How to Pick the Right AI Model?

Episode 32: How to Pick the Right AI Model | DeepSeek vs Qwen Evals

You've seen how an AI agent is built, configured, and given a job. But how do you know if the model behind it is right for the work?

In Episode 32 of System Prompt, Peter and Val close out their agent series with a live demonstration of AI evaluations, or "evals." Instead of trusting public benchmarks or model reputation, they test the tasks that matter to a real workflow.

Using smevals, they compare DeepSeek V4.1 Flash running locally across two NVIDIA DGX Sparks against Qwen 3.8 27B. Their tests cover structured data extraction, instruction following, reasoning, and coding.

The smaller Qwen performs surprisingly well. But the real lesson comes from unexpected failures: DeepSeek adds a timezone to an otherwise correct answer, while Qwen initially returns no output on a task it passes when rerun. Peter and Val examin