Futuremark adds Sky Diver test to 3DMark

June 12, 2014 | 11:01

Tags: #3dmark #benchmark #directx-11 #madonion

Companies: #futuremark

Benchmarking giant Futuremark has released its latest offering, a DirectX 11 test called 3DMark Sky Diver and designed with gaming laptops and mid-range systems in mind.

Available as a free update to all 3DMark users across all editions of the benchmark suite, Sky Diver is designed as a lighter-weight alternative to the company's existing Fire Strike gaming test. 'Fire Strike is equivalent to testing a system with a modern DirectX 11 game on ultra-high settings,' the company explained in its announcement on the release, '[while] Sky Diver is more like running a game on normal settings.'

Sky Diver includes a rolling demo, two graphics tests, a physics test and a combined test. The first of the GPU-based graphics tests concentrates on tessellation performance and uses a forward lighting method, while the second test looks at pixel processing using a compute shader-based deferred tiled lighting approach. The physics test, meanwhile, is designed to put pressure on the system's CPU, while the combined test targets both.

For those running Nvidia hardware in their rigs, however, there's a caveat: 'While testing the 3DMark Sky Diver benchmark, Nvidia discovered an issue where some of their GPU configurations would render a black screen during benchmarking,' the graphics giant has warned of the new benchmark. 'Nvidia has since solved the issue for these configurations and will be including the fix with their next driver instalment coming early next week.' Those eager to get started can install the 335.23 WHQL driver to receive an early fix, the company has claimed.

The demo, sponsored by Asus, is reproduced below, while the Sky Diver benchmark itself can be downloaded from the official website as part of the 3DMark suite.


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