GIMP Image Editing

Website: GNU Image Manipulation Program (GIMP)
Far from being some kind of pr0n-filtering tool, Gimp is an open source image editing application - Gimp is an acronym of GNU Image Manipulation Program. Our test simulates how well a PC can manipulate a collection of large digital photos, and to achieve a low time requires a PC with a powerful CPU, plenty of quick memory and efficient hard disk drive access.

Handbrake H.264 Encoding

Website: HandBrake
We use the open-source, GPL-licensed, multi-platform, multi-threaded video encoder Handbrake to encode a HD video using the H.264 codec. This primarily tests multi-threaded CPU and memory subsystem performance.

Multi-tasking Performance

Website: MPC-HC
Website: 7-Zip
Multi-tasking is a phrase that we're all familiar with, because most of us are now used to running multiple applications at the same time. However, to run multiple applications well you need a powerful (ideally multi-core) CPU and plenty of RAM.

Our multi-tasking test performs a massive file backup (with encryption) using 7-Zip, while simultaneously playing back a HD movie file using mplayer, making it a demanding test for any PC.

Result: All failed. None of the boards would complete the multi-tasking test (the Intel 945 graphics appears to have issues with the Media Player in our test suite) and VIA's U2500 CPU took over two hours to complete just 30 per cent of the test. The simple conclusion is evidently not to do more than one thing at once on any of these systems.