🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <4j96jp$m7r@news.erie.net>, pce@moose.erie.net (Paul
Christenson) wrote:

> When are people going to learn that you can't directly compare benchmarks 
> across platforms?  Especially when the different systems use different 
> processor families?
> 
> For instance, Linux comes up with a "BogoMIPS" rating on bootup.  It's an
> indication of how fast Linux did some timing loops.  One friend's 486DX4-100
> has a BogoMIPS rating of 50.  Another friend's Pentium-133 also has a 
> BogoMIPS rating of 50.  Does that mean that the two machines are the same
> speed?  Of course not.
> 
> A friend of mine compiled up the BogoMIPS-determining code on a high end
> SGI machine.  The machine is overall about 10x faster than the DX4-100, 
> yet its rating was LOWER than that of the DX4.
> 
> Bottom line...  Benchmarks are useless between different platforms.

OK. Let's quit comparing computers. For that matter, the next time I need
to buy a car, I'll just buy the first one I happen to stumble
across--after all, you can't compare different cars. Gee, we don't need to
spend millions of dollars on elections either. How do you compare
candidates. We'll just assign a random number generator the task of
allocating votes.

You HAVE to compare platforms. How else are you going to make a decision.

All you've shown is that BogoMIPS is a lousy benchmark. If you use good
benchmarks, you get reasonably consistent performance stories. In general,
the best benchmark is to run the application the computer user will need
to use most often. The other benchmarks can be evaluated on how they
approximate real life performance.

Most of the standard benchmarks are at least self-consistent. That is, a
P-6 is faster than a P5 which is faster than a 486 and so on. They also
consistently show that a 604 is in the same league as a P6 and a 601 is in
the same league as a P5.  You could argue that finer distinction is
impossible, but to argue that benchmarks have no use is a silly argument,
IMO.

-- 
Regards,       Joe Ragosta

Copyright Joseph M. Ragosta, 1996. Non-exclusive, royalty free
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