Xvid Encoding:

We tested video encoding performance using VirtualDub-MPEG version 1.6.15 and a multi-threaded version of the Xvid codec, along with the LAME MT MP3 encoder for encoding audio. We did a two-pass encode of a 15-minute 276MB digital TV recording with a target file size of 100MB.


DDR3 is finally a winner, with 1333MHz+ out performing DDR2 at both speeds we've tested here. Again, 1066MHz DDR3 isn't really worth considering, you might as well invest in DDR2 at the same clock speed.

MP3 Encoding:

We used LAME MT for our audio encoding test - it's the multi-threaded version of the popular LAME MP3 encoder. We ran tests with both Intel's and Microsoft's compilers - naturally, the Intel compiler resulted in some performance increases on Intel's processors. We converted all 18 tracks from Moby's popular Play album to a 192kbps variable bit-rate MP3.


MP3 encoding only benefits slightly from memory bandwidth, and despite the (continuous!) anomalous result, DDR2 and DDR3 perform within just a couple of seconds of each other.

MP3 Decoding

MP3 decoding is even less memory intensive, and yet again DDR2 out performs even the fastest DDR3.