Using X as a benchmark for 3D adapters.

The current demo of X can be run to safe a profile of the number of 
frames per second that it was able to render one cut scene of the demo in.

Since the different scenes use different amounts of resources (like 
transparent faces, vertices, renderstate changes) the differences
between the certain scenes can give you a pretty precise impression 
of what a 3d accelerator can do.

During a run of the "X-Demo" in benchmark mode, you can not forward
or rewind scenes like you can (with "space" and "B") in normal runs.
You should not stop the program otherwise during a benchmark run, or
you will influence the benchmark results.

When running the X demo in benchmark mode the AQC (automatic
Image quality control) will be turned off, to ensure that the framerates 
are comparable!

Results of the benchmark are of course dependent of the chosen
resolution. X currently defaults to 800*600 for ALL adapters.
This will change for the final game, since many older 3D 
accelerators will still deliver very good results with 
resolutions like 400*300 or 512*384.

To be able to not only compare the speed of the different cards
but also the image quality produced, you can turn on the 
screenshot capture option. If you have this option turned on
X will try to safe one screenshot per scene of the demo to 
the directory "c:\cap". This directory has to exist for capturing
to work!

The benchmarking results will be saved to the file "c:\xperf.txt".
You can use those numbers easily to import them into a spreasheet
program and generate charts to compare the results.

Do not safe screenshots in the same run you want to do 
a reliable benchmark. The saving will influence the speed 
of the program.

Also note that the 3D sound effects can slow down the overall
framerate too. So do not compare results with 3D sounds with to
results taken without soundeffects.

Feel free to print screenshots and results from X in any 
publications. But please mention the name of the game and 
the Egosoft homepage URL with it!
Please write us if you use and like X for the purpose
of testing 3D accelerators and stay tuned for the final
version of the game!

Keyboard: 
	"Esc"	- leave the demo
	"Space"	- skip to next scene (not in benchmark)
	"b"	- go back to last scene (not in benchmark)
	"F11"	- Graphic and 3D settings
	"F12" 	- Sound settings


For questions or bug reports contact: Bernd@egosoft.com