Date: March 13th, 2003.
Article by: Nathan Glentworth (Owner, Head Editor & Hardware Reviewer)
<--CLICK FOR DEALS ON SOFTWARE IN THE UNITED STATES
<--CLICK FOR DEALS ON SOFTWARE IN CANADA

BENCHMARKING COMPUTER #2

Again, the second computer consists of:

Via P4PB Ultra
Intel 2.4Ghz 533Mhz FSB
Nvidia Geforce 4 MX480 (8X AGP, NV18 Core, DX7 Compliant)
Detonator 41.09 Drivers
DirectX 8.1
256 Megs Crucial DDR333
Maxtor ATA-133 7200rpm 30 gig Drive
Windows 2000 Pro SP3
Via Hyperion 4.45 & 4.46 Chipset Drivers

Let's see if this system based on the exact same chipset (P4X400) performs the same way. The only difference is that I will not be able to run 3DMark 2003 seeing that I didn't install DirectX 9 on this particular computer because both I wanted to test the drivers with Directx 8 to see if there was any performance difference and the MX480 NV18 core is only DirectX 7 compliant.

Let's put the drivers through their paces.

PCmark 2002

Let's see the results on this particular board with the 4.45 drivers installed....

A respectable score seeing that I am using a slower CPU.

Now, as you can see, I lost 12 points in the CPU score, I gained a point in the memory score and my hard drive increased by 8 points. This is the kind of result I would be expecting, but seeing that the CPU score dropped a bit, I am still not happy.

3DMark 2001se

Let's see how the 3Dmark pans out.....

A baseline score with the 4.45's...

The result of the 4.46 installation is an increase of 16 3dmarks. A small increase like this is not what I was expecting and wouldn't even be noticeable during a game.

<--CLICK FOR GREAT PRICES ON COMPUTER SOFTWARE