Steve,
Does it do what you want it to do in a reasonable amount of time? If
yes, then don't worry about it.
I generally consider benchmarks to be mostly fluff. They can very
easily be thrown off, and they cause undue stress on end users. For
example, if you have a shiny brand new system, and it benchmarks at
1275.2 (just to pick a number). You might see another user with a
similar configuration out there that gets 1350. This might make you
feel bad, but the Real World performance difference is most likely so
little that you wouldn't even notice it with a stopwatch, let alone
visually be able to tell the difference between the two. One system
probably runs a given application fractions of a second faster than
another. At the same time, some benchmarks just run better on certain
hardware and combinations of hardware than others. This can skew
perception as well. That said, of the benchmarks that are out there, I
don't think SiSoft is all that bad. Norton Utilities used to include
some interesting tools as well. I've always considered time trials and
FPS tests to be better tests of a system. Try encoding some MP3s or
video, and check your time in doing so against some other systems in
doing the same task. In addition, fire up some games, such as Unreal or
anything else recent, and check your frame rates against some others.
These are about as silly as benchmark numbers, but at least have real
world applications.
Lastly, I'm curious, if you sprung for all that really high end
hardware, why the slow EIDE drive instead of Serial ATA, and why the old
crusty sound card instead of a shiny new Audigy 2?
Ed
Steve wrote:
> Hi,
>
> What benchmarking utilities would give me a good overview of my computers
> performance level and alert me to sub-par operation for the given hardware
> configuration?
>
> My system is as follows:
>
> Pentium 4 Processor at 2.8GHz with 800MHz front side bus
> 1 GB DDR 400MHz SDRAM (2 DIMMs)
> 128MB DDR ATI Radeon 9800 with TV-Out Video Card
> 16X DVD-ROM
> 200 GB EIDE Hard Drive (WD2000JB)
> 48X CD-RW Drive
> 56Kbps Data/Fax Modem
> Sound Blaster Live! Digital Sound Card
>
> Thanks for the help.<!-- ~MESSAGE_AFTER~ -->
>> Stay informed about: Basic benchmarking 
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