REBOL/Core Intel build for Mac
04-Mar-2008 11:03 Filed in: REBOL
General | MacOSX
A new release of REBOL/Core for intel mac was
published today. You can read more about it here.
Here are some cheap benchmarks on MacOSX Leopard on a 2 Ghz Santa Rosa Macbook with 4 GB RAM and Leopard on a 1.25 Ghz G4 PPC Mac Mini with 1 GB RAM:
Inserting 1 into a block 100000 times (because you know, we do that all the time):
Looks like I struck a nerve with the G4 here. I ran the test twice to make sure it wasn't erratic or that the machine was swapping, causing the test to slow down, but I got 0:06:11.605227 on the second run. Interesting. If you get anything else with a similarly specced machine, sound off in the comments.
The console benchmark test from rebol.org:
PPC G4:
I knew the terminal under MacOSX Leopard was never going to be a speed demon with a G4 mini, but 14 times slower console output than Intel native?
Rosetta:
Now the console might be off here, since it's Intel native, which makes it gets an automatic speed boost here, so the comparison in that respect might not be fair.
Intel:
That's more like it!
I'm impressed, both that the Intel version is much faster, but Rosetta, the PPC emulation is not too bad either, as it easily outruns my trusty old G4, sometimes by up to 50 times. Looks like Steve Jobs made the right choice when switching to Intel, or there are some things left to optimize for the PPC version.
Unfortunately we can't do any graphics tests, as this only is a port of REBOL/Core. REBOL/View does not yet work on clean installs of OSX Leopard due to font problems which causes a crash and REBOL/View never starts. As some time has been scheduled for working on a REBOL 2.7.6 release this week, REBOL Technologies will be working to fix this problem.
Here are some cheap benchmarks on MacOSX Leopard on a 2 Ghz Santa Rosa Macbook with 4 GB RAM and Leopard on a 1.25 Ghz G4 PPC Mac Mini with 1 GB RAM:
>> t: now/precise repeat i 10000000 [set 'a true] difference now/precise t
== 0:00:13.598378 ; PPC G4
== 0:00:06.310057 ; Rosetta
== 0:00:02.427662 ; Intel
Inserting 1 into a block 100000 times (because you know, we do that all the time):
>> a: make block! []
>> t: now/precise repeat i 100000 [insert a 1] difference now/precise t
== 0:05:57.933257 ; PPC G4 (wow!)
== 0:00:22.498992 ; Rosetta
== 0:00:06.623004 ; Intel
Looks like I struck a nerve with the G4 here. I ran the test twice to make sure it wasn't erratic or that the machine was swapping, causing the test to slow down, but I got 0:06:11.605227 on the second run. Interesting. If you get anything else with a similarly specced machine, sound off in the comments.
The console benchmark test from rebol.org:
PPC G4:
>> do http://www.rebol.com/speed.r
connecting to: www.rebol.com
Script: "REBOL Quick and Dirty Speed Test" (none)
Running...
........................................................................
Console: 0:00:04.612143 - 109 KC/S
Processor: 0:00:01.722944 - 501 RHz (REBOL-Hertz)
Memory: 0:00:03.01248 - 15 MB/S
Disk/File: 0:00:02.041244 - 14 MB/S
I knew the terminal under MacOSX Leopard was never going to be a speed demon with a G4 mini, but 14 times slower console output than Intel native?
Rosetta:
>> do http://www.rebol.com/speed.r
connecting to: www.rebol.com
Script: "REBOL Quick and Dirty Speed Test" (none)
Running...
........................................................................
Console: 0:00:00.665528 - 760 KC/S
Processor: 0:00:00.872422 - 990 RHz (REBOL-Hertz)
Memory: 0:00:02.083128 - 22 MB/S
Disk/File: 0:00:00.62334 - 48 MB/S
Now the console might be off here, since it's Intel native, which makes it gets an automatic speed boost here, so the comparison in that respect might not be fair.
Intel:
>> do http://www.rebol.com/speed.r
connecting to: www.rebol.com
Script: "REBOL Quick and Dirty Speed Test" (none)
Running...
........................................................................
Console: 0:00:00.355696 - 1423 KC/S
Processor: 0:00:00.30406 - 2841 RHz (REBOL-Hertz)
Memory: 0:00:00.567992 - 83 MB/S
Disk/File: 0:00:00.42605 - 71 MB/S
That's more like it!
I'm impressed, both that the Intel version is much faster, but Rosetta, the PPC emulation is not too bad either, as it easily outruns my trusty old G4, sometimes by up to 50 times. Looks like Steve Jobs made the right choice when switching to Intel, or there are some things left to optimize for the PPC version.
Unfortunately we can't do any graphics tests, as this only is a port of REBOL/Core. REBOL/View does not yet work on clean installs of OSX Leopard due to font problems which causes a crash and REBOL/View never starts. As some time has been scheduled for working on a REBOL 2.7.6 release this week, REBOL Technologies will be working to fix this problem.
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