Still, Intel is optimizing this path in DX7 with SSE, and provided us a DLL, not presently available to the public, that uses SSE clipping operations for DX6, so we could see how much better the Intel chips might perform. Our Transform and Lighting subtest showed the Athlon to have the most efficient code overall, and especially for handling the added clipping with guardband off. Photoshop Tests Red type denotes first place. Bus speed ZD FPU WinMark 99 High scores are best. ZD 3D WinMark 99 High scores are best.
Low scores are best.
We also used Adobe Photoshop 5.0.2 to help measure floating-point performance with the Lighting Effects filter and SSE performance with the Twirl filter. Photoshop's filters take static graphics, apply the filter, and quickly redraw the image to the screen. We made sure the file sizes were small enough to fit entirely in memory so as not to involve the disk. Since the CPU does the filter calculations and the Lighting Effects filter contains significant FPU code, it's a valuable tool in measuring FPU performance with a real application. The Athlon processors took the top three spots.