This Comparison is based on TMPGEnc and Windows 98, 98SE, and 2000 (FAT32 and NTFS).

Test Platform

AMD Thunderbird 900MHZ
Asus A7V with Promise ATA 100 controller
256mb generic PC133
GeForce 2 MX 32MB
RealMagic Hollywood+
Sound Blaster Live! Value
20GB Western Digital 7200rpm ATA100
8x4x32 NEC CD-RW
6x IBM DVDROM
3COM 3C905B Ethernet Card

Software & Drivers

The following software and drivers were loaded on all of the operating systems in use. ( 98, 98SE, and 2000)

VIA 4IN1 Ver 1.24
Promise Ultra ATA 100 Drivers
Nvidia 12.41 GeForce 2 MX Drivers
DirectX 8a
SBLive Drivers Ver 3 (Without LiveWare 3)
WinRAR 2.80
Hollywood+ Ver 2.2 Drivers & Applications
SmartRipper
TMPGEnc 12h with VFAPI
DVD2AVI 1.74

TMPGEnc Settings

Settings are the same for all of the operating systems.

The video is from a 4:3 NTSC (not Film) 29.97fps frameserved from DVD2AVI 1.74
VideoCD(NTSC) Template
Normal Motion Search Precision
Source Aspect Ratio = 4:3 Display
Video Arrange Method = Full Screen (Keep Aspect Ratio)
Using "No motion search for still picture per half pixel"
Source Range is set to start in the middle to encode 8992 frames (5min)
Task priority is set to High when in use
And I chose for it not to display the output

Results

Video encoded is a 00:05:00 (8992 frames) clip.

OS	Encoding Time	Quality	Problems
Win98	00:12:28	Same	None
Win98SE	00:12:37	Same	Locked Up
Win2000 FAT32 NTFS	00:12:25 00:12:31	Same Same	None None

Conclusions

All operating systems performed about the same, I would recommend Windows 2000 NTFS due to not having the 4GB file size limit.

- Shochan