Windows Performance

One side of processor reviews that seems to go by the way side is how much difference they make when doing every day tasks like running Windows and regular programs like Office, Internet Explorer, DVD's and more. The other test processor we are placing the 3800 up against is the average Athlon 64 3000+ processor. Some of these tests will be done just by written descriptions, while others such as Office will use time tests.

Windows Boot Time

The first test was to measure how fast both our Athlon 3800 and our Athlon 3000 went with Windows booting times, while this isn't the best test to do as it doesn't really matter how quickly your machine boots up as performance when it is running is far more important.

Windows Boot Test

CPU	Time
AMD Athlon 64 3000+	31 seconds
AMD Athlon 64 3800+, 2.4 Ghz	27 seconds

Microsoft Office 2003 SP1

Microsoft Office Access- Opening a 150MB Database.

CPU	Time
AMD Athlon 64 3000+	8.5 seconds
AMD Athlon 64 3800+, 2.4 Ghz	7.0 seconds

Microsoft Office Word- Opening a 15MB Word Document

CPU	Time
AMD Athlon 64 3000+	3.5 seconds
AMD Athlon 64 3800+, 2.4 Ghz	3 seconds

Microsoft Office FrontPage- Opening a Small Webpage In Split Design Mode

CPU	Time
AMD Athlon 64 3000+	1.5 seconds
AMD Athlon 64 3800+, 2.4 Ghz	1.0 seconds

DVD Performance with Power DVD 5

There was a great deal more smoothness on our DVD test using the excellent Shaun Of The Dead UK DVD Region 2 when played back on the 3800 chip. The transfer is excellent for that film so it was the perfect one to use on our flatscreen display. There was no lag onscreen or skipping when playing with menus and such like when using the 3800 system. But there was some slight skipping when disk access was done, when using the same DVD software on our 3000 processor system.