Dell XPS M1730 Mobile Gaming Notebook

Name: Dell XPS M1730 Mobile Gaming Notebook - Page 9
Brand: Dell

by Michael Lin — Monday, December 10, 2007, 03:45 PM EDT

Futuremark PCMark Vantage

Page 9: Futuremark PCMark Vantage

For our next round of benchmarks, we ran the complete Futuremark PCMark Vantage test suite. This is a relatively new addition to our testing toolbox that is proving to be an excellent overall assessment tool.

"The PCMark Suite is a collection of various single- and multi-threaded CPU, Graphics and HDD test sets with the focus on Windows Vista application tests. Tests have been selected to represent a subset of the individual Windows Vista Consumer scenarios. The PCMark Suite includes CPU, Graphics, Hard Disk Drive (HDD) and a subset of Consumer Suite tests."

Futuremark PCMark Vantage

'Memories', HDD and Communications

The PCMark Vantage "Memories" suite includes the following tests:

Memories 1 - Two simultaneous threads, CPU image manipulation and HDD picture import
Memories 2 - Two simultaneous threads, GPU image manipulation and HDD video editing
Memories 3 - Video Transcoding: DV to portable device
Memories 4 - Video Transcoding: media server archive to portable device

The XPS M1730 ended up in second to last in our first PCMark Vantage test. This is largely due to the fact that the M1730 was using DDR2-667 memory. The desktop systems had a significant advantage since they used much faster memory and it isn't surprising that the Core 2 E6600 system came in first place since it was the only one to use DDR3 memory.

The Vantage HDD suite includes the following tests:

HDD 1 - HDD: Windows Defender
HDD 2 - HDD: game HDD
HDD 3 - HDD: importing pictures
HDD 4 - HDD: Windows Vista start-up
HDD 5 - HDD: video editing
HDD 6 - HDD: Media Center
HDD 7 - HDD: Adding music to Windows Media Player

Naturally, the XPS M1730 is the fastest performer considering it is running a pair of 7,200 RPM drives in RAID0. The ASUS C90S demonstrates the kind of performance you can expect if you were to equip the M1730 without a RAID0 array. If RAID0 isn't fast enough for your taste, Dell also offers several solid state drive options for the XPS M1730.

Vantage Communications suite includes the following tests:

Communications 1 - Three simultaneous threads, Data encryption: CNG AES CBC, Data compression, Web page rendering: graphics content, 1024x768, windowed
Communications 2 - Three simultaneous threads. Web page rendering: open various news pages from IE 7 Favorites in separate tabs, close them one by one, Data decryption: CNG AES CBC, HDD: Windows Defender
Communications 3 - Windows Mail: Search
Communications 4 - Two simultaneous threads, Data encryption: CNG AES CBC, Audio transcoding: WMA -> WMA - to simulate VOIP

The XPS M1730 once again takes the top spot in the communications test. The M1730's powerful Intel Core 2 Extreme processor and superior hard drive speed gave it the advantage here.