AES-NI Performance Analyzed; Limited To 32nm Core i5 CPUs

Benchmark Results: 7-Zip

Our own file compression test executes on the command line and shows that the quad-core is faster. Again, this is because of the high compression level. At launch time, Intel confirmed to us that the compression algorithm used here is "heavier" than the gains seen from AES-NI, which is why the technology's benefits are predominantly masked. We repeated the test run with compression switched off.

In this case, there is little benefit for the Core i5-661 and its AES feature. The total processing time is now reduced to only one-fifth of the processing time with compression enabled, but the quad-core still wins here.

As you can see on the following charts, more threads result in higher processing power for 7-Zip.