AtomX wrote:In most real world computing scenarios, the G4 out-performs the fastest consumer AMDs and Intel's (though I must admit I haven't seen the benchmark comparisons in a few months and AMD and Intel have put out new chips since then).
Very untrue. First off though, let me iterate that it's very difficult to even compare Apple's architecture to that of x86, so this is really
apples and oranges. However, although it hard to compare, Athlons (and Intel for that matter) have twice the frequency (yeah freq. isn't everything that's why you need to keep reading) AND a compareable (if not better) architecture.
Also, it must be noted that Apples use different programs, can't really compare Windows performance to that of OS X and so on. In fact, Windows sucks balls and if you blame that on the processor, I hate to break it to you guys, but that's more of badly implemented software (software+hardware = performance to users). I guess you could compare software that is native to both like Premiere, but at the same time they are coded and tweaked to the specific OS.
Also related, but there were rumors that Apple was going to give up on Motorolla designing there PowerPC chips (b/c it is known in the computer community they suck) and going to go with AMD or Intel processors. If they had a better processor why would they even think about this? It's obviously only a rumors, but there was enough to substantiate that they were thinking about it (like inside letters and whatnot).
As for the first question, as much as Apples aren't as "good" as their x86 counterparts, I am actually for Apples for video-editing. It is known among most professional video editors that Final Cut Pro is a FAR superior program that Premiere. It is more stable, implemented more efficiently (uses memory better, etc.) and is just plain better. If you want a machine purely for editing and can get your other things like games, etc. on a PC or don't care, go with the powerbook.