Grand Prix

The lights go green, so we can get to the competition. A few words about the conditions of the race:

I tested the notebooks in Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition with DirectX 9.0a. I disabled network services, audio subsystems, power-saving services, antivirus software, screensavers and error messages before the tests. The computers were tested at the maximum resolution of the LCD matrix.

I used two power modes in my tests. First, I selected the Always On power mode for the maximum performance and the shortest battery run-down time, and then I switched to the Max Battery mode for the maximum battery run-down time.

Our tests:

1. Performance benchmarks: synthetic (SiSoftware Sandra 2004, PCMark 2004), office and multimedia applications (Business Winstone 2004, Multimedia Content Creation Winstone 2004), games (3DMark 2001SE Pro, Quake 3, Unreal Tournament 2003);
2. Battery life tests (Battery Eater Pro 2.30).

The results of the synthetic tests SiSoftware Sandra 2004 and PCMark 2004 are presented below. Note that both notebooks reduce their performance in more than two times when they are powered by their own batteries.

The results differ rather greatly despite the similarity between the two configurations. The performance of the A4S00L in the CPU and memory tests is 16-18% and 14%, respectively, higher than that of the Ferrari 3200 ¨C although they have the same CPUs and the same amount of memory! I guess the difference in the chipsets may account for this divergence. The use of a faster hard disk drive in the ASUS A4S00K brings its fruit, as this notebook is about 14 percent faster in the HDD performance test than the Ferrari 3200.

No wonder we have almost the same situation in Business Winstone 2004 and Multimedia Content Creation Winstone 2004 as these benchmarks use scripts of office and multimedia applications. The ASUS A4S00K offers about 12 percent more performance than the Ferrari 3200 in Business Winstone 2004, and about 15 percent more in Multimedia Content Creation Winstone 2004. The only strange thing is the value of the difference which is too big.

For the readers who prefer diagrams, here they are: