Futuremark is one of the best-known benchmark providers around. We use the
PCMark line to give us a sense of a computer’s overall capabilities and we’ve
found the 3DMark line to be a good indicator of gaming performance. The new
3DMark FireStrike test is designed to challenge even high-end systems.
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Futuremark PCMark 7 &
8
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Simulated Application
Performance
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PCMark
7 runs through the types of tasks your PC is likely to encounter during ordinary
home and office use. It tests the system’s graphics capabilities as well, but it
isn’t meant to be a gaming benchmark. Look at the
two PCMark benchmarks as an indicator of a system’s general usage performance.
Here we see more high scores from the Syber Vapor. PCMark 7 is known to favor systems that use SSD storage for the primary drive, and combined with the 16GB of DDR3-1600 RAM, Core i5 4690K CPU, and GeForce GTX 970 graphics card, the Syber Vapor was able to muscle its way to a score of 6,526.
We also ran the system through PCMark 8's various tests using the Accelerated mode when possible. These scores will be more meaningful when we amass a larger collection of systems to compare with, though on their own, these are very good metrics.
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| Futuremark 3DMark 11 |
| Simulated Gaming
Performance
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Although Futuremark’s
3DMark 11 has been around for several years, it still provides a good look at a
system’s gaming capabilities. It's also handy tool for benchmarking machines
that still run Windows 7. We ran this benchmark on the Performance preset, at
1280 x 720 resolution. If you download the free version of this benchmark, make
sure you're using the Performance preset to avoid comparing scores that were run
with different test configurations.
The Syber Vapor blows past previous generation gaming systems in 3DMark 11 and trails the Falcon Northwest Tiki by less than 1,000 points. What's remarkable about that is the Tiki is running a GeForce GTX Titan graphics card, which at one time sold for $1,000, just as the the Titan X does today. This benchmark underscores how rapidly the graphics market advances.
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| Futuremark 3DMark Fire Strike
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| Simulated Gaming
Performance
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The next test we
chose was Futuremark’s newest: 3DMark Fire Strike. This benchmark is designed
specifically for gaming PCs. Because Extreme mode is
geared towards systems that have multiple graphics cards in CrossFire or SLI
configurations, we opted for Normal mode, which runs at 1920 x 1080.
The same story plays out in 3DMark Fire Strike, only this time the Syber Vapor and Tiki trade blows for for first place, with the former taking pole position in Graphics test and the latter leading the way in the overall score.
