Tom's Hardware Exclusive: Peacekeeper 2.0
We've been using Peacekeeper in the Web Browser Grand Prix since day one. To coincide with the publication of Web Browser Grand Prix 7, Futuremark, the creators of popular benchmarks like PCMark and 3DMark are releasing an open beta of the new and improved Peacekeeper.
If you've used Peacekeeper in the past, you may have noticed its tagline: The Browser Benchmark. The upcoming version will be known as The Universal Browser Test. While most other companies, projects, and individuals are creating new benchmarks specifically for the burgeoning mobile computing sector, Futuremark set out to create one online benchmark that can run on anything. The new Peacekeeper is designed to operate in any browser and on any device. From desktops and laptops to tablets and smartphones. Compare your Core i7 to your iPhone 4, or compare the Galaxy Tab to the MacBook Air.
This next-generation version covers all areas of testing that the current Peacekeeper handles, along with the latest HTML5 standards and features. Support for video codecs like H.264, Theora, and WebM are checked. WebGL and canvas also appear in the lineup.
Another nice feature Futuremark added to the new Peacekeeper is a detailed breakdown of the individual test results contained in the benchmark.
We decided to take the Peacekeeper beta for a spin on our Web Browser Grand Prix 7 test system. Google Chrome 14, Mozilla Firefox 7, Microsoft Internet Explorer 9, and Opera 11.51 all worked as expected. Unfortunately, Apple Safari 5.1 did not. Since Peacekeeper 2.0 is still a beta release, we won't hold that against either Apple or Futuremark.
Fortunately, we have a Hackintosh, and the new Peacekeeper beta works just fine on Safari for OS X. The chart below contains the results of our expeditionary benchmarks.
Obviously, we won't be tallying these results into the analysis tables of this article; this chart is just for fun. Anyone else interested in checking out the new open beta of the upcoming Peacekeeper benchmark can head on over there right now!