How we test
We wanted to push this month’s group of laptops to their limits using benchmarks that would test their capabilities across a range of creative applications, along with the kind of workloads we’d expect workstation-class computers to be able to run. We still ran the laptops through our standard PC Pro benchmarks, which represent common image-editing, 4K video transcoding and multitasking workloads, but also an additional suite of tests, including:
Cinebench R20: Maxon’s 3D rendering benchmark tests PC performance in CPUintensive ray tracing workloads. It incorporates the newest rendering technologies in Maxon Cinema 4D, and is built to make the most of multithreaded processors and the latest features of Intel and AMD architectures.
V-Ray Next: The V-Ray Next benchmark tests both CPU and GPU-accelerated 3D rendering using V-Ray’s advanced rendering engine, as used in Hollywood blockbusters, architectural visualisations, advertising and more.
OctaneBench: This is a GPU benchmark, testing GPU 3D rendering performance using Otoy’s OctaneRender engine. The current version uses Nvidia’s CUDA tech, so it only runs on Nvidia GPUs, but the next version is expected to use the Vulkan API and run on AMD GPUs as well.
Premiere Pro: We test perform performance in Adobe’s leading video-editing application appl using Puget System’s PugetBench benchmark. This tests live playback playbac and export performance across a range of codecs at 4K resolutions, along with performance when previewin previewing and rendering demanding CPU and an
GPU effects.
SPECwpc: Designed and developed by the SPEC Workstation Performance Characterization group, this sprawling benchmark measures the key aspects of workstation performance using tests based on a wide selection of professional applications. We’ve narrowed down our testing to cover the Media and Entertainment, Product Development, Financial Services and GPU Compute categories of tests, along with the
Storage ge subsystem tests.
Shadow of the Tomb Raider: Crystal Dynamics’ last Tomb Raider game relies heavily avily on multithreaded CPU performance and d GPU horsepower. We run it at the Highest ighest preset at 1080p, with RTX ray tracing racing effects turned off.
AS SSD: Finally, we tested the performance of each of the laptops’ SSD drives using the respected AS SSD benchmark enchmark tool.