3DsoundSurge: Audio benchmarks using Ziff-Davis Audio WinBench 99


	Mikael Hagén's Audio benchmarks using Ziff-Davis Audio WinBench 99

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Audio benchmarks using ZD Audio WinBench 99
Mikael Hagén Last revised on:1/6 - 99

DirectSound
Blue type denotes first place Red type denotes last place.

I didn't include headphones results since those were almost exactly the same as with 2 speakers on all cards both in DirectSound and DirectSound3D. The # of voices reported are the ones that the cards drivers reports as being supported in hardware and apparently they never exceed 32 in this benchmark even though several of these cards support more than 32 voices for DirectSound games and some also supports more than 32 streams for DS3D.

Soundcard	MX300	MX300	MX300	MX300	Live!	Live!
Driver version	2015	2015	2030 beta	2030 beta	Live!Ware 2.0	Live!Ware 2.0
Playback	2 speakers	4 speakers	2 speakers	4 speakers	2 speakers	4 speakers
8 bit/22 kHz Static #of voices	32	32	32	32	32	32
8 voices	0,941	1,09	0	0	0,297	0,421
16 voices	1,6	1,72	0	0	0,243	0,469
32 voices	3,17	3,34	0,0381	0,0418	0,312	0,462
8 bit/22 kHz Streaming #of voices	32	32	32	32	32	32
8 voices	0,933	1,11	0	0	0,248	0,488
16 voices	1,6	1,75	0	0	0,309	0,481
32 voices	3,16	3,34	0,028	0,0374	0,284	0,42
16 bit/44.1 kHz Static #of voices	32	32	32	32	32	32
8 voices	1	1,75	0,0437	0,0725	0,325	0,428
16 voices	1,9	2,04	0,174	0,185	0,304	0,492
32 voices	4,92	5,09	0,286	0,268	0,24	0,411
16 bit/44.1 kHz Streaming #of voices	32	32	32	32	32	32
8 voices	1,01	1,19	0,0512	0,0678	0,307	0,476
16 voices	1,83	2,04	0,102	0,149	0,235	0,419
32 voices	4,88	5,09	0,26	0,387	0,223	0,471

It's clear that the new Vortex2 reference drivers offers a significant speed increase and the difference between the MX300 and Live is really irrelevant for DirectSound since both are well below 0.5% in all cases. If you have a real slow computer (Pentium) you may notice a difference with the MX300 and other Vortex2 cards being the faster one but when it comes to numbers this low this benchmark isn't that accurate and changes from different test runs so it's hard to predict what would happen on a Pentium. The Live seems to be about twice as fast with 2 speakers as with 4 speakers but a 0.15% difference isn't something that should bother anyone.

Soundcard	Monster sound	Monster sound	WaveForce	4DWaveDX	368DSP	368DSP
Driver version	1.07	1.07	1031	.2025	1.25	1.25
Playback	2 speakers	4 speakers	2 speakers	2 speakers	2 speakers	4 speakers
8 bit/22 kHz Static #of voices	13	8	20	32	32	³²
8 voices	0	0,402	0,963	0,0693	0,436	0,409
16 voices	0,0548	0,733	1,4	0,0547	0,491	0,388
32 voices	0,798	1,41	2,21	0,0234	1,06	1,11
8 bit/22 kHz Streaming #of voices	13	8	20	32	³²	³²
8 voices	0	0,333	0,965	0,151	0,512	0,392
16 voices	0,0653	0,896	1,47	0,142	0,501	0,384
32 voices	0,879	1,51	2,19	0,107	1,19	1,09
16 bit/44.1 kHz Static #of voices	9	6	20	32	³²	³²
8 voices	0	0,158	1,34	1,28	0,567	0,376
16 voices	0,637	0,924	2,02	1,98	0,561	0,376
32 voices	2,09	2,31	3,68	3,61	1,21	0,384
16 bit/44.1 kHz Streaming #of voices	9	6	20	32	³²	³²
8 voices	0	0,684	1,34	1,28	0,494	0,354
16 voices	0,646	1,52	2,11	2,05	0,451	0,355
32 voices	2,1	2,93	3,72	3,5	1,17	1,25

These cards perform at a clearly slower level. Aztech's 368 DSP still has scores that are low enough that this should never be noticed on a reasonably fast computer and not much of an issue on slower computers either. The other cards perform quite well with 16 bit/22 kHz streams but with 44.1 KHz and more 8 streams you might see a slight decrease in framerates but it's clear that DirectSound streams are so fast there is no real reason to upgrade your soundcard unless you own an old ISA card.

Soundcard	4DWave-NX	4DWave-NX	YMF744	YM744	FM801	FM801
Driver version	2044	2044	2013	2013	2.03	2.03
Playback	2 speakers	4 speakers	2 speakers	4 speakers	2 speakers	4 speakers
8 bit/22 kHz Static #of voices	32	32	26	26	32	32
8 voices	0	0	0,981	0,988	0,633	2,08
16 voices	0	0	1,38	1,32	1	3,21
32 voices	0	0	2,19	2,22	1,73	5,68
8 bit/22 kHz Streaming #of voices	32	32	26	26	32	32
8 voices	0	0	0,994	0,994	0,729	2,06
16 voices	0	0	1,39	1,4	0,928	3,22
32 voices	0	0	2,13	2,16	1,75	5,68
16 bit/44.1 kHz Static #of voices	32	32	26	26	32	32
8 voices	0	0	1,29	1,36	1,39	2,56
16 voices	0	0	2,06	2,15	2,48	4,14
32 voices	0	0	3,84	3,9	4,35	6,82
16 bit/44.1 kHz Streaming #of voices	32	32	26	26	32	32
8 voices	0	0	1,29	1,37	1,32	2,62
16 voices	0	0	2,1	2,17	2,42	4,21
32 voices	0	0	3,77	3,85	4,54	6,82

Simply excellent scores for the 4DWave-NX. The YMF744 scores isn't great but not bad enough that it should be noticeable in a game. The FM801 score are clearly below average, at least the 4-speaker ones. It's an unusual big difference between 2 and 4-speaker mode and I don't have any idea why. As you will see on the next page the difference between 4-speaker stereo and 3D sound are very small. Headphone mode is a bit faster than the 2-speaker mode, about 0.5-1 CPU utilization.

DS3D benchmarks ->

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