1,000
vista benchmarks
premiere pro 1,310 sec
zero point scores
pHoTosHop Cs3 152 sec
prosHoW 1,506 sec
maiNCoNCepT 1,448 sec
Fear 1.07 137 fps
QUake 4 135 fps
0 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%
107 sec
1,046 sec
698 sec (+107%)
205 fps
184 fps
Our current desktop test bed consists of a quad-core 2.66GHz Intel Core 2 Quad Q6700, and 2GB of Corsair DDR2/800 RAM
on an EVGA 680 SLI motherboard. We are running two EVGA GeForce 8800 GTX cards in SLI mode, Western Digital 150GB
Raptor and 500GB Caviar hard drives, LG GGC-H20L, Sound Blaster X-Fi, and PC Power and Cooling Silencer 750 Quad. OS is
Windows Vista Ultimate
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Our monthly category-by-category
list of our favorite products. New
products are in red.
How We Test
Real-world benchmarks. Real-world results
High-end videocard
XFX GeForce 8800 Ultra
Midrange videocard
EVGA e-GeForce 8800GT SSC
512MB
Soundcard
Creative Labs X-Fi XtremeGamer
Fatal1ty Pro Series
Hard drive
Seagate 1TB Barracuda 7200.11
External backup drive
Seagate FreeAgent Pro 750GB
High-def burner
LG GGW-H20L
DVD burner
Samsung SH-203
High-end LCD monitor
Gateway XHD3000
Budget LCD monitor
Samsung SyncMaster 206BW
Socket AM2 Athlon 64 mobo
Gigabyte GA-M59SLI-S5
Socket 775 Core 2 Duo mobo
Asus P5E3 Deluxe WiFi-AP@n
HD-based MP3 player
Apple iPod
Flash-based MP3 player
Toshiba Gigabeat MET-400
5.1 speakers
Logitech Z5500
2.0 speakers
Audioengine 5
Midtower case
Antec Nine Hundred
Full-tower case
Gigabyte 3D Mercury
Games we are playing: Lord
of the Rings Online: Shadows of
Angmar, Sins of a Solar Empire,
Mythos, Call of Duty 4: Modern
Warfare, Team Fortress 2, Portal,
BioShock.
Our monthly category-by-category
list of our favorite products. New
products are in red.
W
e use the following multithreaded apps
to test a PC’s performance relative to our
zero-point test bed:
Adobe premiere pro cs3 : We take HD video
shot on a pro sony camera and output the
edited results to a blu-ray-friendly MPeG-2 file
format. this test favors clock speed and likes
quad-core CPUs.
Adobe photoshop cs3: A gazillion Photoshop
filters are applied to a RAW digital-image format.
photodex proshow producer: this pro-level
photo slide-show application spits out a hi-def
MPeG-2 file format and favors multicore CPUs.
Mainconcept reference: We take an HD-reso-
lution MPeG-2 file and convert it to H.264/AVC
with this multithreaded encoder. Used by
advanced amateurs and professionals, this
encoder likes fast, efficient multicore procs.
FeAr: Our DX9 gaming test runs at 1600x1200
with soft shadows and is a good approximation
of gaming performance for slightly older titles.
Quake 4: based on the Doom 3 engine, this
OpenGL shooter is optimized for dual-core
CPUs, and although older, it still reveals weak-
nesses in OpenGL drivers.
There’s More
Maximum PC
Online!
For web-exclusive hardware,
software, and game reviews,
head to http://www.maximumpc.com/
exclusive today. Here are just a
few of the many reviews you’ll
find online at MaximumPC.com.
• Wolfking Warrior XXtreme
gaming keyboard
• NEC Multisync LCD195NXM
monitor
• Antec Veris MX-1 drive
enclosure
• Thermaltake BlacX drive
enclosure
• CablesToGo RapidRun
system
• Soundcast Speakercast
• Cambridge SoundWorks
iPod Doc i765
• MemoRight 32GB SSD
• Nikon D300 digital SLR
plus the awesome
no Bs podcasts!
How to Read Our Benchmark Chart
Maximum PC’s test beds double as zero-point systems, against which all review systems
are compared. Here’s how to read our benchmark chart.
The bar graph indicates how much faster
the review system performed in respect
to the zero-point system. If a system
exceeds the zero-point performance by
more than 100 percent, the graph will
show a full-width bar and a plus sign.
Every month we remind readers of our
key zero-point components.
The scores
achieved by the
system being
reviewed.
The names
of the
benchmarks
used.
The scores achieved by our zero-point system are noted
in this column. They remain the same, month in, month
out, until we decide to update our zero-point.
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http://www.maximumpc.com | apr 08 (^) | MAXIMUMPC 71