATA 7,200rpm; integrated Intel 82801ER SATA RAID controller
Velocity Micro ProMagix PCX
Windows XP Professional; 3.6GHz Intel P4 560; Intel 925X chipset; 1,024MB DDR2 SDRAM 533MHz; 256MB Nvidia GeForce 6800 Ultra (PCIe) ; two WDC WD740GD-00FLX0 74GB 10,000rpm Serial ATA; Hitachi HDS724040KLSA80 400GB Serial ATA 7,200rpm; integrated Intel 82801FR SATA RAID controller
User opinions
Select a User Opinion to view: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 User Rating: 
8/10
Beautiful and Powerful
Pros: fast, multitasks well,ram support excellent, esthetically sound, G5 chip surprisingly versatile, 64 bit ready for future, OSX is a perfect 10
Cons: few USB ports, finding compatible PCI expansion card can be tricky, bit pricey
Where to begin?
To start off, this computer looks really, really cool. Its clean and simple on the outside and inside. Access to USB and Firewire ports on front and back is a great asset and cannot be overlooked for ease of use.
Looks count for some things, but not for everything. Inside, very impressive, cooling zones keep the dual processors cool (also there is liquid cooling, but I am not sure which models carry that now) It a very nice experience hearing the fans speed up like jet engine roaring at the ready when the workload increases and the processors work harder.
That takes me to the next point. This computer is FAST. More importantly however, this computer multitasks well. (this is part software part hardware) I do heavy multimedia work (digital video, graphcis etc) and usually have several memory and processor heavy apps running simutaneously. No lag switching apps, (must say I have 2gigs of RAM) but more importantly, little lag when several rendering jobs are going on at the same time. The G5 chip seems to work more efficiently when heaps of work are thrown at it.
There are a few slightly annoying things about the design though
There are only 3 USB ports. Due to many peripherals, I had to buy a USB hub. Apple should have thrown in at least 2 more.
Secondly, I have had a bit if a hard time getting PCI cards that will properly work with the G5. I wanted to get a USB PCI card,but could not get one that either fit properly or worked.
Also, not so much Apples fault, because they are often ahead of the game, but such advanced ports like F/W 800 and S/PDIF otical audio in and out do not have much hardware support in the form of external peripherals or audio devices. Not too much support YET, however in coming year or so this should improve (will get a F/W 800 external HDD by then)
Most importantly, I have found OSX the best part of this computer.
I find it much more enjoyable to work with a OS that will work like you do, not the other way around. Windows has some great features, but Panther/Tiger (whichever you may have) is just too efficient, easy to use and beautiful.
Overall, 8/10. The Powermac G5 is definately one of the top 5 high end PCs out on the market.
FOR BUYERS unless you really NEED speed,multitasking power,extended RAM support, and high end ports, do not buy this computer. It is a bit pricey. If you do basic music/photo/video management and light apps like word processing and internet browsing get one of Apples' less expensive computers, because the only difference youll really notice is how much money you have left in your wallet.
User Rating: 
10/10
The best comp i ever had! switched from Windows!! Read!
Pros: No spyware, Virus, No freezes!, best comp ever
Cons: none really, a little expensive
i got a dual g5, i have never been happier, fast, use adobe photoshop fluidly, convert video fast! , best ever.
User Rating: 
9/10
Great machine! It's the marriage between the hardware and OSX that makes this work so well...
Pros: 1. Reliability , 2. Performance
Cons: price is kinda high. should be a little cheaper
User Rating: 9/10
UNIX will always win over Windows. Period.
Pros: Super stable Unix bases OS. Super powerful. Sleek, user freindly design.
Cons: Lacking support for some games. Expensive for the features.
User Rating: 9/10
Never Had a Problem
Pros: Incredibly fast, tons of RAM Space
Cons: No second optical drive slot, and need of more hard drive bays
User Rating: 10/10
Extemely-fast, good-looking and silent Professional Computer
Pros: Extremely Fast, Sleek Design, Nice Cooling (pretty silent)
Cons: I've heard other people moan about the support apple gives for this product. I haven't needed their support yet.
User Rating: 10/10
Mac wasn't used to full potential
Pros: All basic hardware was the same - somewhat
Cons: The OSes were different
User Rating: 9/10
MUCH more stable than Windows crap!
Pros: Fast, elegant, great apps, beautiful graphics, a joy to use
Cons: Pricey, high-end PC's are faster but MUCH less stable than the G5
User Rating: 10/10
Switched from Windows
Pros: Tight intergration of hard and software. Efficient and sound design. UNIX based OS is rock solid and having access to terminal a bonus. OSX is intuitive and well thought out. No spyware, so far.
Cons: Price is not for the budget minded. Wish it still had SCSI. Keyboard was mushy, had to turn to Matias.
User Rating: 9/10
NFL Side Line Proof..read on..............
Pros: Quick, Industry Standard Graphic Powerhouse
Cons: Expenses for non professionals... read opinion......
Its a stupid, uneducated and quite frankly, moronic statement and it holds true to windblows users who never really experienced the power of the apple.
I would love to be there when a publisher asks for your 56 meg pic of Randy Moss, for their quark express layout and all you have is a ".BMP" or ".JPG" from your HP GIGAMERTZ Centribone laptop to work with, please.....
User Rating: 
5/10
Poor System
Pros: Design and Support
Cons: Really it?s not for Public & Professionals
(2 x eVGA) nVidia GeForce 6800 Ultra
(2 x PQI) DDR 3200 Platinum 1Gb
(2 x AMD) Opteron 250
(TJ06) Silverstone
(1 Power Supply) Power & Cooling Inc. 510 SLI
The Mac is poor and now it will be not my favorite machine
I recommend use to new alternatives for the workstations
The difference between Apple Double G5 and the Double AMD Opteron 250 is the OS platform and many peripheries; I had used a Silicon Graphics® Tezro? and an Apple Double G5 2.5. My First computer in my work [Cad/Cam; Architect & Cinema] was a SGI and then I thought in a Mac and their OS Platform because the OS Irix not is steady; the difference is really the OS Platform.
¿Have you tried benchmark in many systems? The Apple Double G5 in my work is used only for their Pro Applications but for Workstation Applications the Opteron is the Great Option because the computer is multifunctional [The OS Platform is a Red Hat Software]
No more fans ...
http://www.elsemanaldigital.com/articulos.asp?idarticulo=31352
Only objectivity
WSJ: Apple considering the use of Intel chips in Macs
By AppleInsider Staff
Published: 09:00 AM EST
Apple has been in talks with Intel over possibly using its chips in future Macintosh computers, The Wall Street Journal reported Monday.
Advertisement
The rumor revives memories of similar plans which took place back in 1992, when Apple allegedly ported its Mac OS 7 operating system to run on Intel hardware.
The report cites two industry executives who claim knowledge of recent discussions between the companies. The sources said Apple was likely to use the Intel chips.
Neither company would confirm the report and an Apple spokeswoman characterized the report as "rumor and speculation."
It's currently unclear whether the purported move would mark a large-scale shift away from chips made by IBM. Instead, the Journal speculates that Apple could choose to add some Intel-based models to its product line or make a complete shift -- dealing a serious blow to IBM's microprocessor business.
It's also speculated that a move to Intel would enable Apple to better compete with the likes of Dell in the pricing game. Apple has historically sold computers at a much higher price-point than its rivals, due mainly to its component costs.
Of the estimated 200 million computers sold globally each year, Macs currently account for only about 3 million,
User Rating: 
4/10
This is an in-depth review, so you'll have to read it.
Pros: Huge processing power, quiet, cool design
Cons: Read the opinion
The G5 itself is interesting; a large boxish design, with cool little bars on the bottom that keep it from laying flat on the ground. This means that in the event of an earthquake,it will flop over instead of jirating on the little rubber pegs on most PCs. Good thinking Apple.
Next up is the OS. Man, where to start. Well first off as I said we use Final Cut Pro on these computers. However my experience with the program is less that satisfactory. All of the functions are buried under menus and their various sub-menus. It reminds one of the old box within a box within a box trick, and when you get to the last box all there is is a couple quarters. This is the way all the Mac menus work, making it cumbersome to do anything, and even when you finally do get something right the results are less than satisfactory. Also, to my knowledge there are very few programs with a MINIMIZE button for the entire program. Instead you minimize the different windows one at a time. You can also close the different windows one at a time. We've actually had problems with this where students would close the window with the timelines and wouldn't be able to work on their project because the window doesn't pop back up without an elaborate process to retrieve it. Unfortunatly for all you Mac lovers out there, I'm sorry to say it but so much for "so easy". I personally think they should rename the OS "Counterintutive
) with their little logo with the happy person on the side (where do you come up with a logo like that anyway????). We've also experience problems with the compatibility. Microsoft generally includes Quicktime with their OS, but Apple doesn't return the favor. Instead you have to go to the website and download an old, outdated version of Windows Media that doesn't work with half the files we threw at it. This isn't even the worse part though!! During our time using them we've had several experiences where the OS will encounter "critical errors" and shutdown. I understand this happens with Windows, but 99% of the time it is an issue with third party software. By the same token, about 99% of all the fatal errors in Apple computers are a result of the OS. This means when these occur, in order to fix them, it is generally necessary to REINSTALL the OS. Ouch. Finally the performance. Mixed feelings on this one. On one hand, you've got 5 GHZ sitting in your machine, which is nothing to sneeze at. But with those dual 64-bit processors, you'd think it'd pack a little more clout. Nevertheless, in a program called LiveType, a 6 or seven minute block of credits took about 4 hours to render. 4 hours. On my Pentium 4 Hyperthreading PC this would have probably taken around 45 minutes. To render in AVI a section of a movie that is around 7 minutes long takes about 2 hours on my Pentium 4 2.4 gigahertz single processor VAIO. Not impressive. At all. Final Cut Pro suffered less from the issues than Livetype did, with decent render speeds. However, the choices for rendering are slim, limited almost entirely to Apple's proprietary formats (+ some mpeg and avi).
So in short, I've been very disappointed with the G5 despite its excellent insides. I believe that the OS is a real wrench in the system, and if somebody ran a Windows OS on that platform it would SCREAM. However, I've seen far superior performance out of a 3.4 GHZ Hyperthreading Pentium than out of that 5 gigahertz dual 64-bit processor machine. Sorry Apple, but looks like you guys bit the dust once again.
Josh
User Rating: 9/10
Are you kidding? No contest.
Pros: The support is excellent, and I've had no problems whatsoever.
Cons: expensive, that's about it.
User Rating: 
6/10
very cool but overrated, expensive and not good value
Pros: very cool design, quite powerful
Cons: Mac development has slowed compared with Windows. 512MB of RAM? What are they thinking?
also, may i add that OS X is a pain to use (this is coming from a Windows power user, so maybe i'm just not used to it). windows and floating toolbars constantly get in the way of each other constantly -- well at least the LCD is huge, so it's less of a problem on this particular machine.
User Rating: 4/10
Bad buy unless you are very superficial...
Pros: Great looks, Fast video editing, Apples have a few good programs such as itunes, finale pro, and various audio programs.
Cons: Weak graphics, don't expect to game with this, OS-X while is very attractive i hate the efficiency and interface, Not many upgrades available, WAY OVERPRICED, Not enough optical drives available.
User Rating: 9/10
Superior machine. No Spyware, adware, virus issues.
Pros: Superior machine. No Spyware, adware, virus issues.
Cons: A bit pricey, but well worth it.
User Rating: 9/10
Get a clue, PC users!
Pros: More Powerful than any PC out there. So what if it can't use PC apps. Dead silent, Great Reliability.
Cons: PC nerds and illiterites don't understand that the G5 is far superior.
User Rating: 10/10
Best Thing Out!!
Pros: This is an AWESOME machine! Nothing out currently can touch it. Cuppled with the BEST OS....OS X, it is a WICKED kick butt machine.
Cons: Would like to see more 3rd party companies make processor upgrades.
User Rating: 6/10
Can build a faster and better Windows PC for less
Pros: looks cool - ill give u that
Cons: expensive, overrated, limited expandability, can't run some commercial games
User Rating: 6/10
Nice to have for "Pro" applications
Pros: Ease of use with Unix based OS and very nice GUI. System and hardware monolithic and rock-solid. No virus worries. Outstanding features like Rendezvous or Exposé and Target Mode. Very good firewire integration. Runs Win XP as an emulation. Can read Win XP
Cons: Expensive. System more expensive than Win XP Pro because you have to buy upgrades every year. Besides Quartz poor graphics for the buck. Right mouse button still not standard (confusing when also working with Win XP). Delivery problems over and over (acut
User Rating: 8/10
Expensive?
Pros: Powerful Competitively Priced: a dual-Xeon machine similarly configured costs $200 more.
Cons: Should ship with 1 Gig RAM, not 512 Meg.
User Rating: 8/10
Really great design; very fast
Pros: The industrial design is great...amazingly quiet...OS X is getting better and better.
Cons: Large size
User Rating: 
7/10
The best PC on the market
Pros: Fast, easy to use, fast, powerful, fast, nice looking and fast.You will only need to change it in 4 years.
Cons: Price, ONLY the price, but you must pay for quality.
User Rating: 9/10
What R U Waiting 4
Pros: Design, Speed, Ease of use and did I say speed. Also great for music & videos
Cons: $$$$Price, but worth it even if you can't upgrade
User Rating: 7/10
good machine...if you can afford it
Pros: High quality, well-built machine. Excellent general-purpose computer equipped with two fast processors. Great choice for academia and scientific applications.
Cons: Ridiculously expensive. I mean, it is crazy that for the money one has to shell, one gets a meager 512 Megs of memory, no Airport card, no bluetooth module, no wireless keyboard or mouse, no office software of any kind. And, if you want to use your Apple
User Rating: 10/10
G5 saved my graphic life!!!
Pros: I've been pro PC for years, and have done all my work on it(industry/freelance 3d & video artist). I have a dual opteron system with 2g of ram and a quadro fx card. After countless crashes and faulty reliability I made the jump to Apple. Now I'm virtu
Cons: None...I just wish they would start selling parts to make mac clones. If apple did that, I think more people would make the switch.
User Rating: 8/10
Good rock solid machine
Pros: Very, very fast. Solid and can run Windows XP and Autocad with use of VPC software. Like two computers in one!
Cons: Needs more Ram stock. You may want to upgrade to 4 gig for running Windows XP
User Rating: 6/10
good machine, not really good value
Pros: Sturdy built, fast CPUs. Predicted durability is excellent.
Cons: Ridiculously expensive. After shelling over 4K$ (canadian)...that is, if one already has a monitor, one gets a meager 512 MB and no airport card, no bluetooth module, no wireless keyboard or mouse, no software bundle of any kind, and after three months t
User Rating: 8/10
Fantastic for the Right Reasons
Pros: Lighting fast speed, Rock solid stability of OSX, and best web program Safari avaliable today. People need to stop complaning about the imbalance of avaliable mac software. If you don't like what software is avaliable don't buy a mac, but for those of u
Cons: Of course it's pricy, but sometimes you get what u pay for. IBM needs to get into gear to keep up with Intel and AMD.
User Rating: 10/10
No XP Nightmares!
Pros: Fast, easy to use, integration of software and hardware, ages far better than "alternatives", stable, safe OS, excellent colour capabilities
Cons: No viruses.
User Rating: 10/10
Better than PC unless you are stupid
Pros: Unbeatable performance and stability. Don't believe that there is no app available because you can run virtual machine in this machine and can run any windows applicarion. Only a stupid will try to compare it with PC. Comparing it with PC is like comparin
Cons: Expensive
User Rating: 10/10
Why cant there ever be a true comparison
Pros: cnet is a windows product marketer they do not run fair comparisons
Cons: If they are to give advice on product they need to remain neutral which with their advertisers they cannot and will not give unbiased information
User Rating: 
3/10
to expensive; not enough juice
Pros: acceptable grahpics;fast but not that fast
Cons: many: small ram, expensive; no useful bundled software; get sony vaio r: better value, bundled software, very fast, lots of ram, huge hard drive, much better graphics, all for half the price Apple is a dissapointment; as usual
User Rating: 5/10
Apple has lost the race
Pros: Standardized Mac system with good software aps and systems. Few viruses for Mac system anymore.
Cons: IT DOES NOT HAVE PCI Express! It only has PCI-X slots and one 8X AGP slot. The writer in this article was wrong. PCI-X and PXI-Express are totally different. This computer should have faster processors, memory, PCI-Express (16x), better audio, better
User Rating: 5/10
Apple Returning to the Bad Old Days
Pros: Fast, good looking, solid performance.
Cons: Lame warranty, penny pinching features, expensive upgrades, limited expansion. There are faster PCs out there.
User Rating: 10/10
Can't Touch This!!
Pros: Simply the best computer ever made. If you need power, this is it. King of all computer.
Cons: Maybe too expensive, and minimum configuration.
User Rating: 6/10
Not worth the MSRP
Pros: Fast,nice looking.
Cons: Price for use. Who really needs this? Unless you're a studio or university student in some sort of elevated study, then I see no real use for this.
User Rating: 10/10
Very fast, beautifully designed computer
Pros: Awesome machine, in love with it!
Cons: Just as the other guy said, more RAM should come with it, 512MB doesn't cut it for pro-designers, seriously Apple. More Hard Drive space, only 2? C'mon.
User Rating: 10/10
Clean. Simple. Mac G5.
Pros: Extremely fast and powerful. System delivers utmost ease of use and operation as well as expansion. Sweet looking exterior and interior. Solid operating system (built upon the UNIX OS). Much quieter operation compared to any PC I have ever had. Extremely
Cons: Tad pricey, but well worth the elimination of virus/trojan/worm threats.
User Rating: 9/10
A beautiful beast
Pros: design, quality, MacOS X Panther, UNIX core, broad range of free compilers
Cons: case insensitve default file system (HPFS or something a rather). expensive
User Rating: 9/10
PeeCee comments...come on, really..
Pros: Everything that's been said here on the PRO side, true, true, true. PeeCee folks, be a bit more specific when griping about apps and such. You're reviews are like swiss cheese..full of holes. Panther is the most stable OS available today, and crashing is
Cons: Out-of-the-box RAM config should be doubled.
User Rating: 9/10
Processor Setting
Pros: Have you tested this Mac using the setting Maximal or the Default Automatic in the Energy Prefernces (Options). To me it makes a 10 to 15% difference in performances
Cons:
User Rating: 10/10
Forget windows, go apple
Pros: the BEST OS and BEST hardware available on the market. forget what that guy wrote in the review, comparing this computer to a pc is like comparing a Ferrari to a cheap Fiat.
Cons: Expansive, but hey, you must pay for quality.
User Rating: 10/10
Fast slick and reliable
Pros: others have said it all
Cons: Pricey and it could use some more fire-wire / usb-ports. With a printer, a scanner, a wacom and two external fire-wire drives, all slots (except the ones on the frontside of the machine) - including those on the monitor - are occupied.
User Rating: 3/10
A good looking PC
Pros: it looks nice ,Daughter had to have it because it looked cute . Ok for web surfing
Cons: Very high price no real Software Out dated Video (considering Price) Slow ram , This is our 2nd MAC and still all the same issues. Still have to have a PC to do real Apps.
User Rating: 9/10
this machine is NOT expensive
Pros: I am flabergasted that CNET would post a review indicating that this machine is expensive? Try getting the same power out of a PC and see how much you spend- just the same amount or more, with a better looking waranty, but it probably won't work quite rig
Cons: 512 mb of RAM is enough to boot the OS and maybe 1 or 2 productions apps, but if you're like me and run everything at once (cause you CAN do that with a mac)- buy more RAM, after market. You can add 1GB for $180.
User Rating: 7/10
What was wrong with the abacus?
Pros: It is very big and warm when you turn it on.
Cons: When I was young, we did everything with an abacus.... and that was when we had one. Sometimes we just used rocks and my brothers
User Rating: 8/10
Crunch Monster
Pros: Lightning fast, sleek, over built, No out sourcing of customer support.
Cons: Minimum software bundles
User Rating: 9/10
Simply Stuning!
Pros: Absolutely amazing speed and power for huge files and apps. Awesome expandability and connectivity. Very quiet. Simply the best money I ever spent.
Cons: Puts out a lot of heat, enough to heat my studio apartment without assistance! (not really a con since I save on my electric bill)
User Rating: 9/10
The fastest personal computer on the planet
Pros: best currently available hardware and OS in one box from one shop. Forget the bitter & twisted rantings from Windows mags that it is possible to make a computer out of wood that is theoretically faster, yeah!... just try getting it fixed if (when) it
Cons: laughing at windows users may damage your ribs
User Rating: 10/10
windows geeks are sissies!
Pros: booyah! Simply the best comuter on the market
Cons: none when compared to windows...you cnet guys are just afraid of the truth. Apple smoke your butts and XP is Mac OS 8.0
User Rating: 9/10
Fantastic developer box, super fast!
Pros: Very fast, very quiet most of the time
Cons: Expensive, but competitive with similarly outfitted 2-way PCs, should include more bundled business software
User Rating: 10/10
Awsome Awsome Awsome
Pros: Fast easy Awsome It Screams through anything you put at it. OSX is a Dream come true
Cons: None
User Rating: 8/10
WONDERFUL MINUS THE PENNY PINCHING
Pros: Way Fast, Built like a tank, quiet, simple, elegant, great creative facilities, some great built in programs
Cons: No Appleworks (cheap mac dudes)? For this price, they should include Office Mac
User Rating: 9/10
Probably the fastest. PS Machine out there
Pros: speed, speed, speed, oh its quiet, and speed, and with wifi and BT build in its a perfect workstation... basically a grafik designers and video editors wet dream all in on one package...
Cons: none really... just one little one more ram should come stock...
