Benchmarking (continued):
PCMark2002:
FutureMark's PCMark2002 is a "multipurpose benchmark, suited for benchmarking all kinds of PCs, from laptops to workstations, as well as across multiple Windows operating systems." Available as a free download, anyone can test their system and use FutureMark's online result browser to see how they stack up with the outside world. Results are provided for CPU, MEM (memory), and HDD (hard drives), and all three are graphed below. The CPU and hard drive performance didn't vary much from board to board, but the 865PE based ABIT board holds a serious edge in the memory performance.
PiFast 4.2:
PiFast 4.2 is a simple test run from the command prompt that will calculate the value of Pi to the number of decimal places requested. The score is based on the total time required to do so, and provides a good indicator of processing power. I ran the test to calculate to 10,000,000 decimal places and used the following internal settings (No Disk Memory, 1024K FFT, Chudnovsky method). From the results below it can be seen that the Pentium 4 2.6C completes the task just under 2 seconds quicker on the 865PE based ABIT board when compared to the FoxConn 865G based board.
ScienceMark 2.0 Cypher Benchmark:
ScienceMark 2.0 provides a full suite of tests that can be run, and I chose one to use for comparison purposes. The Cypher benchmark was run on both boards, and the results below show that the ABIT board holds roughly a 2/10 of a second edge on the FoxConn board for completing this task.
AquaMark3 CPU:
“AquaMark3 is a powerful tool to determine reliable information about the gaming performance of a computer system. Because the benchmark extensively utilizes DirectX9, DirectX8 and DirectX7 functionality, it represents the requirements of typical gaming applications in 2003 and 2004.” This benchmark was run at 1024x768, anti-aliasing off, 4x AF, and “Max Details.” AquaMark provides three results of interest; a CPU score, a GFX score, and a total score. The chart below shows the CPU score, and reveals about a 3.5% difference in performance between the two boards, while using the Radeon 9600XT video card. It should be noted that Aquamark3 would not run while using the onboard video, so all three phases of the results will simply show a zero!
AquaMark3 GFX:
The GFX portion of Aquamark3 is focused more on the graphics portion of performance (if the name didn't give that away). The graph below shows results run under the same conditions described in the previous paragraph, and show an insignificant margin of 12 points between the two motherboards.
AquaMark Total:
The final result of interest from the AquaMark3 package is the total score. The graph below shows results run under the same conditions described in the previous paragraph, and shows a modest lead of 100 points going to the ABIT IS7-G. 100 points isn't much based on a total score around 31000, and tells me that either board would be well suited for game play according to this benchmark... Just don't try to use the onboard video for any of your modern video games!
3DMark03:
3DMark03 is the next generation of video benchmarks from FutureMark featuring "full DirectX9.0a support with completely new tests and graphics, 3DMark03 Pro continues the legacy of being the industry standard benchmark.” The results are reported as unitless “Marks”, and the following are based on the graphics cards being set to a resolution of 1024x768, 32 Bit, 4x anisotropic filtering. The scores on the Radeon 9600XT were nearly identical on the 865G based FoxConn board, as they were on the 865PE based ABIT board, but the onboard video was only able to complete one test in the 3DMark03 suite, and the low score reflected this!
3DMark2001SE:
FutureMark's 3DMark2001SE is a benchmark for DirectX8 video performance that will "empower you to make informed hardware assessments. The game tests, texturing tests, filtering tests, image quality tests, and others give you an overview of your system’s current performance and show you what kind of performance you could expect if you were to upgrade your PC." Also available in one form as a free download, anyone can test their system and use the online results browser to analyze their score. The results graphed below use the same unitless "Marks" as 3DMark03, and were obtained running at a resolution of 1024x768, 32 Bit, D3D, with anti-aliasing turned off. As you can see, the FoxConn board allowed the Radeon 9600XT to perform nearly as well as on the ABIT IS7-G, but the onboard video is obviously not intended for DirectX8 gaming.
UT2K3:
This gaming benchmark was develop by HardOCP and is based on the game Unreal Tournament 2003. I chose to use the br-anubis map for this comparison, and with settings at 1024x768, D3D, “Max Detail", recieved the scores listed below. The Radeon 9600XT provided identical scores, while the onboard video cranked out a measly 9.75 frames per second! Ouch, once again... do not try to play games using the onboard video!
PowerDVD VGA Speed:
PowerDVD 5.0 includes a system diagnostic that I like to run as a benchmark. The results are reported in frames per second in various modes, and I chose one mode for comparison purposes. In this benchmark, the results were extremely close between the boards while running the Radeon 9600XT, but finally... the onboard video scored a victory! To be honest, you don't need a fraction of these speeds for realistic DVD playback, but with all benchmarks, better scores are always nice to get.
Please read on to the next page for more... Next
Page 1 | Page 2 | Page 3 | Page 4 | Page 5 | Page 6 | Page 7
Home | Forum | Review Index
|
|
