Speed of process

[ericmark]

I am taking an AS level in photography and the exam is for 8 hours and in this time I need to process the images I have.
I know in the exam we will be using a Mac and Photoshop CS4 but at home I am using a PC compatible and Photoshop CS4.
To combine 3 images to produce a HDR (High dynamic range) on my PC at home takes about an hour. And to combine 2 images to form one panoramic image about 1/2 an hour.
I would not have enough time to complete on those times but I know a Mac is faster.
But I also realise it is not just the processor speed but also ability to multi-task and if the program is designed to use that ability.
So how do I compare speeds to ensure I have enough time to complete exam.

 

[tapir]

First you need the specs of the Macs you'll be using in your exam. Seeing as Macs are generally faster, especially when it comes to Photoshop, photo editing, video editing, chances are it could be faster than your home set up. you don't say what you're running at home either..

 

[ericmark]

My computer is an AMD Athlon[tm] 1.75 Ghz, 704 MB of RAM and the college MAC looks like this

I will guess around 2.26 Ghz so should be faster.

If I divide the time my PC takes by 2.26 and times by 1.75 will that give the time it will take or is it more involved than that?

 

[NatB]

It's more involved than that. RAM and video card performance are as important as the processor you have.

I would say your bottleneck is the lack of RAM you have which is like a workspace, if your pc is having to swap data from hard disk to RAM all the time you're going to pay in peformance.

 

[timtheenchanter]

http://www.apple.com/macmini/specs.html

is your machne dual core? if not you have 2 problems in tru=ying to run photoshop, lack of ram and lack of processing power.

the minimac has a 2.26Ghz dual core, so essentially 2x2.26Ghz, it also has (minimum) 2Gb of Ram these are just the base specs of the minimac, so may be more, the minimac isnt ideal for photoshop, but its not bad.

just for the record, I use macromedia suite, adobe premier and photochop on PCs and macs, and TBH not seen any real difference in similarly specced machines, the only plus point I know of on a mac when it come to video editing on the powermac is almost limitless in terms of RAM it can support.

 

[Monkeh]

There have been quite a few models of Mac Mini. All are identical from the front. They've had G4s, Core Solos, Core Duos, and Core 2 Duos, of various speeds, as well as widely varying base and maximum amounts of RAM, and HDDs of varying capacity and speed. You cannot use the current model specs as a comparison point.

the powermac is almost limitless in terms of RAM it can support.

Modern Macs are no different to a modern PC. They use essentially same hardware. However, even the latest Mac Pros only support 32GB of RAM. This is not limitless, and is half of what many true professional workstations can support. Some can handle even more.