µATX Part 1: ATI Radeon Xpress 1250 Performance Review

Media Encoding Performance

We are utilizing an updated video encoding test suite for this article that includes Nero Recode 2, Windows Media Encoder 9, Sony Vegas 7.0e, and Roxio VideoWave 8. The scores reported include the full encoding process and are represented in seconds, with lower numbers indicating better performance.

Our first encoding test is quite easy: we take our original Office Space DVD and use AnyDVD and Nero Recode 2 to copy the full DVD to the hard drive without compression, thus providing an almost exact duplicate of the DVD. We then fire up Nero Recode 2, select our Office Space copy on the hard drive, and perform a shrink operation to allow the entire movie along with extras to fit on a single 4.5GB DVD disc. We leave all options on their defaults except we disable the advanced analysis option. The scores reported include the full encoding process and are represented in seconds, with lower numbers indicating better performance.


The results are very interesting as we did not expect our X1250 based systems to compete in tests where CPU throughput is the prime differentiator between chipsets. The ASRock board is about 3% faster than the Intel equipped G33M.

Our next test has us converting our day at the beach AVI file into a high definition WMV file suitable for our Aunt Gertrude to view on her new high definition LCD TV. We ensured our quality settings were set to High Definition. The balance of options is set to standard settings and then we let this program do its magic.


Our MSI board finishes this grueling task about 3% quicker than the ASRock board and 5% faster than the abit board. While CPU performance is very important in this test, a good storage system is a must during this particular conversion test.

Our Sony Vegas 7.0e test converts several of our summer vacation files into one plasma screen pleasing 1080/24P format with a 5.1 audio stream. We ensured our quality settings were set to their highest levels and then let the horses loose.


In a test that really stresses the CPU, we see the ASRock board is about 10% faster than the MSI G33M and 6% faster than the abit.

Next on the list is our Roxio VideoWave 8 test from the PC WorldBench 6.0 test suite that makes a short collection of video vacation shorts into a final movie.


The MSI G33M is about 4% quicker than our X1250 boards in a test that stresses the CPU and storage system equally. Overall, the CPU throughput of the Radeon Xpress 1250 is extremely competitive with the Intel G33 chipset with storage intensive tasks favoring the Intel chipset.