Sometimes faster does not mean faster

Soldato
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The most use I get out of my PCs these days is converting Videos to DVD.

I help run a Ghost Hunting club, and each of us have different video recorders, and they use varying media formats.

I use various ways to get the files from the cameras into my PC, luckily most are digital and are minutes, but a couple take a while.

The thing is that once I have all the Media files, I can then dump them all into ConvertX-to-DVD and then I can use TMPGEnc to make a DVD with Menus

Then, when thats all done, I can then use Nero to burn 4 DVDs at a time.

Now, I have been doing this for some years now, I have gone through various PCs in order to do it, and no matter what, the best PC that I have, is one of my older ones.

Dont get me wrong here... If I was to do any one job, the newer Pcs absolutely kill the old one, thats not in question, but in terms of multitasking, there is no PC that I have, that is better and smoother than my old I7 860... Its only a 2.93 Ghz I7 and the Mobo is the Gigabyte P55-USB3 Socket 1156.
But when I grab a whole load of windows and chuck a load of miscellaneous videos into various open windows of ConvertX to DVD, and I set the program to only use one core, I click on go, and on that PC, I have 8 copies of ConvertX running and I can shrink the windows down just easy peasy and I can get on with doing anything else while Im waiting... Usually I will have a play at Dawn Of War or watch a video for 15 or 20 minutes.

But on my more recent setups, heavy multitasking has been a serious PITA!

2 or 3 convertions are not bad, but no way can I do 8 like I can on the 860... Now way!

If I have lots to do, I have even found myself also burning 4 DVDs at once, while also converting the videos from WMV/AVI, and also using TMPGEnc to also convert the completed VOBs into a Menu'ed DVD format, and sure, the convertions take longer... a hell of a lot longer, dont get me wrong, but the PC still chugs along quite happily and is responsive as ever with very little actual slow down at all... Again, I can also play Dawn of War, Crysis, COD, whatever and see no real glitching, while any newish PC would have failed a long time back.

I have just recently bought myself 2 high end PCs. AMD and Intel, and thankfully both are good setups and I am glad I bought them, they are both faster than the 860 in every respect, but I have had to splash out serious cash for them. I have other PCs that are much quicker than the 860 in terms of Raw CPU power but for massive heavy multitasking, just fall over flat.

So, as I said, sometimes, faster is not always faster.

This is not a question asking for answers... just a rant.
 
Another one?

All my PCs all run on SSD for C: and real HDs for D: E: etc with the exception of my main PC and that also runs extra SSD for downloading torrents before they get moved to the Server.
 
Another one?

All my PCs all run on SSD for C: and real HDs for D: E: etc with the exception of my main PC and that also runs extra SSD for downloading torrents before they get moved to the Server.

My apologies didn't realise you had some already. :)

Not sure why that's the case. Not due to drives being near capacity is it?
 
When you are converting the videos to DVD Format are they being saved on the same drive? It would be faster to pull from SSD and save to HDD.

Also, have you taken in to account that because the new 'faster' hardware is converting them faster the HDDs cannot keep up?

For example. Your old PC may have a HDD write rate of 200mbps. The old i7 May have been converting each one at 25mbps. So multiply that by 8 would give you 200mbps.

The new hardware may be converting at 60mbps to a similar 200mbps drive. After running 3 instances you are already using 180mbps of the 200mbps available. In the long run this is 10% slower. The videos will convert more than twice as fast, but less than half of them at once, so you are only getting 90% of the performance you once were.

Try running 3 instances to HDD 1, 3 to HDD 2 and the last 2 back to your SSD. This is if you have multiple HDDs of course.
 
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