Unevenly Matched Mini-Trio: MSI vs. Shuttle vs. Saintsong

15 Benchmarks And 10 Different Systems

Overall, we used 15 different benchmark tests to get a balanced picture of the performance of the three systems. The benchmark results provide a transparent overview of ATX motherboards equipped additionally with identical hardware that have the same chipset as the bare-bones devices.

We evaluate OpenGL performance with two different Quake-3 tests; Direct3D performance from the DirectX package is determined with the 3D Mark 2001 SE (based on DirectX 8). The various MPEG encoding benchmarks make for a comprehensive testing scenario: using the "Platinum MP3 Maker" encoder, a 178 MB WAV file is coded in "MPEG-1 Layer 3 Format." The MPEG-2 encoding test is new, and relies on the Main Concept Encoder, in which a file in DV format (1.2 GB) is converted into MPEG-2 format (audio and video). Packing files, which we now do with the new Winrar Packer 3.1, also has practical applications. Sysmark-Benchmark 2002 is used to determine the office performance. Finally, SiSoft Sandra 2003 and the well-known PC Mark 2002 cannot be forgotten.