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| Video and Audio Encoding Performance AMD's Dual Core vs, Intel's Core2 Duo | |
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(Review by JoeF, August 28, 2006) |
Summary
Arguably, the biggest factor driving the computer industry is gaming. However, the home entertainment sector, especially encoding of audiovisual content is becoming increasingly important as well. Ripping and editing software ranges from super-expensive studio editions to free downloads. Each program has its own quirks, favoring either Intel's or AMD's processors. We took LAME, Dr. DiVX, NeroVision4 and Monkey's Audio as representatives of the inexpensive (or free software) and ran AMD's dual core CPUs as well as Intel's Core2 Duos through the paces. One issue to keep in mind is that not all programs are multithreaded, this is particularly true for audio stream-encoding, however, multiple cores can take care of multiple audio streams in parallel.
Processors we looked at run from about US$150.- to US$1150.- but is there also an 8 x performance difference? In other words, which CPU will give the best bang for the money?
The Other Side of Gaming
With the introduction of the Core 2 architecture, Intel is once again competitive in the desktop processor arena. Core 2’s raw performance and low power consumption is a much needed U-turn from the Pentium 4. What matters, though, is what that CPU power can do for the consumer.
Intel Core2 Duo vs. AMD AM2: Click for larger image
One of the most demanding uses for a PC is playing games. Modern games require not only a brawny CPU, but also a powerful video card, or GPU, to render high resolution textures and complex lighting effects. As the screen resolution of the game increases, the burden migrates from the CPU to the GPU to render the increased number of pixels at an acceptable framerate. The ability of nVidia and ATI’s current video cards to work in tandem as either SLI or Crossfire, respectively, greatly increases the GPU power available to the hardcore gamer. Even so, at the resolutions a hardcore gamer is likely to use for gaming, performance remains GPU limited. In other words, once a certain baseline CPU performance is met, a faster CPU spins its wheels waiting for the video card to push the pixels onto the screen.
The other performance intensive task that has become common on the consumer desktop is audio and video encoding. Whether it is compressing tracks from a CD to load onto a portable media player, or taking video of the kids to burn to DVD for the grandparents, encoding relies heavily on the CPU, and is independent of the speed of the video card. That makes A/V encoding the perfect demonstration of force for the latest processors.
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Athlon64 X2-3800+ (ADA3800DAA5CD) | |
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Core2 Duo E6300 (HH80557PH0362M) |
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