MSI P55-GD80 LGA1156 Motherboard Review‏

System Benchmarks

SuperPi Mod v1.5

When running the SuperPI 32MB benchmark, we are calculating Pi to 32 million digits and timing the process. Obviously more CPU power helps in this intense calculation, but the memory sub-system also plays an important role, as does the operating system. We are running one instance of SuperPi via the HyperPi 0.99b interface. This is therefore a single-thread workload.


Although the MSI was slower than either the ASUS or Intel motherboards, there difference was truly trivial at a mere 0.9%. Once you start overclocking, and manually tweaking all the second memory timings, this gap would very likely vanish.

Cinebench R10

Cinebench R10 64-bit
Test1: Single CPU Image Render
Test2: Multi CPU Image Render
Comparison: Generated Score

Developed by MAXON, creators of Cinema 4D, Cinebench 10 is designed using the popular Cinema software and created to compare system performance in 3D Animation and Photo applications. There are two parts to the test; the first stresses only the primary CPU or Core, the second, makes use of up to 16 CPUs/Cores. Both are done rendering a realistic photo while utilizing various CPU-intensive features such as reflection, ambient occlusion, area lights and procedural shaders


Here we see that the P55-GD80 edged out the ASUS board in multi-threaded performance, but was surpassed in the single-threaded test. Both were a bit faster than Intel's enthusiast offering.

PCMark Vantage x64

PCMark Vantage Advanced 64-bit Edition (1.0.0.0)
PCMark Suite / Default Settings
Comparison: Generated Score

The main focus of our General Tasks category lies with the most recent installment of the PCMark series, Vantage. While still classified under the description of a Synthetic benchmark, PCMark Vantage uses many of Vista's (Note - Vantage is Vista-only) built-in programs and features along with its own tests, so it is "real-world" applicable in regards to CPU performance. The following is a general list of the tests in the PCMark suite, very much in line with tasks of an average user: Data encryption, Data compression, CPU image manipulation (compression/decompression/resize), Audio transcoding,Video transcoding,Text editing,Web page rendering, Windows Mail, Windows Contacts, and CPU game test.


While the P55-GD80 was a bit faster than Intel's board, the P7P55D Deluxe was still a fair bit faster than both in this test.

HDxPRT 2009

HDxPRT 2009, otherwise known as the Intel High Definition Experience and Performance Ratings Test 2009, is a new platform evaluation tool for measuring digital media experience. HDxPRT evaluates the capabilities of a media PC using real world usage scenarios and popular media applications. The benchmark's results are illustrated in the Create HD Score, which represents the overall digital media creation performance of a test system.

HDxPRT 2009 workloads are based on usages performed with popular programs, like: i. DivX encoder to create videos for YouTube, ii. MainConcept H.264 encoder to create videos for Blu-ray discs, iii. Sorenson Squeeze 5 for Flash videos, iv. Adobe Photoshop Elements 7 for Photo editing v. Apple iTunes to convert music for portable media players vi. Cyberlink PowerDVD 8 and Windows Media Player to play H.264 videos vii. On2 Flix 8 Player and Windows Media Player to play Flash videos.


Once again, the MSI falls a little bit behind the P7P55D Deluxe, but it's still faster than the DP55KG.


Photoshop CS4

For the image editing portion of this review, we will use Photoshop CS4 in coordination with Driver Heaven’s Photoshop Benchmark V3, which is an excellent test of CPU power and memory bandwidth. This is a scripted benchmark that individually applies 15 different filters to a 109MB JPEG, and uses Photoshop’s built-in timing feature to provide a result at each test stage. Then it’s simply a matter of adding up the 15 results to reach the final figure.


Continuing the trend, the P55-GD80 places second behind the P7P55D Deluxe, with the Intel coming in last.


Lame Front End

Lame Front End v1.0 is a single-threaded application, which means that it only utilizes a single processor core. This will obviously limit performance but it will allow us to see the benefits of Lynnfield aggressive Turbo Boost with single-threaded loads. We will be encoding a WAV rip of Santana’s Supernatural album and converting it to MP3 using the highest fidelity VBR 0 quality preset.


In LFE, the tables are turned with the MSI coming in last, and the Intel board claiming its first minor victory.

x264 HD Benchmark

x264 HD Benchmark v1.0
Test: MPEG-2 HD 720P Video Clip Conversion to x264
DVD Video Length: 30 Seconds
Comparison: FPS of Second Pass

x264 is quickly becoming the new codec of choice for encoding a growing number of H.264/MPEG-4 AVC videos. Think of it as the new Divx of HD and you can understand why we felt it critical to include. Tech Arp's recent development of the x264 HD Benchmark takes a 30 second HD video clip and encodes it into the x264 codec with the intention of little to no quality loss. The test is measured using the average frames per second achieved during encoding, which scales with processor speed and efficiency. The benchmark also allows the use of multi-core processors so it gives a very accurate depiction of what to expect when using encoding application on a typical full length video.


The MSI comes in second once again, but all three models are seperated by less than 1FPS, which equates to a roughly 3.5% difference.

WinRAR

WinRAR 3.8.0
Test: Compression of 1GB of Assorted Files
Comparison: Time to Finish

One of the most popular file compression/decompresion tools, we use WinRAR to compress a 1GB batch of files and archive them, timing the task until completion.


Continuing the trend, the MSI places second behind the ASUS, and slightly surpasses the DP55KG's compression time.


The MSI P55-GD80 took the lead in 1 of the 8 benchmarks, came in last once, and finished second behind the ASUS P7P55D Deluxe in all the others. Truthfully though, you'll never notice the performance difference in these real-life apps.