3DMark for Windows 8 to unify test suite between ARM and x86 solutions

[sebbbi]

Extra size + extra weight = less mobile, unfortunately. We've tested a bunch of tablets in my (still) recent job and IMO if this is the direction of Windows-based tablets, than it is bogus. :S

29% isn't much, and you have to remember that this is a first generation Windows tablet. If you read the Samsung Slate reviews, you will find many reviewers being very excited about the product and the new possibilities it brings. It's a real Windows computer, and not just a media consumption device. You can connect it with a USB cable to your printer, scanner and camera (among other things). You can connect it to a Windows network just like any other workstation (network printing, accessing files of your company file servers, shared user credentials, distributed computing, etc). It can connect to all the same services and run all the same software any Windows based laptop/desktop can (even your own custom made software/services). It can run full versions of latest Word, Powerpoint, Excel, Outlook and Photoshop. If you are traveling a lot and need to do some work on the go, this tablet is perfect for it. On your hotel room you can put it on a dock and use it with a wireless mouse + keyboard and have a desktop computer on go (much more ergonomic than using a small notebook). And when you are outside your hotel room, you can carry it with you like any other tablet.

The 1024 level Wacom digitizer makes it really appealing to graphics artists. Wacom Cintiq displays cost around 2000$ (just the display without a computer). A personal Wacom tablet + computer on a go with half the price tag is very appealing to many.

I must agree that the device is more appealing to business and professional users. iPad might be a better choice, if you just consume media (browse net, play casual games, watch youtube), but if the additional features and possibilities are important for you, this is really a unique product, that has unique value compared to any tablets based on mobile technologies. There's still a lot of time to Windows 8 launch. I am sure we will see similar devices (and an improved version from the Samsung device) at Windows 8 launch.

 

[Dominik D]

29% isn't much

Actually it is huge. Larger size demands smaller weight if you want to be able to hold the device in one hand. And obviously it's hard to make something larger and weight less at the same time. Take Motorola Xoom for example: it's longer and heavier than iPad and you can easily feel it. It's inconvenient to use it with one hand occupied with something else. Even tiny differences make UX painful IMO. Another example would be Acer Iconia Tab A500. Increasing weight and length of the device makes it hard to use it IMO. And these are Android devices, stuff like ASUS Eee Slate is even worse. :S

first generation Windows tablet.

Sure, I'm not dismissing Windows on tablets, I just don't like what I've seen so far. Most tablets tend to be larger and heavier than iPad and that's true for both Android and Windows based designs. I think this tendency should be reversed in order to compete with Apple.

If you read the Samsung Slate reviews, you will find many reviewers being very excited about the product and the new possibilities it brings. It's a real Windows computer [cut, cut, cut]

Sure, I have nothing against the system. I just don't like the hardware it's used with. This is the same with laptops, actually. Most of them have lower res than I'd like to. But I refuse to pay for 15" MacBook Pro just so I can have some decent resolution on my mobile device. foo x 768 just doesn't cut it for me. :/

 

[sebbbi]

foo x 768 just doesn't cut it for me. :/

iPad 2 resolution is only 1024x768. 1366x768 is an definite improvement over it (33% more pixels). I personally find 1366x768 a pretty good match for the 11" Macbook Air (identical display size and resolution to Samsung Series 7 Slate). For the larger notebooks I of course prefer 1920x1200 (or 1080p) displays, but so far I have no bad things to say about the Macbook Air. It has a very good display, a definite improvement over the old 1024x600 resolution netbooks and it weights pretty much the same. It's a really good piece of hardware (and one of the many reasons why I am excited about the Samsung Slate with identical HW components + touchscreen + Wacom digitizer).

 

[Dominik D]

That sentence was about notebooks being too low-res. x768 on 11 inches is fine but I find it laughable at 15 inches of more. My claim is that there's a difference in tendency between Apple products and other stuff in terms of size-to-resolution, size-to-weight, etc. And most of the players are moving in the wrong direction with their hardware (IMO of course). Tablets are too bulky, laptops are too ugly and low-res, and so on. HP refreshed its Envy line two days ago or so and Envy 14 became Envy 15. No resolution change. When asked about its screen HP answered "it's hard to buy a decent display these days". Cry me a river HP. :[ Tablets are no better in this respect: it seems that everyone is trying to build a tablet-as-a-laptop-substitute these days as if it were impossible to have tablet as a product in and on itself. Windows and Android devices are both guilty of this.

 

[sebbbi]

That sentence was about notebooks being too low-res. x768 on 11 inches is fine but I find it laughable at 15 inches of more. My claim is that there's a difference in tendency between Apple products and other stuff in terms of size-to-resolution, size-to-weight, etc. And most of the players are moving in the wrong direction with their hardware (IMO of course). Tablets are too bulky, laptops are too ugly and low-res, and so on. HP refreshed its Envy line two days ago or so and Envy 14 became Envy 15. No resolution change. When asked about its screen HP answered "it's hard to buy a decent display these days". Cry me a river HP. :[ Tablets are no better in this respect: it seems that everyone is trying to build a tablet-as-a-laptop-substitute these days as if it were impossible to have tablet as a product in and on itself. Windows and Android devices are both guilty of this.

Agreed. Too many recent laptops have bad quality displays, and all cheap desktop displays are still based old TN panel technology. The day I got my first IPS display (to my work computer) I have too become really picky about display quality. IPS just looks so much better compared to old TN panels. The good thing with Samsung is that they have evolved IPS even further (PLS). The Samsung Series Slate is one of the first products to feature a PLS display. There's rumors flying around the net that Apple is going to be switching to PLS panels as well with their new products (but nothing concrete yet, so take as grain of salt).

Naturally not all of the Windows 8 tablets will be anywhere as good as the Samsung Slate. You can't just put in all the most expensive components inside a tablet and start selling them at 500$. The 2764M alone costs 250$ (recommended sales price according to Intel) , the 128GB SSD is pretty much a novelty item and the PLS display and the Wacom digitizer cannot be cheap either. Lets hope that 1366x768 will be the minimum supported resolution for certified Windows 8 products. I wouldn't want to see ATOM based 1024x600 resolution devices anymore

And that's why I also consider 3DMark coming for Windows 8 a really good thing. If some manufacturers are releasing underpowered hardware, it will be really easy for customers to notice that: Those tablets will fare very badly in 3DMark.

 

[Laurent06]

Naturally not all of the Windows 8 tablets will be anywhere as good as the Samsung Slate. You can't just put in all the most expensive components inside a tablet and start selling them at 500$. The 2764M alone costs 250$ (recommended sales price according to Intel) , the 128GB SSD is pretty much a novelty item and the PLS display and the Wacom digitizer cannot be cheap either. Lets hope that 1366x768 will be the minimum supported resolution for certified Windows 8 products. I wouldn't want to see ATOM based 1024x600 resolution devices anymore

Again you consider this good from your point of view and the one of reviewers who are not representative of the vast majority of end-users of tablets (as much as most people in this forum are not representative). If Windows and x86 and higher performance was a requirement for most end-users, Apple and others would not have sold that many tablets.

Currently W/x86 tablets are a niche and unless they become as physically attractive (again from a typical end-user point of view, not you and me), as power-efficient and at a similar price as existing tablets, they'll stay in their niche

 

[Ailuros]

And that's why I also consider 3DMark coming for Windows 8 a really good thing.
If some manufacturers are releasing underpowered hardware, it will be really easy for customers to notice that: Those tablets will fare very badly in 3DMark.

There are quite a few synthetic benchmarks available in the embedded space as we speak and while they all can produce useful information and help detect weaknesses they cannot deliver a good picture for anyone's buying decisions. I for one used 3dmark in all of my PCs and for a couple of reviews I had written in the past but it never influenced my conclusions or buying decisions.

Synthetics are already there to measure embedded devices and while it definitely won't hurt to have one more, it's not that it'll change anything significantly in the grander scheme of things. All smart-phones and tablets that will run win8 in the future will inevitably run times slower than any other higher end devices that specific 3dmark will be able to run on. What it'll probably help for is for large part of the public to finally understand how to categorize in terms of performance in strict analogy to power consumption.

Other than that we still need framecounters in mobile games for embedded devices. If we're talking about 3D performance it's the right spot to seek answers from and not any sort of synthetics, since you obviously can't play with the latter.

 

[pjbliverpool]

This is going to be really interesting. Brilliant move by Futuremark, 3d Mark will be very relevant again once this is released.

I can't wait to see the ARM vs x86 benchmarks. There are bound to be some very suprised people regardless of the outcome.

 

[mczak]

Agreed. Too many recent laptops have bad quality displays, and all cheap desktop displays are still based old TN panel technology.

On the desktop you can actually get fairly cheap eIPS displays. Samsung also had a cPVA display which was even cheaper (really competing with the cheapest TN monitors), though it seems they no longer make any cPVA panels (too bad not only were they cheap they also blew the charts in the (static) contrast category).

 

[Deleted member 13524]

3DMark coming to Android

3DMark Benchmark coming to Android

3DMark® Benchmark Coming to Android™

Companies Invited to join Futuremark® Benchmark Development Program to Create the First Industry Standard Gaming Performance Benchmark for the Android Platform

HELSINKI--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Futuremark®, the world leader in performance benchmarking software, today announced that it has started development of 3DMark® for Android™ (working title), with the aim of bringing the industry standard gaming performance benchmark to Android powered tablets in 2012. Companies involved in the manufacture of Android powered devices are invited to join Futuremark's Benchmark Development Program to play a critical role in the development of 3DMark for Android, from initial specification to final delivery. http://www.futuremark.com/bdp/

Research groups such as Gartner and IDC are predicting explosive growth for tablets in the coming years. Undoubtedly games will be one of the key drivers of this growth as the performance and power of these lightweight devices improves. Fierce competition between Android devices means hardware manufacturers and their suppliers will need an objective, impartial and forward-looking performance reference to enable their engineers to deliver competitive products.

Jukka Mäkinen, CEO of Futuremark said,

"Since 1998, the PC industry has relied on 3DMark to accurately measure gaming hardware performance. In 2012 we will bring 3DMark to the Android platform with a professional grade benchmark that can be trusted by manufacturers, suppliers and vendors to provide the definitive measure of gaming performance on Android while showcasing the very best in real-time graphics and effects."

Dedicated benchmarking software provides industry engineers and press reviewers with the tools to produce consistent results that are repeatable, reliable and relevant. 3DMark is a purpose built benchmark for measuring gaming performance. It uses bespoke workloads designed specifically to stress test graphics hardware and highlight bottlenecks in the system.

3DMark for Android (working title)

- Measures gaming performance using rendering, CPU and physics tests.

- Stunning real-time graphics pushing the OpenGL ES API to the limit.

- Complementary online service to compare results between devices.

- Results will be comparable with 3DMark for Windows 8.

- Currently in development, expected to be released in 2012.

The Benchmark Development Program (BDP) is a Futuremark initiative for building partnerships with hardware and technology manufacturers. The BDPs for 3DMark for Windows and PCMark include companies such as AMD, NVIDIA, Intel, Imagination Technologies, Dell and HP. An open process of close co-operation with BDP members results in high-quality benchmarks that reliably provide consistent, vendor-neutral results to the benefit of both the industry and consumers.

So not only will 3DMark for Windows 8 be able to compare between ARM and x86 solutions, 3DMark for Android will allow us to see which OS (Win8 vs. Android) provides less overhead and/or has better optimized drivers.
Bets are on!

 

[Ailuros]

I'd be very surprised if a linux kernel based OS would have a bigger overhead than windows. Interesting tidbit nonetheless.

 

[Dominik D]

I'd be very surprised to see Win8 having bigger overhead than Linux.

 

[pjbliverpool]

Most exciting 3DMark in many years!

 

[Deleted member 13524]

A year and 2 months after the announcement, here comes the new 3dmark:

http://www.futuremark.com/pressreleases/3dmark-gets-a-launch-date

February 4 is for PCs. Android, iOS and Windows RT is set for a couple of weeks afterwards (they will only be waiting for the stores' validation, probably).

Ice Storm is the test that will compare x86 and ARM devices all together. We can check videos and pictures from each test in futuremark's website.