Media Benchmarks

Download from: bit-tech.net
We have developed our own suite of benchmarks using real-world and open source applications to simulate how PCs are actually used. The suite comprises an image editing test using Gimp, a video encoding test using Handbrake and a multi-tasking test using 7-Zip to archive and encrypt a large batch of files while a HD movie plays in mplayer.

A score of 1,000 means that the test system is as fast as our reference PC, which used a 2.66GHz Intel Core 2 Duo E6750 at stock speed, 2GB of Corsair 1,066MHz DDR2 memory, a 250GB Samsung SpinPoint P120S hard disk and an Asus P5K Deluxe WiFi-AP motherboard. The scoring is linear, so a system scoring 1,200 points is 20 per cent faster than our reference system. Equally, a system scoring 1,200 is 4 per cent faster than a system scoring 1,150.

Battery life

Testing the battery life of laptops is a contentious thing – do you test for the absolute best-case by disabling everything and leaving the CPU to idle, or do you set a film to loop and measure that? Both of these tests are unrepresentative of what you’ll use for your laptop for the most – a bit of work and web-browsing while on the sofa. We’ve therefore chosen to test by loading up a website with a bit of light Flash animation, which loads the CPU with a moderate amount of work (about 5 per cent CPU load on this laptop). We’ve left the WiFi on, but let Windows dim the screen to half brightness, and also disabled the screensaver and the ability to turn the screen. Finally, we entered the advanced battery options to make sure that the laptop won’t go to sleep, ensuring that we used the full life of the battery.

Battery Capacities

• Samsung X120: 8,850mAh
  
• 1.4GHz Intel Core 2 Solo SU3500 + 2GB 800MHz DDR2 laptop: 5,200mAh
  
• 1.66GHz Intel Atom N280 + 1GB 800MHz DDR2 laptop: 5,900mAh
  
• 1.66GHz Intel Atom N450 + 1GB 800MHz DDR2 laptop: 4,400mAh