First post, by simonecuttlefish
Hi (my 1st post : )
I'm making up a DOSBox collection of DOS only PC scene demos for PC-BSD and was wanting to incorporate some kind of benchmarking software so users can test their Dosbox.conf settings internally.
I'm trying to set it up via a DOS menu system (working beautifully atm using either moo http://www.eiu.edu/~philos/retro/dos/menus.htm or access http://surf.to/AccessDosMenu. (newest access uses 800X600 vesa mode that mongrels up the mouse unfortunalty in PC-BSD/Xwindows, but it funtions well from keyboard. I didn't want the uses to have to learn DOS to play the demos initially, but will encourage them out of the GUI slowly : )
There are dozens of DOS video benchmarks about but most tend to test memory read/writes, and in the "real world" of emulation, this is meaningless - the important thing is how long it takes to display a certain number of frames, not virtual writes to virtual memory locations on virtual hardware : )
I've tried the old 3dbench and 3dbench2 programs (with the spinning computer and 3d text bouncing about), but it's really not that good for what I want, seems more CPU than video related and doesn't really stress video functions.
The "perfect" program seems to be doom19s (shareware doom latest), as when it completes a timedemo it terminates and spits out collectable text (via >filename.txt), but it is not redistributable bundled with other software : (
Hexen demo (or was it heretic? one of them) didn't have these redistribution hastles, BUT.. (always a but), their -timedemo demo# function does not sync video, so it's effectively useless : (
Quake1 is also OK as you can -condebug out the results, but not redistributable.
I can work around the redistribution thing, but it would be very nice to be able to include it. Can someone suggest anything that does the following (the more it does the better)
1) Does real world type tests: displays a known set of routines on the screen and times them (like MadOnion for DOS if there was such a thing : )
2) Would be GREAT if it displayed/dumped performance data either to the screen on exit, or to a file (not essential, but lovely as I can harvest the info on exit and display/store it for user comparative testing)
3) Allows redistribution: again not 100% essential but really a nice thing to have)
4) Even a piece of truly abandoned abandon-ware would do - either benchmarker or DOS game with performance tests.
There MUST be some old DOS software as freeware or redistributable shareware out there that fits the bill, but I have been gouging around old DOS software repositories for days now and still not found what I was looking for.
What do YOU guys use for performance testing?
Thanks.
