SAN DIEGO, July 30, 2003 - SPEC/GPC's Application Performance Characterization (SPECapc) project group today released the first benchmark to measure total system performance based on real-world use of Maya® 3D animation and effects software. Free downloads of the benchmark and initial performance results are available on this web site.

SPECapc for Maya 5 was developed by Alias in cooperation with SPECapc. It includes four scenarios created in Maya 5 that enable users to evaluate scene drawing and playback performance, CPU-intensive operations, and standard I/O performance.

Each of the four models - a werewolf, human hand, insect and squid - are rendered and displayed in the five different modes used in Maya 5: wireframe, Gouraud-shaded, texture, texture highlighted with a wireframe mesh, and texture selected (texture with wireframe mesh and control points). The benchmark is unique in its ability to test performance for large texture sizes and multiple viewports.

"We are pleased to work with SPECapc to provide a service to the Maya user community," says Rob Hoffmann, senior Maya manager at Alias. "Animators worldwide now have a standardized tool for realistically evaluating performance for the many different hardware systems that run Maya 5."

SPECapc for Maya 5 joins standardized SPECapc benchmarks for 3ds max, Pro/ENGINEER, SolidWorks, Solid Edge and Unigraphics applications. The non-profit SPECapc group works with independent software vendors to develop benchmarks based on popular digital content creation (DCC), CAD/CAM and visualization applications.

SPECapc is a project group of the Graphics Performance Characterization (GPC) Group, which in turn is part of the Standard Performance Evaluation Corp. (SPEC). SPEC is a non-profit corporation formed to establish, maintain and endorse a standardized set of relevant benchmarks that can be applied to the newest generation of high-performance computers. SPEC's membership includes computer hardware and software vendors, leading universities, and research facilities worldwide.

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Maya is a registered trademark of Silicon Graphics, Inc., exclusively used by Alias Systems, a division of Silicon Graphics Limited.

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