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by KerrAvon 1178 days ago
Although it was supposed to be, PowerPC wasn’t the leap forward that the M1 was, partially because the system software was still largely run in 68k emulation and partially because Intel poured infinite money into making x86 faster to remain competitive with RISC processors.
2 comments

> Although it was supposed to be, PowerPC wasn’t the leap forward that the M1 was

Just as with M1, it depends on your workload.

For instance, in the old school PBS show, The Computer Chronicles, they mention a prepress shop using the first PowerPC Macs that saw one of their workflows go from hours to minutes.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ic0dkf1iFOY

Speaking from my own impressions, the UI was noticeably faster. There were many applications - mp3 playing, for example - that only worked on PowerPC.

Over time Intel became faster, but there was a period of ~1-3? years when PPC was faster. AFAIR :)