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Futuremark Releases 3DMark for Windows RT

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3DMark for Windows RT is now available, just days ahead of the Surface 2 release.

Futuremark said on Monday that 3DMark for Windows RT is now available as a free app in the Windows Store. This version includes the same benchmarks tests as the Android and iOS editions including Ice Storm, Ice Storm Extreme and Ice Storm Unlimited. This release should help make accurate cross-platform benchmarking "easy and fast," the company claims.

Ice Storm is a DirectX 11 feature level 9 benchmark that includes 720p Graphics tests designed to stress graphical (GPU) performance and a Physics test to stress processing (CPU) performance. Ice Storm Extreme raises the Graphics tests to 1080p and uses higher quality textures and post-processing effects for a more demanding load. Ice Storm Unlimited is designed to test the raw performance of the underlying hardware.

News of 3DMark's release on Windows RT arrives after Futuremark updated the Professional Edition of PCMark 8 that enables Windows 8.1 and Internet Explorer 11 compatibility, introduces new options for testing OpenCL, and adds detailed hardware monitoring graphs. This version also uses a new installer, meaning users should manually uninstall both PCMark 8 Professional and SystemInfo using Add/Remove Programs in the Windows Control Panel before installing the updated version.

New to PCMark 8 Professional are interactive graphs that show hardware monitoring data from each benchmark run. The Home and Creative benchmarks now offer a choice of run modes, and progress windows have been improved to show an estimated time for each test. SystemInfo has been updated to v4.21 for improved compatibility with the latest hardware, and scans that are supposedly at least 50 percent faster.

"While this update only applies to PCMark 8 Professional Edition, the good news is that it clears the way for PCMark 8 Basic and Advanced, which we now expect to release within the next couple of weeks," reads the company's news blog.

The Professional Edition of PCMark 8 costs $1495 and can be purchased here. 3DMark for Windows RT can be downloaded directly from Microsoft's Windows Store here.

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4 Comments Comment from the forums
  • dozerman 15 October 2013 20:29
    Isn't this kindof pointless, considering there is only one company that even produces RT computers?
    Reply
  • kyuuketsuki 15 October 2013 20:44
    11726383 said:
    Isn't this kindof pointless, considering there is only one company that even produces RT computers?
    Futuremark was probably pretty much done with porting the benchmark before all the OEMs dropped RT. Besides, it still makes a good cross platform benchmark to compare the performance of the Surface 2 versus Android/iOS tabs.

    Also, considering that Microsoft plans to merge Windows Phone and WinRT in the next couple of years, WinRT isn't going away just because Microsoft (and Nokia, though really that's just Microsoft again) is the only one producing WinRT tabs. Also, it's quite possible OEMs may pick up RT again in the future.
    Reply
  • somebodyspecial 15 October 2013 22:14
    I prefer REAL GAMES with benchmarks in them, than this synthetic junk that is easily cheated. I wish they would just go to direct game tests only for testing gpu type stuff. But yes, RT is dead. Until MS starts selling Surface in Ipad like numbers, it's over. Nobody will rejoin a 900mil loss machine.
    Reply
  • photonboy 16 October 2013 02:58
    I think RT will disappear now that Intel is capable of producing energy efficient x86 chips. How did they not figure RT would be a fail? It looks like Windows 8 x86 but can't run x86 software. It's expensive.

    I know they had to compete with Apple, but how did they not see this was a really bad idea. They should have put in a slightly heavier battery and had an x86 tablet from the start rather than go down the RT path that EVERYBODY knew was a bad idea.
    Reply