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Phoronix Test Suite Basics
Phoronix Test Suite : les bases
How do you compare apples and oranges? Comparing Windows to Linux really is a bit like comparing an apple and an orange; they’re members of the same thing (operating systems), but quite different once you work with them.
Comment comparer des pommes et des oranges ? Comparer Windows à Linux revient à comparer des pommes et des oranges : ils relèvent du même ensemble (systèmes d'exploitation), mais ils sont radicalement différents lorsqu'on travaille avec.
As a system builder who builds both, I’ve always wanted to find some way to measure the performance of both. Windows has lots of benchmarking tools, 3DMark, Prime95, PCMark, Passmark, Novabench and SiSoft Sandra to name a few. Linux too has several benchmarking tools, bonnie++, glmark, httest, etc. But comparing Windows benchmarks to different Linux benchmarks just doesn’t work well.
Construisant des systèmes sur la base des deux, j'ai toujours recherché un moyen commun pour mesurer leurs performances. De nombreux outils d'évaluation des performances existent sous Windows tels que 3DMark, Prime95, PCMark, Passmark, Novabench et SiSoft Sandra, par exemple. Linux a également son lot de logiciels de mesures de performances : bonnie++, glmark, httest, etc. Mais comparer les mesures des outils Windows aux mesures des différents outils Linux n'est pas pertinent.
Enter Michael Larabel’s Phoronix Test Suite (PTS). Phoronix Test Suite is a cross-platform benchmark and testing suite that runs on Windows, Linux, Mac OS X and the BSD operating systems.
C'est là qu'entre en jeu Phoronix Test Suite (PTS) de Michael Larabel. Phoronix Test Suite est une suite logicielle multiplateforme effectuant des mesures de performances sous Windows, Linux, Mac OS X et les systèmes d'exploitation BSD.
I used PTS to benchmark 2 systems, a HP 6710b dual core notebook running Linux Mint 14 MATE (64-bit edition), and a Phenom 4 core desktop running Ubuntu 12.04 (32-bit edition).
J'ai utilisé PTS pour comparer deux systèmes : un portable HP 6710b dual core sous Linux Mint 14 MATE (64-bit edition) et un PC de bureau Phenom quadri core sous Ubuntu 12.04 (32-bit edition).
PTS is available in the Ubuntu software repositories, but the version in Ubuntu 12.04 was out-of-date, so I opted to download directly from the Phoronix Test Suite download site: http://www.phoronix-test-suite.com/?k=downloads
PTS est disponible dans les dépôts officiels Ubuntu, mais la version sous Ubuntu 12.04 était dépassée. J'ai donc choisi de la télécharger directement du site du concepteur : http://www.phoronix-test-suite.com/?k=downloads
If you choose to open with Ubuntu Software Centre, you may get a message about the software being poorly packaged. It should run just fine if you continue to install it. Hopefully the packaging will be cleared up in the future.
Si vous choisissez de l'ouvrir avec la Logithèque Ubuntu, vous aurez peut-être un message de mise en garde sur la qualité des paquets. Cela devrait malgré tout fonctionner si vous continuez l'installation. Espérons que les paquets soient nettoyés prochainement.
The Phoronix Test Suite has a massive amount of tests covering everything from Disk to System to Graphics to Processor to Memory to Network. Tests can take from a few minutes to a few hours to download and run.
Phoronix Test Suite comporte de nombreux tests couvrant tout : disque, système, affichage, processeur, mémoire, réseau. Les tests peuvent prendre de quelques minutes à plusieurs heures entre téléchargement et exécution.
Part of the beauty of the Phoronix Test Suite is its simplicity. It’s a bit like the Drupal content management system in that you can pick what you want to install and run. PTS can also download and run a suite of tests (the cpu suite, for example), but be prepared for a long wait as some suites contain 25+ tests.
Un part de ce qui fait le charme de Phoronix Test Suite est sa simplicité. C'est peu comme le système de gestion de contenu de Drupal au sein duquel vous pouvez piocher ce que vous voulez installer et exécuter. PTS peut aussi télécharger et exécuter une série de tests (la série processeur, par exemple), mais préparez-vous à une longue attente car certaines séries comportent plus de 25 tests.
Installing from the PTS website puts an icon in the unity dash. That icon can be used to launch PTS, but since PTS is primarily a command line tool, it’s easier just to run the command: phoronix-test-suite
L'installation depuis le site internet de PTS place une icône dans le tableau de bord d'Unity. Cette icône peut être utilisée pour lancer PTS, mais puisque PTS est avant tout un outil en ligne de commande, il est plus simple d'exécuter la commande :
phoronix-test-suite
Running phoronix-test-suite lists the arguments PTS takes. To see the list of tests available run: phoronix-test-suite list-available-tests
L'exécution de phoronix-test-suite liste les arguments utilisés par PTS. Pour lister les tests disponibles, exécutez :
phoronix-test-suite list-available-tests
Be patient, PTS may take a minute or so to download the list of tests the first time.
Soyez patient : PTS peut prendre environ une minute à télécharger cette liste de tests pour la première fois.
Tests are not installed by default, so you’ll need to install a test. In this example, we download the bork file encryptor processor test: phoronix-test-suite install bork
Les tests ne sont pas installés par défaut : vous aurez donc besoin d'installer un test. Dans cet exemple nous allons télécharger le test du processus d'encodage de fichier sous Bork.
Be patient, downloading and installing some of the tests can take time. During that time the computer may appear to be doing nothing, but your hard drive lights should show activity.
Soyez patient : télécharger et installer certains tests peut prendre du temps. Durant cette période l'ordinateur semble ne rien faire mais le témoin d'activité de votre disque dur devrait prouver le contraire.
To run a test, use the run argument along with the name of the test: phoronix-test-suite run bork In the case above, we run the bork test, which would have been previously downloaded.
Bork ran relatively quickly taking just over 4 of the estimated 7 minutes on our Phenom-based quad-core test machine. PTS outputs test results as a number which can be opened as a graph in a browser and uploaded to http://openbenchmarking.org/ – the open, collaborating benchmarking site also developed by Phoronix.
What makes PTS and openbenchmarking.org even more useful is the ability to compare results. Thousands of participants have uploaded their results from various tests to the openbenchmarking.org site. If you have PTS installed, you can compare your system with an already benchmarked system by running: phoronix-test-suite benchmark and the name of the system/bench following the result in the URL.
Earlier, I mentioned it was possible to run a suite of tests; phoronix-test-suite list-available-suites lists the suites of tests available. I installed and ran the cpu suite of tests on a dual core HP 6710b notebook running Linux Mint 14, then I ran phoronix-test-suite benchmark 1212094-SU-CPUSUITE444 on the AMD Phenom based desktop to compare the exact same suite of tests. Running the command on a new system automatically downloads and installs the same tests installed on the old system. The results on the new system are then compared against the old system. 1212094-SU-CPUSUITE444 is the name that openbenchmarking.org assigned the initial test system. Part of the name, CPUSUITE, is based on the name I initially gave the test on the HP notebook. Better to name your tests something more useful like HP6710b2GBRAM, something that better reflects the system that the test is being run on.
In our comparison the dual core notebook actually beat the four core desktop on 3 of the 25 tests.
The full results of the tests and complete specifications for each system can be seen on the openbenchmarking.org web site at: http://openbenchmarking.org/result/1212094-SU-CPUSUITE444/
Speaking about specifications, the phoronix-test-suite is also useful as a tool for getting information about your system. If all you want to do is find out system information, you can do it without downloading any additional tests - by running: phoronix-test-suite system-info To get detailed system information run: phoronix-test-suite detailed-system-info
This covers most of the basics of the phoronix test suite. PTS is capable of much more if your needs are greater. If you’re managing a lot of systems Phoronix also offers commercial support for the Phoronix test suite. More information about commercial support is available on the Phoronix Test Suite site: http://www.phoronix-test-suite.com/?k=commercial
Phoronix creator Michael Larabel also maintains http://www.phoronix.com/ where he has written hundreds of articles about Linux support on the latest hardware.