Processors Toolkit

Athlon XP/2600+: how we tested

Kai Schmerer ZDNet.co.uk

Published: 03 Sep 2002

The performance of the new processors was evaluated using the following benchmarks:

Benchmark tests used
Benchmark type	Benchmark name
Application-based tests	ZD Business Winstone 2001, ZD Content Creation Winstone 2002
Encoding tests	LSX MPEG Encoder 3.5, XMpeg 4.5 (MPEG); Musicmatch Jukebox 7.0 (MP3)
Rendering tests	Bryce 5.01, 3D Studio Max 4.26, 3D Studio Max 5, Cinebench, Lightwave 7b, Maya 4.0 Unlimited, Distributed Net RC5-64
Internet tests	ZD i-Bench 3.0
Workstation tests	SPEC Viewperf 7.0
Gaming tests	3DMark 2001 SE, Aquanox, Comanche 4 (DirectX 8); Quake, Vulpine GLmark 1.1p (OpenGL)

The benchmarks were run on the following equipment:

Test platforms
Component	Athlon XP	Pentium 4/DDR	Pentium 4/Rambus

Motherboard	Gigabyte 7VRXP	ASUS P4B533-V	Asus P4T533-C
Chipset	VIA KT333	Intel 845G	Intel 850E
Memory (MB)	256	256	256
Memory type	DDR333	DDR333	PC800/PC1066

The rest of the test equipment is the same for all systems. A Promise Fastrak 100 drives two IBM DTLA 307030 hard disks configured as Raid-0. For our CPU tests, ZDNet is now using a GeForce4 Ti 4600, in combination with the Detonator 30.82 drivers. Therefore, the results from earlier CPU tests are no longer comparable with the following benchmarks. All tests are carried out under Windows XP Professional at 1,024 by 768 resolution and 32-bit colour depth.

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