MaximumPC 2008 03

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 ted 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

best of the besT

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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

The classic Z5500 takes the lead

with the demise of Creative’s S750.

2.0 speakers

Audioengine 5

Midtower case

Antec Nine Hundred

Full-tower case

Gigabyte 3D Mercury

Games we are playing

Battlefield 2, Crysis, Call of Duty

4: Modern Warfare, Peggle, Team

Fortress 2, Portal

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.

•    OCZ    32GB    ATV USB 

flash drive

•    Wolfking   Trooper gaming      

keyboard

•    MemoriesOnTV   4.0

•    ViewSonic  DimaniDuo       

NX2232w LCD/tV

•    SimpleTech Duo Pro 

backup drive

•    Enermax    Jazz    Drive       

enclosure

•    Logitech   Z-Cinema

•    Vudu   moviebox

•    Vuzix  iWear

•    Etymotic   Edge    GX400

plus the awesome No bs

Podcast!

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.

best of the besT

http://www.maximumpc.com | mar 08 (^) | MAXIMUMPC 73