Encoding Performance

HandBrake utilizes all six cores and as a result we saw healthy performance gains when comparing the Phenom II X6 1090T and 1055T processors to the Phenom II X4 965 quad-core. The Phenom II X6 1090T was 18% faster, while the 1055T was also 10% quicker.

These gains had the Phenom II X6 1055T placed above the Core i7 930 for a slight margin. The higher clocked 1090T enjoyed a 10% performance advantage.

The x264 HD Benchmark also makes use of all six cores but at around 75% CPU utilization, which didn't allow the hexa-core processors to provide any significant gains over the quad-core parts. Still the Phenom II X6 1090T was slightly faster than the Core i7 930 processor in this test.

The TMPGEnc 4.0 Xpress software also failed to push all cores to the max with the CPU utilization levels of the Phenom II X6 processors sitting at around 55%. While the new hexa-core processors were actually slower than the Phenom II X4 965 processor in this test, the Core i7 980 XE was able to provide a significant performance advantage over the Core i7 975 EE.

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