ps
é baseado no uso de CPU acumulado (desde o início do processo), em que a% de CPU é uma média (total / hora).
top
informa a utilização da CPU (média) desde a última vez que foi amostrada.
Para referência, veja este trecho de man ps
CPU usage is currently expressed as the percentage of time spent running during the entire lifetime of a process. This is not ideal, and it does not conform to the standards that ps otherwise conforms to. CPU usage is unlikely to add up to exactly 100%.
e de man top
The task's share of the elapsed CPU time since the last screen update, expressed as a percentage of total CPU time. In a true SMP environment, if 'Irix mode' is Off, top will operate in 'Solaris mode' where a task's cpu usage will be divided by the total number of CPUs. You toggle 'Irix/Solaris' modes with the 'I' interactive command.