Shuttle SB65G2 & SN85G4 XPCs

HOW WE CONFIGURED THE TEST SYSTEM:

We configured both of these Shuttle XPCs as similarly as possible.  The video cards, memory, hard drives, driver versions (where applicable) and OS configurations were identical.  Before we started benchmarking these machines, we entered their system BIOSes and set each board to their "Optimized Defaults".  We then configured the RAM to run at 200MHz (DDR400), with the timings set by the SPD.  The hard drives were then formatted, and Windows XP Professional (SP1) was installed.  When the installation was complete, we hit the Windows Update site and downloaded all of the available updates, with the exceptions of the ones related to Windows Messenger and Media Player 9.  Then we installed all of the necessary drivers, and removed Windows Messenger from the system altogether.  Auto-Updating and System Restore were disabled as well, and we set a 768MB permanent page file on the same partition as the Windows installation.  Lastly we set Windows XP's Visual Effects to "best performance", installed all of our benchmarking software, defragged the hard drives and ran all of the tests.

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PCMark2002 Benchmarks Some Synthetic Scores

In our first batch of tests, we used Futuremark's PCMark2002 benchmarking suite.  Like other synthetic benchmarks, it's difficult to translate PCMark2002 scores into "real world" performance.  However, because it is very easy to run, and produces repeatable, comparable results, PCMark2002 has become a staple here in the H.H. labs.  We ran PCMark2002's "CPU" and "Memory" performance modules on both systems.  The CPU module incorporates the following tests:

CPU Test:

• JPEG decompression

• Zlib compression & decompression

• Text search

• MP3 Audio Conversion

• 3D Vector Calculation

Memory Test Technical details: (Quoted From Futuremark)

Raw read, write, and read-modify-write operations are performed starting from a 3072 kilobytes array decreasing in size to 1536 KB, 384 KB, 48 KB and finally 6 KB. Each size of block is tested two second and the amount of accessed data is given as result. In the STL container test a list of 116 byte elements is constructed and sorted by an integer pseudo-random key. The list is then iterated through as many times as possible for 2 seconds and the total size of the accessed elements is given as result. There are 6 runs of this test, with 24576 items in the largest run corresponding to a total data amount of 1536 KB, decreasing in size to 12288 items (768 KB), 6144 items (384 KB), 1536 items (96 KB), 768 items (48 KB) and 96 items in the smallest run corresponding to 6 KB of total data.

PCMark2002 had the Pentium 4 equipped SB65G2 out in front of the SN86G4 in both tests.  In the CPU performance module, the 3.2GHz Pentium 4 pulled ahead of the Athlon 64 3200+ by 1375 points, a 21% advantage.  The SB65G2 also held onto a 608 point lead in the memory performance module.  However, these two tests are heavily dependant on clock speed and raw memory bandwidth - two areas where the Athlon 64 3200+ doesn't fare well against a high-end P4.  In tests where latency and IPC are important though, the Athlon 64 3200+ should have a marked advantage.

Video Encoding Benchmarks With The SB65G2 & SN85G4 XPCs Wanna Make a Movie?

We also did some video encoding with both of these Shuttle SFF systems.  To get the scores listed below, we took a 24MB, standard MPEG 2 format video clip and converted it to the DivX format, using v5.1 of the CODEC, with XMPEG v5.02.  The results are reported below are in Minutes:Seconds, lower numbers equal better performance.

The SB65G2 with its 3.2GHz Pentium 4 performed very well in this test, besting the Athlon 64 3200+ equipped SN85G4 by a full 20 seconds.  This is another test where the Pentium 4 has historically excelled.  Xmpeg takes advantage of the Pentium 4's hyper-threading technology, so as far as this benchmark is concerned, the SB65G2 is essentially equipped with 2 processors.  I wonder what'll happen when we move onto some gaming and real-world tests?  Let's find out!

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