Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!apple!sun-barr!newstop!male!mutchler From: mutchler@zule.EBay.Sun.COM (Dan Mutchler) Newsgroups: comp.benchmarks Subject: Re: SPECmarks Message-ID: Date: 9 Nov 90 17:22:36 GMT References: <1990Nov9.012540.28546@aplcen.apl.jhu.edu> <4de7f24e.20b6d@apollo.HP.COM> Sender: news@male.EBay.Sun.COM Distribution: comp Lines: 33 In-reply-to: rehrauer@apollo.HP.COM's message of 9 Nov 90 16:14:00 GMT In article <4de7f24e.20b6d@apollo.HP.COM> rehrauer@apollo.HP.COM (Steve Rehrauer) writes: Yep, that's what it is. I'm told the SPEC members originally didn't want to provide a "boiled down" number, since, like most simplistic "bottom line" figures, it really doesn't give you an accurate picture of how the system performs across the range of tests. An unbalanced system might have huge swings across the various tests. The chart, which most glossy sales adverts omit, will show this. The "SPECmark" figure doesn't. However, it was inevitable that people would want to make comfortable "X to Y" comparisons, and at least "SPECmarks" are far, far less misleading than "MIPS". Well, maybe...If a the two systems X and Y have fairly balanced performance then the single number is reasonable, but a current example is the RS/6000. It comes in at 27 SPECmarks for the geometric mean, but that is due largely to fantastic floating point performance on vectorizable code. A user that does little floating point will find that the integer portion of the system is about 15 SPECmarks, making it much closer to its competitors. I agree with the original SPEC position. Look at all ten numbers and only use the ones that mean something to your application. The boiled down number can be just as misleading as MIPS. -- Dan Mutchler | ARPA/Internet: mutchler@zule.EBay.Sun.COM Sun Federal System Engineer | UUCP: ...!sun!mutchler -------------------------------------------------------------------------- There is no such thing as sanity. And that is the sanest fact. --Mark Knopfler