[snail22]

It's always seemed to me that web browsing is faster on windows... even older PCs, than on even the newest macs... regardless of the connection speed, the pages just seem to load faster. And no, I don't see a huge improvement in Safari. Is this all inside my head?

[AVGuy]

Yes /forums/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif

[Nobody]

No it is faster on PC and downloads are too...just what we MAC users deal with.

[rockinphotog]

If a Mac and PC are on the same internet connection side-by-side, the PC will download faster? How is that possible?

[snail22]

I don't know about downloads, but in my experience browsing is simply faster on windows. The difference is between instantaneous (on windows) and a split second (on a mac).

[Martian]

I find that custom programming the MS optical intellimouse for IE on the Mac more than compensates for the slight speed advantage of PC browsing. This MS mouse actually works better on the Mac than on the PC. It is always faster to toggle between separate windows than go backward and forward in a single window. Works great when you keep coming back to the same referring page, like Google.
Ive programmed that 4 button mouse for Internet Explorer:
Right top button opens links in new windows, and when held down on the page when not over a link, it will turn to a hand to drag the page.
Right side button toggles between all open IE pages.
Left side button is BACK command.
Scroll wheel scrolls, of course
Scroll wheel when depressed and rolled changes text magnification.
I am still running OS 9, but I hope the mouse programmability carries over to OS X.

BTW, I find file download speeds the same on my Mac and PC over DSL.

[MacCheetah3]

Hi
Well, I just pulled off a test. I know, it is only one example but still, it should prove something.
Ti 1GHz/1GB/60GB/10.2.5/Safari v73
Dell 1.1GHz-P3/512MB/40GB/XP-Pro IE v.6.0.2800.1106.xpsp2.02110-1929
I went to a few sites that I just typed in that I knew I had never been to. If I can recall now...yeah...short memory sometimes. /forums/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif
http://www.plates.com
http://www.panasonic.com
http://www.magnavox.com
It seemed overall pretty even with the Mac winning with plates.com and VERY close with the last two. I don't notice more than MAYBE second difference on most sites. Except, Flash, etc is definitely faster on the PC, but Apple is getting better at it. Well, that's my two cents anyway.
MacCheetah3
"Monkeys are cool"

[Nobody]

MAC is getting alot faster ...but how long do we have to wait...it seems all we do is wait....I will wait though but sometimes things with MAC are intolerable but I still prefer MAC any 'ole day of the week.

[yasashisasy0nara]

Isn't your comparison somewaht bias since you're comparing a PC running on a p3 vs. a g4 ti? I suppose
it shouldn't really make much of a difference since you're just browsing the net. But to be more fair it should
be a current pc with a current mac. Not a pc that has a processor that is years old. /forums/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/confused.gif

[MacCheetah3]

Hi
I guess, I can't argue too much about that fact. However, they are both ~1GHz and as you said, it is a mostly simple task. Plus, I didn't say the Apple is faster but rather generally equal. Once again, I do claim the PC to be noticeably different with things like Flash and some other plugins. It is faster overall, I suppose, if you count plugins than.
Just wondering, since I don't know, is a P4 really faster at web browsing than a P3...That is, in close clock speeds?
MacCheetah3
"Well, honk my hooters"

[mozart11]

pc's are faster overall. day to day web surfering, application launching, window opening, word processing, etc... and i'm a devoted multi mac owner.

[icerabbit]

From my own test last year with a dozen sites globally visited side by side at the same moment (cleared cache, cookies auto accepted etc) in general my G4 450 cube with 768 RAM could not keep up with my outdated Pentium II 350 w 256 RAM. (even though the Cube is considered PIII class and has more raw horsepower)
I'd have to dig for the details, but can very honestly say that close to 2/3 of the time the old PC came out ahead to way ahead. On the other occasions time was equal or in favor of the Cube. At the time opera was the fastest in general on both OS. IE on the mac was and still is a joke. Thank god for Safari! I don't have a more recent mac to test improvement compare to the cube with.
On a last note: a now 6mo old pc is browsing is faster than both the old pc and the cube. It shouldn't really matter for something like browsing a web page which is most often a limited amount of data for machines that younger than 7 years, but it does go considerably faster on the most recent machine. Sadly enough.
Why? I can only think that there's some differences in hardware architecture (motherboard, cpu, busses, chipsets, ...) that are more optimized for some/those tasks on the pc side where the macs are still using more traditional and/or semi-optimized architecture.
icerabbit
PS: I don't see any difference download wise between OS. Both through ethernet & wifi both types of machines reach the same capped cable download limit from the same test server.

[Nobody]

I've never done a test, however, my wife and I switch between the Ti 550 PB and my work PIII Thinkpad quite often. The Thinkpad is definately faster surfing the web.
In my opinion, the Powerbook is worth the wait. /forums/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif

[Night_Porter]

IE was originally written to be part of the windows operating system (they were force to remove it) so it works seamlessly with the Windows OS.
On the Mac, the browser works as a separate application.
Hopeful when Safari is out of Beta it'll be just as fast as IE is on Windows.