Category: Benchmarking

Finally!

on March 26, 2015

We’re releasing the community preview of WebXPRT 2015 tomorrow. We’re very excited that it’s finally here. In the past few weeks, we’ve discussed some of the new features in WebXPRT 2015, such as test automation, its new and improved tests, and its Chinese UI. We think you’re really going to enjoy the new WebXPRT.

The design document (login required) specifies that WebXPRT will contain an experimental workload. That workload is not in the community preview, although we plan for it to be in the general release. However, because any experimental workloads are not included in the overall score, this will not affect any results you generate.

We’re also investigating the use of the JavaScript navigator object to improve system disclosure, but we are still determining if we can get reliable enough information to display. So this information is not displayed in the community preview.

As with all the BenchmarkXPRT community previews, we’re not putting any publication restrictions on this preview release. Test at will, and publish your findings. We guarantee the results for the community preview will be comparable to results from the general release.

If you’re not a community member, join us and check out the new WebXPRT.

Eric

Posted in Automation, BenchmarkXPRT development community, Chinese, Collaborative benchmark development, Community Preview, WebXPRT, WebXPRT 2015 |

More power, more control

By Eric Hale

on March 19, 2015

As I said last week, the community preview for WebXPRT 2015 is coming up soon. One of the changes that will be exciting to anyone who does a lot of testing is that we made it simpler to automate WebXPRT tests.

WebXPRT 2015 will let you automatically select any set of tests you want to run. However, as always, you must run the entire suite of tests to get an overall score. Although the community preview will not include any experimental tests, the automation includes control for those future tests as well.

You may choose from several output formats: HTML table, XML, and CSV, or you can download the results as a text file.

Using the automation is simple: you just append the desired test parameters to the end of the URL. The format allows you to mix and match a lot of options, while still being very concise. The details will be in the release notes.

As people who test a lot of devices, we are very excited about this new capability.

Eric

Posted in Automation, BenchmarkXPRT development community, Collaborative benchmark development, Community Preview, Future of performance evaluation, Performance benchmarking, WebXPRT, What makes a good benchmark? |

It’s been a show to watch!

By Eric Hale

on March 5, 2015

Mobile World Congress 2015 (MWC) has been happening this week in Barcelona. There have been lots of cool phones and tablets, of course, but also there has also been a lot of other cool stuff. From smart watches, foldable keyboards, and 200 GB SD cards to “privacy glasses,” electric bicycles, and even furniture from IKEA, this has definitely been a show to watch.

As you know, Bill is our man in Barcelona. If you read Bill’s blog, you know he lives for this sort of stuff. He’s also been meeting with vendors and having great conversations about the XPRTs.

Last week I mentioned that Bill took a great-looking handout to MWC with him. For those who have been wondering what a megaphone had to do with anything, here’s what the front and back look like.

Even though MWC hasn’t ended yet, we’re already deep into preparations for Intel Developer Forum 2015 – Shenzhen. We’ll have more to say about that in the weeks to come.

In other news, we released a new build of BatteryXPRT 2014, v103. The build fixes a problem reported by a reviewer testing the LG G3. Scores from this build are comparable with previous BatteryXPRT scores. Click here for more details.

Eric

Posted in Android, Battery life, BatteryXPRT 2014 for Android, BenchmarkXPRT development community, Mobile World Congress, Trade Shows |

An updated BatteryXPRT 2014 build is available

By Eric Hale

on March 4, 2015

Today we’re releasing a new build of BatteryXPRT 2014 (v103) at BatteryXPRT.com and the Google Play store. The build fixes a problem reported by a reviewer testing the LG G3. The device was going to sleep during the performance test, and causing BatteryXPRT to crash after waking up. We’ve seen this problem only on the LG G3, but it may occur on other devices as well.

The new BatteryXPRT build prevents the device from entering a sleep state. Scores from this build are comparable with previous BatteryXPRT scores.

Click here to download the new BatteryXPRT installer (318 MB) directly from our site.

For users who have limited bandwidth or trouble accessing the Google Play store, downloading the APK files (16.9 MB total) may make installation easier.

Download the updated BatteryXPRT APK (2.7 MB) directly from our site.

Download the updated BatteryXPRT Tests APK (14.2 MB) directly from our site.

If you have any questions about the update or any other XPRT-related topic, feel free to contact us at BenchmarkXPRTsupport@principledtechnologies.com.

Posted in Android, Battery life, BatteryXPRT 2014 for Android, Performance testing on tablets |

An updated MobileXPRT 2013 build is available

By Eric Hale

on February 20, 2015

Today we’re releasing a new build of MobileXPRT 2013 (b93) at MobileXPRT.com and the Google Play store. The build fixes a problem reported by a reviewer testing the LG G3. The device was going to sleep during the performance test, and causing MobileXPRT to crash after waking up. We’ve seen this problem only on the LG G3, but it may occur on other devices as well.

The new MobileXPRT build keeps the screen active during the run. Scores from this build are comparable with previous MobileXPRT scores.

Click here to download the new MobileXPRT installer (250 MB) directly from our site.

For users who have limited bandwidth or trouble accessing the Google Play store, downloading the APK files (16.9 MB total) may make installation easier.

Download the updated MobileXPRT APK (10.3 MB) directly from our site.

Download the updated MobileXPRT UX Tests APK (7.6 MB) directly from our site.

If you have any questions about the update or any other XPRT-related topic, feel free to contact us at BenchmarkXPRTsupport@principledtechnologies.com.

Posted in Android, BenchmarkXPRT development community, MobileXPRT, Performance benchmarking, Performance testing on tablets |

Staying Awake

By Eric Hale

on February 19, 2015

Here in the Eastern US, we’re in a deep freeze. Wherever you are, I hope you’re comfortable and safe.

Tomorrow, we’ll be releasing a patch to MobileXPRT. This patch fixes a problem first reported in a Tom’s Hardware review of the LG G3. The reviewer was not able to get MobileXPRT to run to completion on that device. We looked at the problem and found that the LG G3 was going to sleep during the performance test, and that when the device woke up, MobileXPRT caught an exception and crashed. This problem appeared to be specific to the LG G3, but could occur on other devices as well.

When we changed MobileXPRT to keep the screen active during the run of the app, the benchmark ran on LG G3 without any issues. We’ve tested this fix on our entire test bed and found that it works well. As always, the results remain comparable with previous versions.

We’ve made the same change in BatteryXPRT and are testing it now. Testing BatteryXPRT takes more time than testing MobileXPRT, but we hope to release the patch soon.

In other news, Bill is going to Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, March 2-4, and he would love to meet you. If you are also planning to go, let us know.

Eric

Posted in Android, Battery life, BatteryXPRT 2014 for Android, Mobile World Congress, MobileXPRT |

Category: Benchmarking

Finally!

More power, more control

It’s been a show to watch!

An updated BatteryXPRT 2014 build is available

An updated MobileXPRT 2013 build is available

Staying Awake

Check out the other XPRTs: