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Category: Web-based testing

WebXPRT 3 is here!

We’re excited to announce that WebXPRT 3 is now available to the public. BenchmarkXPRT Development Community members have been using a community preview for several weeks, but now anyone can run WebXPRT 3 and publish their results.

As we mentioned on the blog, WebXPRT 3 has a completely new UI, updated workloads, and new test content. We carried over several features from WebXPRT 2015 including automation, the option to run individual workloads, and language options for English, German, and Simplified Chinese.

We believe WebXPRT 3 will be as relevant and reliable as WebXPRT 2013 and 2015. After trying it out, please submit your scores and feel free to let us know what you think. We look forward to seeing new results submissions!

How to submit results for the WebXPRT Processor Comparison Chart

The WebXPRT 2015 Processor Comparison Chart is in its second month, and we’re excited to see that people are browsing the scores. We’re also starting to receive more WebXPRT score submissions for publication, so we thought it would be a good time to describe how that process works.

Unlike sites that publish any results they receive, we hand-select results from internal lab testing, end-of-test user submissions, and reliable tech media sources. In each case, we evaluate whether the score is consistent with general expectations. For sources outside of our lab, that evaluation includes checking to see whether there is enough detailed system information to get a sense of whether the score makes sense. We do this for every score on the WebXPRT results page and the general XPRT results page.

If we decide to publish a WebXPRT result, that score automatically appears in the processor comparison chart as well. If you would like to submit your score, the submission process is quick and easy. At the end of the WebXPRT test run, click the Submit button below the individual workload scores, complete the short submission form, and click Submit again. The screenshot below shows how the form would look if I submitted a score at the end of a WebXPRT run on my personal system.

WebXPRT results submission

After you submit your score, we’ll contact you to confirm the name we should display as the source for the data. You can use one of the following:

  • Your first and last name
  • “Independent tester,” if you wish to remain anonymous
  • Your company’s name, provided that you have permission to submit the result in their name. If you want to use a company name, we ask that you provide your work email address.


We will not publish any additional information about you or your company without your permission.

We look forward to seeing your score submissions, and if you have suggestions for the processor chart or any other aspect of the XPRTs, let us know!

Justin

Glimpses of the next WebXPRT

Development work on the next version of WebXPRT is well underway, and we think it’s a good time to offer a glimpse of what’s to come.

We’ve updated the photo-related workloads with new images and are experimenting with adding a new task to the Organize Album workload. The task utilizes ConvNetJS, a JavaScript library designed for training neural networks within the browser itself, to assign classifications to a set of images. It’s an example of the type of integrated deep learning tasks that will be showing up in all sorts of devices in the years to come.

We’re also testing an additional task in the Local Notes workload using Tesseract.js, a popular OCR (optical character recognition) engine. Our scenario uses OCR technology to scan images of purchase receipts and gather relevant information.

We’re testing these new tasks now, and will include them only once we’re confident that they produce consistent and reliable results without extending the benchmark’s runtime unnecessarily.  Consequently, the next WebXPRT might contain variations of these tasks, or other new technologies altogether. We mention them now to offer some insight into the types of workload enhancements that we’re considering.

We’ve been working hard on the new WebXPRT UI as well. The image below shows the new start page from an early development build. We’re still making adjustments, so the final product will probably differ, but you do get a sense of the new UI’s clean look.

WebXPRT screen shot

As we’ve said before, we’re committed to making sure that WebXPRT runs in most browsers and produces results that are useful for comparing web browsing performance across a wide variety of devices. We appreciate the feedback we’ve gotten so far, and are happy to receive more. Do you have ideas for the next WebXPRT? Let us know!

Justin

Introducing the WebXPRT 2015 Processor Comparison Chart

Today, we’re excited to announce the WebXPRT 2015 Processor Comparison Chart, a new tool that makes it easier to access hundreds of PT-curated, real-world performance scores from a wide range of devices covering everything from TVs to phones to tablets to PCs.

The chart offers a quick way to browse and compare WebXPRT 2015 results grouped by processor. Unlike benchmark-score charts that may contain results from unknown sources, PT hand-selected each of the results from internal lab testing and reliable tech media sources. If we published multiple scores for an individual processor, the score presented in the chart will be an average of those scores. Users can hover over and click individual score bars for additional information about the test results and test sources for each processor.

WebXPRT proc chart capture

We think the WebXPRT Processor Comparison Chart will be a valuable resource for folks interested in performance testing and product evaluation, but the current iteration is only the beginning. We plan to add additional capabilities on a regular basis, such a detailed filtering and enhanced viewing and navigational options. It’s also possible that we may integrate other XPRT benchmarks down the road.

Most importantly, we want the chart to be a great asset for its users, and that’s where you come in. We’d love to hear your feedback on the features and types of data you’d like to see. If you have suggestions, please let us know!

Justin

WebXPRT in 2017

Over the last few weeks, we’ve discussed the future of HDXPRT and BatteryXPRT. This week, we’re discussing what’s in store for WebXPRT in 2017.

WebXPRT is our most popular tool. Manufacturers, developers, consumers, and media outlets in more than 350 cities and 57 countries have run WebXPRT over 113,000 times to date. The benchmark runs quickly and simply in most browsers and produces easy-to-understand results that are useful for comparing web browsing performance across a wide variety of devices and browsers. People love the fact that WebXPRT runs on almost any platform that has a web browser, from PCs to phones to game consoles.

More people are using WebXPRT in more places and in more ways than ever before. It’s an unquestioned success, but we think this is a good time to make it even better by beginning work on WebXPRT 2017. Any time change comes to a popular product, there’s a risk that faithful fans will lose the features and functionality they’ve grown to love. Relevant workloads, ease of use, and extensive compatibility have always been the core components of WebXPRT’s success, so we want to reassure users that we’re committed to maintaining all of those in future versions.

Some steps in the WebXPRT 2017 process are straightforward, such as the need to reassess the existing workload lineup and update content to reflect advances in commonly used technologies. Other steps, such as introducing new workloads to test emerging browser technologies, may be tricky to implement, but could offer tremendous value in the months and years ahead.

Are there test scenarios or browser technologies you would like to see in WebXPRT 2017, or tests you think we should get rid of? Please let us know. We want to hear from you and make sure that we’re crafting a performance tool that continues to meet your needs.

Bill

Ending the year with a bang!

As we promised in the blog post The newest member of the family, we made the WebXPRT 2013 community preview available this week. It has already been used in a review! The AnandTech review of the Acer Iconia W510 includes results from the WebXPRT 2013 community preview for that device and for the Microsoft Surface RT and the Apple iPad 4. The review has results from the TouchXPRT 2013 community preview for the Acer Iconia W510, Microsoft Surface RT, and the ASUS VivoTab RT as well.

Obviously, we’ve been doing some testing ourselves. Here’s a sampling of the devices on which we’ve successfully run WebXPRT:

Device Processor Operating system Browser Score Confidence interval
HP Envy 2 1.8 GHz Intel Atom Z2760 Windows 8 Internet Explorer 10.0.92 201 +/- 6
Asus VivoTab RT 1.2 GHz Tegra 3 T30L Windows RT Internet Explorer 10.0.92 160 +/- 5
Kindle Fire 1.2 GHz ARM Cortex-A9 Android OS 2.3 (customized: 6.3.1_user_4107720) Safari 5 92 +/- 2
ASUS-made Google Nexus 7 1.2 GHz Tegra 3 T30L Android 4.2 Chrome 18 201 +/- 4
Motorola DroidX phone 1 GHz TI OMAP3630-1000 Android 4.5.621 Browser version 2.3.4 26 +/- 1
iPhone 5 1.3 GHz Apple A6 iOS 6.0.2 Safari 6 168 +/- 2
iPad mini 1GHz Apple A5 iOS 6.0.2 Safari 6 110 +/- 1
iPad 4 1.4 GHz Apple A6X iOS 6.0.1 Safari 6 180 +/- 2

 

As the results above show, WebXPRT can run on a wide range of devices. We are working to get results on lots of different devices and would like your help. We’ll set up a forum thread for results that starts with these. We’ll then add additional ones we produce. Please respond in the thread with results you get.

In addition to performance results, the WebXPRT 2013 community preview also provides a report on the HTML 5 capabilities of your device. For those who want to know more about the capabilities of HTML 5, there’s more good news. The W3C community released the feature-complete spec for HTML 5 and Canvas 2D this week.

You can find an explanation of scenarios in the WebXPRT 2013 community preview, and an explanation of how it calculates its results in the WebXPRT 2013 CP1 Overview. Let us know what you think. There’s still time to help us shape the final version of both WebXPRT 2013 and TouchXPRT 2013.

Eric

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