Benchmarking Performance: CPU Web Tests

One of the issues when running web-based tests is the nature of modern browsers to automatically install updates. This means any sustained period of benchmarking will invariably fall foul of the 'it's updated beyond the state of comparison' rule, especially when browsers will update if you give them half a second to think about it. Despite this, we were able to find a series of commands to create an un-updatable version of Chrome 56 for our 2017 test suite. While this means we might not be on the bleeding edge of the latest browser, it makes the scores between CPUs comparable.

All of our benchmark results can also be found in our benchmark engine, Bench.

Mozilla Kraken 1.1: link

Kraken is a  Javascript based benchmark, using the same test harness as SunSpider, but focusing on more stringent real-world use cases and libraries, such as audio processing and image filters. Again, the basic test is looped ten times, and we run the basic test four times.

Web: Mozilla Kraken 1.1 on Chrome 56

With the newer high-performance cores, AMD gets a fair crack at benchmarks like Mozilla, where it historically lagged behind with its Bulldozer-family architecture.

Google Octane 2.0: link

Along with Mozilla, as Google is a major browser developer, having peak JS performance is typically a critical asset when comparing against the other OS developers. In the same way that SunSpider is a very early JS benchmark, and Kraken is a bit newer, Octane aims to be more relevant to real workloads, especially in power constrained devices such as smartphones and tablets.

Web: Google Octane 2.0 on Chrome 56

In recent years, Intel has made strides on its Octane performance. So even with cores and threads, and the sizable jump up from Kaveri, AMD is still behind on this test.

WebXPRT 2015: link

While the previous three benchmarks do calculations in the background and represent a score, WebXPRT is designed to be a better interpretation of visual workloads that a professional user might have, such as browser based applications, graphing, image editing, sort/analysis, scientific analysis and financial tools.

Web: WebXPRT 15 on Chrome 56

Benchmarking Performance: CPU Rendering Tests Benchmarking Performance: CPU Encoding Tests
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  • haplo602 - Tuesday, February 13, 2018 - link

    Finally one review where I can see the driver version ... So this is the same driver used also for the Ryzen mobile APUs. Can you check if you can force/manual install the latest Adrenaline drivers ? That works on some of the Ryzen 2500u chips and actually increases the performance by some 15+% ...
  • haplo602 - Tuesday, February 13, 2018 - link

    I hope there's a memory scaling article in the future with frequency and CL scaling for the APU part ...
  • crotach - Tuesday, February 13, 2018 - link

    What about HTPC use?

    I was considering GT 1030 + Intel route for H265 and HDR10 playback and was really looking forward to Zen APUs, but there doesn't seem to be any motherboards with HDMI 2.0?!

    Also, I wonder if the chips can be undervolted and underclocked to bring them to a near silent noise level for the living room.
  • Lolimaster - Tuesday, February 13, 2018 - link

    You can undervolt and underclock ANY intel or amd cpu.
  • forgerone - Tuesday, February 13, 2018 - link

    What most writers and critics of integrated graphics processors such as AMD's APU or Intel iGP all seem to forget, is not EVERYONE in the world has a disposable or discretionary income equal to that of the United States, Europe, Japan etc. Not everyone can afford bleeding edge gaming PC's or laptops. Food, housing and clothing must come first for 80% of the population of the world.

    An APU can grant anyone who can afford at least a decent basic APU the enjoyment of playing most computer games. The visual quality of these games may not be up to the arrogantly high standards of most western gamers, but then again these same folks who are happy to have an APU also can not barely afford a 750p crt monitor much less a 4k flat screen.

    This simple idea is huge not only for the laptop and pc market but especially game developers who can only expect to see an expansion of their Total Addressable Market. And that is good for everybody as broader markets help reduce the cost of development.

    This in fact was the whole point behind AMD's release of Mantle and Microsoft and The Kronos Group's release of DX12 and Vulkan respectively.

    Today's AMD APU has all of the power of a GPU Add In Board of not more than a several years back.
  • krazyfrog - Tuesday, February 13, 2018 - link

    Why did you leave out the 8400 and the 1500X in these comparisons?
  • Kamgusta - Wednesday, February 14, 2018 - link

    Because these CPUs, while having the same price range, outperform these Raven Ridge chips. That would have been a bad press for AMD and it seems like Anandtech wants to remains extremely loyal to AMD in these days.
  • msroadkill612 - Tuesday, February 13, 2018 - link

    "the data shows both how far integrated graphics has come, and how far it still has to go to qualify for those 'immerse experiences' that Intel, AMD, and NVIDIA all claim are worth reaching for, with higher resolutions and higher fidelity. "

    This assumes a static situation which is rot.

    what it reveals is that in the current paradigm, coders have coded accordingly for satisfactory results. If the paradigm changes and other ways work better, then code evolves.

    This unprecedented integration of new gen, sibling cpu & gpu, offers many performance upsides too for future code.

    picture a mobo with a discrete gpu like an equivalent 1030, then picture a ~matchbox footprint apu - there is a huge difference in the size of the respective circuits - yet they both do the same job & have to send a lot of data to each other.

    it's not hard to figure which is inherently superior in many ways.

    I strongly disagree with your blinkered bias.
  • Pork@III - Tuesday, February 13, 2018 - link

    There is something unfinished, something inconsolable.
  • elites2012 - Tuesday, February 13, 2018 - link

    anything this chip lost to intel at, was most likely outdated. adobe, fcat, dolphin, pov are all outdated benchmarks.

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