3DMark 2000 is a DirectX 7 based synthetic benchmark. Pretty much every video card on the market will support the features tested in here, and by now, advanced graphics cards are no longer going to be the bottleneck.

3DMark 2000 should be a good test to indicate gaming performance in most DirectX games available today. We are just starting to see games using advanced DX8.1 functions, however, and as more people own cards such as the Radeon 8500 and GeForce 3, we are going to see more very soon. Until then, 3DMark 2000 lives on.

In an older benchmark like this, the score is going to be rather tight with a single step up.  As I said, the video card is NOT the bottleneck here, so the faster CPU has a chance to shine.  Lets have a look at the newer 3DMark, used with our shiny GeForce 3 Ti500...

MadOnion 3DMark 2001: SE

3DMark 2001 SE is a DirectX 8 based benchmark, and makes use of such advanced features as vertex shaders, pixel shaders, point sprites, and various forms of bump mapping. If you don't have a GF3 or Radeon 8500, stay home kids.  We used the latest version, "Second Edition" which adds not much new as far as I can tell... There is a single new test (unfortunately not as pretty as the others).

Even less of an increase than 3DMark 2000! Raw computing power isn't quite as important as a fast video card when it comes to this test.  Unfortunately, even with pretty much the fastest CPU in existence, and a damn fast video card, I am still nowhere near making the top 20 Fastest Webmasters on MadOnion's GamersHQ... Maybe I'll see what I can do about that after playing with the frontside bus a bit ;)

Vulpine GLMark

Similar to 3DMark, GLMark is a demo-based video benchmarking system. Unlike 3DMark, it uses OpenGL rather than DirectX. It supports some advanced OpenGL functions, and some GeForce 3 specific functions. Unlike 3DMark, GLMark gives a final score based on framerate and has no theoretical tests.  Finally, unlike 3DMark, GLmark looks like crap, and is really boring to watch.

The margin is getting slimmer and slimmer... But before you go asking "why did they bother making this CPU" let's get to some more benchmarks first...

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