Intel Core i5, Core i7 800 Processors and P55 Express
LAME MT and x264 Encoding
In our custom LAME MT MP3 encoding test, we convert a large WAV file to the MP3 format, which is a popular scenario that many end users work with on a day-to-day basis to provide portability and storage of their digital audio content. LAME is an open-source mid to high bit-rate and VBR (variable bit rate) MP3 audio encoder that is used widely around the world in a multitude of third party applications.
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In this test, we created our own 223MB WAV file (a hallucinogenically-induced Grateful Dead jam) and converted it to the MP3 format using the multi-thread capable LAME MT application in single and multi-thread modes. Processing times are recorded below, listed in seconds. Shorter times equate to better performance.
The new Core i5 750 and Core i7 870 processors performed very well in our custom LAME MT benchmark. Intel's new mainstream processors were able to best all of the other chips we tested, save for the ultra-high-end Core i7 965.
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The x264 benchmark measures how fast a system can encode a short, DVD quality MPEG-2 video clip into a high-quality H.264 HD video clip. The application reports the compression results in frames per second for each pass of the video encoding process, and it is threaded so it can take advantage of the additional resources afforded by multi-core processors.
The Core i5 750's performance in the x264 benchmark falls somewhere in between the Core 2 Q9650 and Core i7 920, and about on par with the Phenom II--give or take a couple of FPS depending on the pass. The new Core i7 870, however, outpaces everything with the exception of the Core i7 975.
