PCMark 8 v2.0 Update Released To Everyone Today

By Nathan Kirsch

Futuremark has made the PCMark 8 v2.0 update available to all users today. The Steam version of PCMark 8 will update automatically, the standalone version will prompt you to download and install the update. The update improves the Home, Creative and Work benchmarks with new tests using popular open source applications for image processing, video editing and spreadsheets. Futuremark added a wider variety of workloads to the Work benchmark to better reflect the way PCs are used in enterprise environments. And for Professional Edition users, the Storage benchmark has been expanded with two new options that enable specialist analysis of drive performance. This official update is PCMark 8 version 2.0.191 and the accompanying release notes are below.

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New in PCMark 8 version 2.0.191
This is a major update that adds new tests and workloads. Scores from the Home, Creative and Work benchmarks in PCMark 8 v2.0.191 are not comparable with scores from v1.2.157 or other previous versions. This update adds a new Compatibility Mode setting to the Professional and Advanced Editions that enables you to run older versions of each test for times when you need to compare scores with historical benchmark results.
These notes are a summary of the changes in this update. Please read the PCMark 8 Technical Guide for detailed descriptions of the new tests and workloads.
Home benchmark
  • Home updated to version 3.0. Scores should not be compared with previous versions.
  • New Photo Editing test using the open source ImageMagick library and a wider variety of image processing operations.
  • Video Chat test now features improved face detection and performance. The test has been updated to use OpenCV 2.4.7.
Creative benchmark
  • Creative updated to version 3.0. Scores should not be compared with previous versions.
  • Photo Editing test using the open source ImageMagick library and a wider variety of image processing operations.
  • Video Editing part 2 now uses source material in 4K UHD resolution (3840×2160).
  • Video Group Chat test now features improved face detection and performance. The test has been updated to use OpenCV 2.4.7.
Work benchmark
  • Work updated to version 2.0. Scores should not be compared with previous versions.
  • Work version 2.0 adds a new Spreadsheet test and includes the Video Chat test to provide more varied and representative workloads for office and enterprise use.
  • New Spreadsheet test using LibreOffice Calc, a part of the open-source productivity suite from The Document Foundation.
  • Added Video Chat test to the benchmark.
Storage benchmark
  • Storage updated to version 1.1. Scores are comparable with previous versions.
  • Added Expanded Storage tests for specialist analysis of drive performance, (PCMark 8 Professional Edition only).
Compatibility Mode
  • Compatibility Mode enables you to run the Home, Creative and Work benchmarks from version 1.2.157 for instances when you need to compare scores against historical result data, (PCMark 8 Professional and Advanced Editions only).
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