3DMark Vantage

INTRODUCTION TO 3DMARK VANTAGE

Few benchmarks have had such an impact amongst gamers as the 3DMark benchmarks from Futuremark. Whether it is to verify that you are getting the expected performance out of your system or to brag about how fast your system is, 3DMark has always been the benchmark to use.

As the last version came out 2 years ago many gamers have been anxiously waiting for a new version that more accurately can test today’s cards and today it is finally here: 3DMark Vantage.

3Dmark Vantage is the latest in a long line of video card benchmarks from Futuremark. Just as its predecessors its main goal is to test your video card in a variety of tests created to push the video card as much as possible. In addition to the video card tests it also has some pretty nifty CPU tests in it.

WHAT DO YOU NEED TO RUN 3DMARK VANTAGE?

Earlier versions of 3DMark had one default setting which yielded an “official” score. With 3Dmark Vantage Futuremark has chosen to instead give us 4 different presets which all will yield an official score. Let’s first look at the general requirements of all presets:

Processor
Requirement: SSE2 support
Recommendation: A dual-core processor with performance equivalent to Intel Core 2 Duo E6600, AMD Athlon X2 6000+, or higher

Graphics Card
Requirement: Fully DirectX10-compliant graphics hardware

System Memory
Requirement: Windows Vista minimum requirement
Recommendation: 2 GB or more

Hard Disk
Requirement: 1 GB of free hard disk space

Operating System
Requirement: Windows Vista with Service Pack 1

As you can see this benchmark, just as PCMark Vantage requires Windows Vista. In the review guide, from where these requirements are taken from, it does say Service Pack 1 as a requirement for Vista but in the actual benchmark it just says Windows Vista.

In additions to the above requirements each preset also has some special needs:

• Entry - 128MB DX10 Video Card and a monitor capable of displaying 1280x1024 resolution.
• Performance - 256MB DX10 Video Card and a monitor capable of displaying 1280x1024 resolution.
• High - 512MB DX10 Video Card and a monitor capable of displaying 1680x1050 resolution.
• Extreme - 512MB DX10 Video Card and a monitor capable of displaying 1920x1200 resolution.

I’m sure not everyone will be able to run the benchmark with the High or Extreme presets but it is nice to have some “official” presets that push the cards even further.