Encoding Performance
Encoding software is very CPU intensive and might not be something many Pentium users are going to be interested in. Nonetheless, for those wanting to encode on the cheap, here are our results.
The Pentium G3258 matched the A10-7850K with 120fps, while overclocking it allowed for slightly more performance than what was delivered by the Core i3-4130. With 161fps, the overclocked G3258 was just 17% slower than the FX-8350, though it was almost 40% slower than the Core i5-4670K.
The G3258 performed surprisingly well in x264 HD Benchmark, at least as far as the first pass data is concerned, delivering 35fps at 3.2GHz and 46.6fps once overclocked to 4.4GHz, which is roughly the same performance seen from the Core i5-4670K. The second pass results were quite different though as the overclocked G3258 managed just 8.9fps, and while that was still faster than the Core i3-4130 it was 32% slower than the Core i5-4670K.
The last encoding benchmark is based on EMPGEnc's Video Master Works and here the Intel Pentium G3258 took 431 seconds to complete the workload once overclocked, putting it on par with the Core i3-4130 and FX-8350 – not bad.