X-bit labs

AMD Athlon 64 3400+ CPU Review (page 7)

Category: CPU

by Ilya Gavrichenkov

[ 01/05/2004 | 10:05 PM ]

Besides these two benchmarks we also decided to use a new Futuremark PCMark04. This test also measures the system performance during typical tasks processing. However, unlike Winstone tests, Futuremark developers included not only a few popular applications, but also a few popular algorithms apart from the applications where they are actually used. Here is a list of applications and tasks which are used within the PCMark04 package to measure the performance of our test system: ZIP archiving, spelling checking with the help of Link Grammar Parsing Library, web-sites rendering in Internet Explorer 6.0, image conversion into JPEG format, mp3 files decoding with  the help of Ogg Vorbis library, video decoding with Windows Media encoder 9 and DivX 5.0.5, 2D graphics primitives processing, work in 3D via Microsoft DirectX 9 with Havok Physics engine 2.1 physical modeling system, anti-virus checking with F-Secure Anti-Virus, info encoding and decoding with Blowfish Algorithm.

If we disregard the results of the memory subsystem tests where Athlon 64 FX-51 with the integrated dual-channel memory controller demonstrates the highest performance possible, the AMD processors do not look that attractive in PCMark04 any more. The reasons for this unpleasant failure lie in the test itself. The thing is that the first half of PCMark04 test runs a few tasks simultaneously thus involving Hyper-Threading technology supported by the Intel Pentium 4 processors. And the second half of the test contains mostly algorithms for streaming data processing, which have been always faster on CPUs with Pentium 4 architecture.