TMPGEnc Plus MPEG-1 Encoding Performance

For the next test, we've taken the same high-end, 3-minute AVI file, and encoded it to MPEG-1 using TMPGEnc Plus 2.5. This is a bit less stressful on the system than our previous MPEG-2 encoding, but is still very popular method of VCD authoring. The performance results are expressed in the form of time elapsed (minutes: seconds) and as with the MPEG-2 results, a smaller bar denotes less time encoding, and therefore represents higher performance.

The TMPGEnc Plus MPEG-1 performance results follow along with the same trend line as our higher-end MPEG-2 benchmark, although the overall encoding times are reduced. The Pentium 4-3.4E is still the fastest game in town, and follows the 3.2E as the only processors capable of dropping below 2 minutes for the full encode. This solidifies our opinion of the Pentium 4 Prescott core as a multimedia speed demon, and the new architecture definitely pays off with the fastest performance scores for desktop video encoding.

Also keep in mind that these two TMPGEnc Plus encoding tests were performed with a 3-minute AVI file, so real-world differences could be extrapolated to a 2+ hour AVI file encoded to MPEG-1 or -2, and the end result could be a difference of 10 minutes or more, even with these high-end processors.

SiSoft SANDRA 2004 Performance

SiSoft SANDRA 2004 is the latest revision of this popular system benchmark, but sticks to its roots and supplies a wide range of individual benchmarks and system utilities. The memory bandwidth tests are the most popular section of the SiSoft SANDRA benchmark suite, and highlight the potential performance levels of the CPU-memory subsystem.

The SANDRA Integer memory bandwidth scores don't hold any real surprises, and the 200 MHz core speed increase for the two 3.4 GHz processors just move the SANDRA scores up a bit. The 1-MB of L2 cache does seem to help the Pentium 4-3.4E, and we see slightly higher SANDRA scores for the Prescott models compared to the Northwood. This test does clearly illustrate the architectural differences between the AMD and Intel processors, with the Pentium 4-3.4E and it's dual-channel DDR400 memory interface able to easily surpass the Athlon 64 3400+. But by the same token, the integrated dual-channel DDR400 controller of the Athlon 64 FX-based CPUs posts the highest overall scores.

The corresponding SiSoft SANDRA 2004 Floating Point Bandwidth results are a mirror image of the Integer scores, and shows the various Intel and AMD processors in the same basic ranking.