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What are the best Testing/Benchmarking Sites - Plus a little game for bonus points.

I've seen blogs where gamers and others talk about the scores they got on their machines. I'm assuming speed is the main thing they are testing and benchmarking. I've run Fresh Device and my system benchmarks well on there but I want to know what sites are out there to really test my machine and to make sure there no real weaknesses. I'm not looking to win the top score for the best gaming machine, just to see if I'm getting the most out of what I have. I'm asking this because some of the posts say they score very low and can't figure out why because they added this or that upgrade. Here is a brief layout of my system, so if you recommend a site and know what it testing for, I'd be glad to get a guess as to where you think my system should score. I'll split the points as best I can for all posters with bonus points going to those guess at scores and come within 10% (based on the actual) of the actual (did that make sense). For non numeric results, guesses must be exact. If you need any more info before making your post let me know. I'll choose the winner (officail accepted answer) based on a combination of what I think is the best link and how close you come to guessing the score. All other good links will get points and an assist as long as I don't run out of points (which I don't think I will), then it will go to the first posters. Bonus points too to anyone that sees something that could be improved with my current setup (again I'll give more info if needed) Ready, set, post.......

Operating System System Model
Windows XP Professional Service Pack 2 (build 2600) MSI MS-7220 100
(MY INSERT) Motherborad is MSI K8N Diamond Plus
(MY INSERT) PSU Antec SmartPower 2.0 SP-500 ATX12V 500W Power Supply 115/230 V TUV, UL, CUL, CE, CB, FCC
Enclosure Type: Desktop
Processor a Main Circuit Board b
2.40 gigahertz AMD Pentium 4
256 kilobyte primary memory cache
2048 kilobyte secondary memory cache Board: MSI MS-7220 100
Bus Clock: 200 megahertz
BIOS: American Megatrends Inc. 080012 12/14/2005
Drives Memory Modules c,d
620.10 Gigabytes Usable Hard Drive Capacity
444.84 Gigabytes Hard Drive Free Space

LITE-ON DVDRW SHM-165H6S [CD-ROM drive]
PLEXTOR DVDR PX-716AL [CD-ROM drive]
3.5" format removeable media [Floppy drive]

ST3120023A [Hard drive] (120.03 GB) -- drive 0, s/n 3KA11DVW, rev 3.33, SMART Status: Healthy
ST325082 3A USB Device [Hard drive] (250.06 GB) -- drive 2
WDC WD2500KS-00MJB0 [Hard drive] (250.06 GB) -- drive 1, s/n WD-WCANK3228075, rev 02.01C03, SMART Status: Healthy 3072 Megabytes Installed Memory

Slot 'DIMM0' has 1024 MB (serial number SerNum0)
Slot 'DIMM1' has 1024 MB
Slot 'DIMM2' has 1024 MB
Slot 'DIMM3' has 1024 MB
Local Drive Volumes

c: (NTFS on drive 1) 250.05 GB 211.90 GB free
d: (NTFS on drive 0) 119.99 GB 49.83 GB free
h: (NTFS on drive 2) 250.06 GB 183.11 GB free

DISABLED Marks a disabled account; LOCKED OUT Marks a locked account

Lexmark C510 PS3 on USB001
Controllers Display
Standard floppy disk controller
NVIDIA nForce4 Parallel ATA Controller
NVIDIA nForce4 Serial ATA Controller (2x) NVIDIA GeForce 7900 GT [Display adapter] (2x)
Default Monitor
DELL 2007FP [Monitor] (20.2"vis, s/n C9536659249S, May 2006)
Bus Adapters Multimedia
Silicon Image SiI 3132 SATALink Controller
Standard Enhanced PCI to USB Host Controller
Standard OpenHCD USB Host Controller Sound Blaster Live! 24-bit
Communications Other Devices

abpowell

ASKER

Also big bonus if somebody sees something in there that a hacker could use against me. I tried to delete all personal info but I could have missed something.

Callandor

> 2.40 gigahertz AMD Pentium 4

Where are you getting this info? It cannot be an AMD and a Pentium! That board supports socket 939 Athlon64's, AthlonFX's and Opterons.

For overall video and cpu scoring, 3DMark05 is the test many use, though it is a synthetic benchmark. The tests that run through actual games and count the framerate are real world benchmarks, which you can find on TomsHardware.com.

It's obvious that you have a no holds barred system, if the 2.4GHz refers to an AthlonFX or Opteron cpu and you have two 7900GT's in SLI. I won't post any guesses about your scores, since they should be in the top 5% or you have wasted your money.

Your hard drive is the one area that doesn't seem exceptional. If you're going for the brass ring, why not get a RAID-0 array with Raptor drives? Keep in mind when using RAID-0 to have a ready backup at all times. If you want top bragging rights, an overclocked Opteron 148 running at 3GHz would be essential. Someone here has one running at 3.4, which I believe is the fastest I've heard yet.

Callandor

You also have 4GB installed, which is a waste, since your system only sees 3GB. You also give up a little on RAM latency when you operate 4 modules, as opposed to 2.

ASKER CERTIFIED SOLUTION

Gary Case

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JohnnyCanuck

Are you a black male living in Baltimore, MD?

abpowell

ASKER

I'm not sure why Belarc reads my cpu that way, I did forget to change that but everyone is correct. It's an AMD Athlon 64 X2 4800+ Toledo 2000MHz HT 2 x 1MB L2 Cache Socket 939 Dual Core Processor. I found out too late about the extra GB of RAM but that is the first I've heard that it would slow things down. Would all agree that a set of 512s would be the best?

Other things like the psu are because I started trying to upgrade an older (dell) machine to run video editing software and finally just said forget it and built a new one. Plus I asked that question before but also asked the question because I was worried about heat. Since then I have installed three fans, one in front (on HDD0) one internal (on HDD1) and one in the rear between the graphics cards. Brought temp down about 20 degrees so I may look into a new hard drive which brings up another question but I better put that on another post, lest I get a hand slapping. I'll post the pointer on here for anyone interested.

abpowell

ASKER

A couple more comments.

Callandor: >I won't post any guesses about your scores, since they should be in the top 5% or you have wasted your money.< I'm trying to make sure I haven't.

JohnnyCanuck >Are you a black male living in Baltimore, MD?< What the?????? No

Callandor

Just remove a pair of modules and see if you like 2GB. Unless you're running huge PhotoShop files or multitasking like crazy, you shouldn't miss the extra 1GB.

Gary Case

There are two memory issues: If you have memory that overlaps the system address space, there is a slight (typically one clock cycle) delay when addressing the system elements in that range. The difference in performance is very minimal, but if you're trying to squeeze every bit out it can make a difference. The second is that with unbuffered modules, some boards will add 1/2 cycle to the CAS latency if you're using 4 modules. This is because the added load on the bus destabilizes the waveform, and is done for stability reasons. I didn't check your manual for this -- but Callandor indicated you "... give up a little on RAM latency when you operate 4 modules ..." so I presume he did (Callandor -- did you confirm this, or was it an assumption ??). In any case, if you simply remove two modules and use 2GB you will definitely get the maximum memory performance. If you add 2 512mb modules, you'll "see" a full 3GB -- and gain the performance of the additional memory, but may slightly slow down the access. Whether that slight slowdown is offset by the benefits of the additional GB of memory depends on the specific application mix. It would be very interesting to see your benchmark results run both ways :-)

Gary Case

... I looked up your motherboard's notes r.e. memory population: if you use single-sided modules you can install four modules with no reduction in latency/speed. If you are using double-sided modules there will be a reduction if you install four modules. In fact, it doesn't just reduce the CAS latency, but slows the memory down to DDR333 speed. So if you want to maximize both memory and speed, you need to use 2 x 1GB single-sided modules and 2 x 512mb single-sided modules.

Here's the specific comment from MSI:

The Maximum memory speed decreases when the following two memory combination is selected:
- Each channel is installed with two double-sided memory module
- Both DIMM1 and DIMM3 are installed with double-sided memory module

Gary Case

... bottom line: If your current modules are double-sided, I would just use two of those and settle for 2GB. If they are single-sided, you may want to add 2 single-sided 512mb modules.

abpowell

ASKER

I am running xp pro and as stated previously upgraded to this system primarily for video editing. So I was trying to get all the RAM I could squeeze in. If somebody had a 250 GB chip out there I probably would have bought it. Is there a big difference between the 512 set and a 1 GB chip?

Gary Case

... on the other hand ==> if you're satisfied with the system's performance, just leave the memory you already have installed :-)

SOLUTION

Callandor

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Callandor

If I were a little faster, I would actually post it BEFORE Gary ;-)

abpowell

ASKER