14 DAY TRIAL // Futuremark is well known for two things: its ability to produce capable benchmark software but also for its major patch released. And that is not a bad thing after all because instead of releasing a new version of the benchmark, they patch the original product in order to bring it up to date. That may sound unimportant but it actually means a lot when you thing about the fact that hardware and software world changes all the time.
This time, Futuremark has released a bunch of patches for all its benchmarking products, including the PCMark suite. It seems the company took some time to ensure that its products are Vista capable but they also tried to correct a few bugs in the source code of the benchmark routines, most of them regarding incompatibility issues and erratic behavior when the benchmarks were run under some specific hardware configurations.
3DMark06, 3DMark05 and PCMark05 have all been updated. 3DMark 2005 has jumped from version 1.02 to version 1.10 while 3DMark 2005 has now been updated from the 1.20 version to the 1.30 version. Futuremark says that all its benchmarks are Vista ready, excepting 3DMark 2005. Users can download the full version of the new benchmarks but they can also choose to download just the patches containing the updates.
As a result of the patches, users of the Basic (free) editions will now be also able to view and compare their scores online. A new service called "Result Analyzer" could turn out to be one of the key elements regarding Futuremark's upcoming products. Unfortunately, the company did not say anything regarding the launch of a new DirectX 10 ready benchmark.