Guidelines for Thoroughly Testing System Stability

[Jrjy3]

Introduction to the Concept of Stability

Many people these days are running their overclocked machines without testing for stability carefree, unaware of the dangers and crashes that may fall upon them in the future.

I'm writing this guide for everybody, even people who already know the process of stability testing. Those that already know how to test for stability can use this post simply as a reference in case you need something in the future. Do not use this post as a rulebook, but use it as an extremely good guideline to try to follow when stability testing your computer.

The goal I have is to have every single overclocker know the dangers of not stability testing your machine and for them to know how to do it properly.

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Why is Stability Important?

Your computer is a tool, made to help you in performing many different tasks, whether it's playing a game, listening to music, or writing a thirty page report on Post-Modern Existentialism.

While running, your computer is stressing itself. It can be working very hard or barely at all, depending on what you're doing with it. Your tool is seeing some use; as a screwdriver is used to screw things in, your computer is performing many different processes. If your hardware isn't stable, it will make a mistake sooner or later. Your very expensive screwdriver is either going to crack, or it will shatter and land on your toe.

Without trying to scare anyone, that mistake could happen while you're performing some vital task such as defragmenting your hard drive or while you're typing up that thirty page report on Post-Modern Existentialism that you've been working on for the last three months (That should be backed up anyway).

That mistake could cost you every bit of data on your hard drive.

Basically, if your computer hasn't been stability tested, it's very possible it isn't stable, and it is going to mess up at the wrong moment. After all, Murphy's Law states that what can go wrong will go wrong.

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Overclocking and Stability

Stability isn't only important for people who overclock their hardware, it's important for everyone, even if you're using stock hardware. Even though you're more likely to be stable if you're using stock hardware, things can still happen. However, over clockers are at far greater risk because of the changes they make to their hardware.

When we overclock, we push the limits of how fast are hardware can run. We add strain to our hardware even with everyday processes, and we drastically increase the chances of having a setup that is unstable, even if everything looks fine on the surface (or desktop if you will).

Almost everybody has had some experience with instability: trying for the extra speed step, and getting a crash, or getting artifacting after overclocking our video card. Generally, more voltage, less speed, or better cooling fixes the problem. Underneath though, the potential for instability still exists as you can never be positive how stable your setup is until you've tested it thoroughly.

The potential for instability is a very important concept that many people disregard. Many people think that if it looks good on the surface and runs well on a light gaming session or benchmarking session, then it's probably ok.

This mentality is similar to someone looking at quicksand. Quicksand looks solid on the surface. Unknown to the observer however, quicksand is all mushy, to some degree, underneath the surface (underneath = a processor doing complex processes). The dangerous quicksand and the perfectly save sand by the beach both look the same from a surface perspective.

What Can I Do?

You don't have to do all that much. All you have to do is take a little bit of time and test your machine thoroughly. You can poke the suspicious looking sand with a big long stick, and see if it's safe to walk across or not. This is where we move away from the awareness-raising scare tactics and extremely clever metaphors, and move towards actual techniques involving three really awesome pieces of software that can be used to stability test your machine thoroughly.

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Proper Stability Testing Methods

Honestly, stability testing isn't very complicated. Knowing that your computer is at risk for being unstable is more than half the battle.

Following are three programs which I live by when it comes to testing your hardware for stability.

The three programs are Prime95, 3DMark, and memtest86. All three programs are small programs that are free and easily accessible to anyone with internet access. Respectively, these programs focus on stress testing your CPU, your GPU, and your RAM.

There are tons of other stress testing programs which are also effective - when it comes to these, it's all about using what you feel is necessary and thorough. Some of the many programs that stress test your machine I'm not going to talk about are fairly effective substitutes for the ones which I am going to talk about.

However, if you skip any of the "big three" - CPU, GPU, and RAM - you really aren't being thorough enough. Three programs, one that focuses on CPU, one that focuses on GPU, and one that focuses on RAM, need to be used, because individually, they do not provide reliable results.

One important thing si the factor of general system stability at manufacturer settings. Before overclocking or tweaking your machine, one should ensure that all hardware is operating properly. Overclocking an unstable machine and then stress testing it, finding errors, and spending hours troubleshooting a problem inherent to some faulty component, isn't something anyone wants to go through. Sometimes a component is faulty to begin with, and needs to be replaced.

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The Following Testing Procedure Is Thorough, but not Decisive. Why?

Instability isn't always dictated by CPU, GPU, or Memory processing errors as a result of overclocking or heat. Instability can also be a result of different components failing.

When overclocking, we add strain to our computer PSU, requiring a higher output from that PSU. This can compromise the consistency of a unit's voltage outputs if it is putting out more volts that recommended. Especially when a high power draw overclocked machine is being used, low voltage rails often compromise stability, even when no processing errors or faults are occurring with other hardware within the computer. Such instability will manifest itself through errors during the following testing procedures, and might even appear to be problems with the CPU, GPU, or RAM. If your machine seems to be unstable, it is important to rule out the PSU by testing it with a load using a voltmeter to read the PSU's output voltages while stress testing the computer with the same test that previously generated errors. If readouts are normal (normal being that they don't fluctuate or droop when the test load is applied), the PSU can be generally ruled out as the source of error.

The integrity of your motherboard is more difficult to pinpoint, but can be usually ruled out by researching known issues with the board or testing things that would usually crash the system without the CPU, GPU or RAM overclocks. These variables include things such as overvoltages, BIOS revisions, and general frequency changes independant of CPU, GPU, or RAM clock speeds.

Sometimes an external device, such as a wireless USB adaptor or a printer can create conflicts, either by hardware or software, that can make a machine unstable. However, when this happens, it is easy to find the source of error. For example: if you add a new device and your machine starts crashing every five minutes, and the errors go away when the device is removed, then you can tell the cause of the errors through simple logic and common sense.

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ONE VERY IMPORTANT GUIDELINE: RULE OUT ALTERNATE SOURCES OF ERROR!!!

When you are stability testing the components within your machine, it is a good idea to try and test them one at a time. If we test our processor while running an unstable memory over clock, for example, we might attribute instability present in our RAM to a perfectly stable CPU over clock.

To remove alternate sources of error, you should overclock and change the voltage one component at a time when testing for stability, focusing the testing on the altered component's integrity while the overclock is in place. By focusing on a single component and keeping other components running at a confirmed stable manufacturer's specifications, we make it a lot easier to rule out alternate sources of error. This allows us to easily tweak the source of error, whichever overclocked component it might be, back into a stable setting before overclocking other hardware.

By ruling out alternate sources of error, we test with confidence that any errors are a result of the component that you modified that has been configured with settings of unknown integrity.

For similar reasons, it is important to confirm a machine's integrity at stock settings before overclocking it.

Ultimately, it does us no good knowing the machine is unstable if we do not know which part of the machine is unstable. It is impossible to make changes towards ensuring stability if we do not know which component is unstable and therefore needs to be adjusted.

Of course, testing components alone is no measure of an entire system's stability. If everything within your computer is heavily overclocked and overvolted, some tests should be run with all changes applied to make sure that none of the adjusted settings are causing conflicts with each other that would not normally occur at stock settings, or slightly overclocked settings.

Now that we've covered some basic principles of stability testing, and some common problems we might encounter independant of CPU, GPU, and RAM, let's go over CPU, GPU, and RAM testing in three steps.

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Step 1: CPU Stability Testing with Prime95

There is one program that is widely viewed as the CPU stability tester that is better than all other CPU stability testers. This is for good reason, and it is called Prime95.

Many alternatives to Prime95 exist for stressing the CPU, some of which are highly effective and very easy to use. Although Prime95 is a well proven stress test program, some of the alternatives are by no means inferior. I chose to keep Prime95 as the recommended CPU stress tester due to its time tested effectiveness. Prime95 is not definitively 'the best', but even Linus uses it. Therefore it must be good :D (Note that this is sarcasm. Simply because Linus uses something does NOT mean that is the best, by any means.)

Please keep in mind that Prime95 can give still errors even when your processor is stable. Unstable memory or other problems that there are with your system can cause errors in Prime95. Your processor is not the sole potential cause of Prime95 giving errors.

Prime95 puts your processor through a very rigorous "math test". After each "question", it compares your computer's "answer" with an answer that is known to be correct.

The work which Prime95 puts your processor through will bring your processor up to a near-peak load temperature. This helps to stress test your processor as much as possible, while also giving you an idea of what your load temperatures are. Any potential for instability which is present will be found by Prime95 after a sufficient amount of time.

You can download the latest version of Prime95 here: [url=http://www.mersenne.org/freesoft.htm]http://www.mersenne.org/freesoft.htm[/url=http://www.mersenne.org/freesoft.htm]

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How to Use Prime95 Effectively

After you have installed Prime95, run it and go to the 'Advanced' tab and then select 'Password'. Type in the password 9876 and enter it. Now go back to the 'Advanced' tab, and select 'Priority'. If you want to fully stress your CPU, set this to 10. If you plan to use your computer while stress testing, set it to 7 or 8. However, if you want to get true results, I highly suggest you set this to 10.

Setting the priority to 10 effectively gives all of your system resources to Prime95 while it is running. Any processes running hidden in the background won't be able to steal processing power from Prime95, ensuring the most effective stress test possible.

When you want to stress test your processor, run Prime95, go to the 'Options' tab, and select 'Torture Test'. Run the Torture test at the default settings.

Make sure that any screensavers are turned off and all other applications are closed while stress testing your CPU with Prime95.

Prime95 should never run in conjunction with any other stress testing programs, period. Prime95 is known and proven to be most effective when run by itself, and is less thorough when used with something else running at the same time.

When you are testing stability with Prime95, you want to run the Torture Test for at least one day, or a complete 24 hours.

Why 24 hours? There is a very common misconception that if your machine can pass Prime95 stability testing for, say, four hours, your machine will be able to run stable, regardless of what you are doing, for four hours as well, without an issue. This is not the case.

It is often that Prime95 finds errors in its 16th - 20th hour of testing, a potential for instability that wasn't found after only four hours of testing. After a mere four hours of stress testing with Prime95, the potential for instability still exists. 24 hours is widely viewed as a sufficient time period to catch any instability that may be present, but by all means test longer if you are able to do so. Be sure to note, however, that running Prime95 for extremely long periods of time can raise your electric bill.

If 24 hours seems like a really long time to leave your computer on, keeping your machine unusable because of the processes it's doing, try running Prime95 overnight, and then through the day while you're at school or work.

For CPU specific testing, a Large FFT Prime95 test is an alternative to the more "system-stress" oriented Blend test that runs by default. The choice is up to the end user. The Blend test is recommended in these guidelines because of it's qualities as both a processor and a system stress test.

That's all there is to Prime95. Twenty-four hours of Prime95 at Priority 10 is 'certified stable', and ready to use 24/7.

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Run a CPU Stress Test While Helping to Aid Important Scientific Research

Distributed Computing

A lot of people run distributed computing programs 24/7, which constantly keep their CPU at full stress load while helping to aid important scientific research.

Running a program like Folding@Home after passing 24 hours of Prime95 is a fantastic way to constantly keep an eye on your system's stability, while also aiding Medical research.

It is imperative that one does not run a distributed computing program on a machine that hasn't been stability tested, as mistake-filled results do not in any way help the effort.

For more detailed information about this distributed computing program, check out the Folding@Home Website.

The Folding@Home website can be found here: [url=http://folding.stanford.edu/English/HomePage]http://folding.stanford.edu/English/HomePage[/url=http://folding.stanford.edu/English/HomePage]

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Step 2: GPU Stability Testing with 3DMark 11

When it comes to stability, 3D testing is often overlooked completely. Many people don't overclock their graphics cards, and because of this, they decide that 3D stability tests are a waste of time. This is completely incorrect. It is very common that an overclock will pass Prime95 and memtest86 for 24 hours, but lock or crash 3DMark 11 in a few minutes. It is for this reason that testing GPU stability is a great idea. For those who do overclock their video cards, 3DMark 11 is an invaluable video card stability testing tool.

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How to Use 3DMark 11 Effectively

After installing 3DMark 11, run the program, and select the 'game' tests for use. Now set the benchmark for 'looping', so that all the tests that have been selected will loop indefinitely. With looping, the benchmark will not stop after a single run, which will allow you to stress test with the program for many hours. In order to give 3DMark 11 the optimal priority, press CTRL+ALT+DELETE while the program is running and go to the Task Manager. Right click on 3DMark 11 and select 'Go To Process'. Right click on the process that is then highlighted, and select 'Set Priority'. Set the Priority to 'Realtime'. This needs to be done every time you use 3dMark 11 for stress testing your GPU.

Giving the program 'Realtime' priority effectively gives all of your system resources to 3dMark 11 when it is running. Any processes running in the background won't steal resources from 3DMark 11 while it's stress testing, ensuring the most thorough test possible. Also be sure to turn off any screensavers and that no other applications are running.

Once the program is running, you will want to look for artifacting on the screen. Artifacting is a term for visual erroring. This is almost always caused by graphics card instability. Artifacting most commonly makes itself apparent through large geometric objects flickering in and out on your screen, texture corruption, and 'texture snow' which may appear as white specks.

If you do happen to see any artifacting on your screen, you may want to try to either turn your GPU overclock down, or giving your GPU slightly more power.

You should always run 3DMark 11 by itself. Do not run the program at the same time as any other system-stressing applications. This ensures that it's doing the most thorough job that it can.

For 3DMark 11, four hours of looped testing is a sufficient test for your machine.

Many machines can run 3DMark 11 for hours and hours without issue, but will fail Prime95 or memtest86 after a short period of time. Because of this, 3DMark 11 isn't particularly useful as a system stability test when used by itself.

You can download 3DMark 11 here: [url=http://www.3dmark.com/3dmark11]http://www.3dmark.com/3dmark11[/url=http://www.3dmark.com/3dmark11]

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Step 3: Testing Memory Stability with Memtest86

Memory instability is probably the stability-aware overclocker's next to worst nightmare, because it can cause many problems. Luckily for all of us, this program exists. It's idiot-proof, very small, and fantastically effective at finding any memory instability. Memtest86 tests as much of your RAM as possible. It is a stand-alone program, meaning it needs to be run outside of your OS.

Keep in mind that memtest86 can still give errors even with stable memory, just like other programs can. An unstable CPU can cause erroring in memtest86 as well as other system problems. This means that your memory is not the sole potential cause of memtest86 giving errors.

You can download memteset86 here: [url=http://memtest.org]http://memtest.org[/url=http://memtest.org]

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How to use Memtest86 Effectively

Memtest86 is fairly easy to run. All you have to do is install the ISO file to a CD or USB drive, and then boot from that CD or USB drive. I will not go into depth on how to install them to the CD or USB drive as Corsair has a fantastic tutorial on how to do everything with memtest86. This tutorial can be found here: [url=http://www2.corsair.com/training/how_to_memtest/]http://www2.corsair.com/training/how_to_memtest/[/url=http://www2.corsair.com/training/how_to_memtest/]

Similarly to Prime95, 24 hours is really required for a complete and thorough memory stability test, and for the same reasons.

Similarly to Prime95, it's easiest for most people to run memtest86 overnight and leave it running the following day while you're at school or work.

Many people use specific memtest86 tests by themselves to test out a new memory overclock quickly in order to see whether it's likely to be stable or not.

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Conclusion

I really hope this tutorial/guide has been helpful to you. If you've read through the entire tutorial and found it educational, I'm glad that I helped! Also, if you only read the beginning of this guide and learned about the dangers of instability, then this guide has served its purpose as well.

The main goal here is for everybody to know the problems that can arise from having an unstable system, and how to test your system properly for stability.

One thing this guide is devoid of is solutions to instability. This is intentional, as there are tons of guides on how to fix things like this. One very general rule is that if your system is crashing after setting up an overclock, decrease the overclock or increase the voltage.

If I have missed anything, please make sure to tell me by replying. Thank you for taking the time to read this post and learn about the dangers of system instability!

[Whaler_99]

FYI - I am pretty sure the latest version of Prime95 handles hyperthreading with no issue, opening the appropriate number of windows/workers, for each core, real or HT. On my 3570K I get 4 workers, and on my 2600k I get 8...

Otherwise, really nice write up. Stress testing for 24hrs is so important.

[Jrjy3]

FYI - I am pretty sure the latest version of Prime95 handles hyperthreading with no issue, opening the appropriate number of windows/workers, for each core, real or HT. On my 3570K I get 4 workers, and on my 2600k I get 8...

Otherwise, really nice write up. Stress testing for 24hrs is so important.

Ok. I didn't realize that. I must have read that a while ago if/when it didn't support hyperthreading. Thanks for the info.

By the way, do you know how I can edit a post I already posted? When I click the edit button, it brings up a blank box, not the post that I have already made...

[Whaler_99]

FYI - I am pretty sure the latest version of Prime95 handles hyperthreading with no issue, opening the appropriate number of windows/workers, for each core, real or HT. On my 3570K I get 4 workers, and on my 2600k I get 8...

Otherwise, really nice write up. Stress testing for 24hrs is so important.

Ya. fringing thing... BEFORE you hit edit, highlight and "copy" everything. I always past into notepad, just to make sure I got it. Then when you Edit - blanks everything out. You then paste back in your original message and edit changes. PITA. :) It is a known bug with this version of VB5.

[Jrjy3]

FYI - I am pretty sure the latest version of Prime95 handles hyperthreading with no issue, opening the appropriate number of windows/workers, for each core, real or HT. On my 3570K I get 4 workers, and on my 2600k I get 8...

Otherwise, really nice write up. Stress testing for 24hrs is so important.

Hm... When I copy and paste, all of the formatting goes away :(

I don't have time to re-format everything right now. I'll have to do it tomorrow or sometime later. Thanks for the information though!

[4Strings]

Quick question. I'm going to build a new rig in the next week or two, once I finish it, I stress test it, right? Regardless of whether I'm planning on OCing.

So here's my question:

When I run stress-tests that run inside the OS, like Prime95 or 3DMark and not memtest86, when you say not to run any other programs, does that include anti-virus software???

If I do have to turn off my anti-virus, can/should I disconnect my computer from the internet so as not to potentially catch a virus?

Sorry for sounding like a total noob about this.

And thanks for the GREAT guide! :)

[LimeDk]

Quick question. I'm going to build a new rig in the next week or two, once I finish it, I stress test it, right? Regardless of whether I'm planning on OCing.

So here's my question:

When I run stress-tests that run inside the OS, like Prime95 or 3DMark and not memtest86, when you say not to run any other programs, does that include anti-virus software???

If I do have to turn off my anti-virus, can/should I disconnect my computer from the internet so as not to potentially catch a virus?

Sorry for sounding like a total noob about this.

And thanks for the GREAT guide! :)

no you should not turn your anti-virus off i think he means like if your anti-virus was scanning after virus you should stop it, and dont have games to run in the background stuff like that,

[Jrjy3]

Quick question. I'm going to build a new rig in the next week or two, once I finish it, I stress test it, right? Regardless of whether I'm planning on OCing.

So here's my question:

When I run stress-tests that run inside the OS, like Prime95 or 3DMark and not memtest86, when you say not to run any other programs, does that include anti-virus software???

If I do have to turn off my anti-virus, can/should I disconnect my computer from the internet so as not to potentially catch a virus?

Sorry for sounding like a total noob about this.

And thanks for the GREAT guide! :)

Yes, that is correct. Whether you're overclocking or not, you should always stress test.

If you do turn off your anti-virus (it's up to you whether you do or not) as long as you don't connect to the internet, you won't catch a virus. You can unplug it for peace of mind, but you should be fine. If you do have your anti-virus still running while stress testing, make sure that it is not scanning for viruses any time you're running the stress testing programs.

That's fine that you're a noob in this subject! The purpose of this guide is to educate you so you aren't a noob anymore!

[Whaler_99]

FYI - I am pretty sure the latest version of Prime95 handles hyperthreading with no issue, opening the appropriate number of windows/workers, for each core, real or HT. On my 3570K I get 4 workers, and on my 2600k I get 8...

Otherwise, really nice write up. Stress testing for 24hrs is so important.

Copy - and then paste locally in Word. The copy and paste back. That MIGHT keep the formatting...

[Jrjy3]

FYI - I am pretty sure the latest version of Prime95 handles hyperthreading with no issue, opening the appropriate number of windows/workers, for each core, real or HT. On my 3570K I get 4 workers, and on my 2600k I get 8...

Otherwise, really nice write up. Stress testing for 24hrs is so important.

It still didn't work... Oh well. It's not all that much formatting. I'll just reformat it later. Thanks for your help though!

[Sklomp]

I tried installing 3dmark11, but it wouldn't start up. It appears for one second in taskmanager but then disappears

[Wats]

How come no one suggests AIDA64?

[Jrjy3]

I tried installing 3dmark11' date=' but it wouldn't start up. It appears for one second in taskmanager but then disappears[/quote']

I'm not sure what would be causing that. You might try contacting the makers of 3DMark 11 or visit their help page to see if they already have a solution.

[Soaljen]

the memtest website is so confusing, how do i download it? maybe im just a complete idiot but i have tried a few of their download links and none of them work

[Jrjy3]

the memtest website is so confusing' date=' how do i download it? maybe im just a complete idiot but i have tried a few of their download links and none of them work[/quote']

Corsair has a great guide here that was linked in my original post. http://www2.corsair.com/training/how_to_memtest/

[Ghost]

I had an issue with memtest. When I make a bootable USB my PC will not boot from it. Even though I have USB set to my primary boot device. I realized that it must be only one of the back usb ports.

Being lazy I just burned a disc.

[Fordox]

There is one program that is widely viewed as the CPU stability tester that is better than all other CPU stability testers. This is for good reason, and it is called Prime95.

Many alternatives to Prime95 exist for stressing the CPU, some of which are highly effective and very easy to use. Although Prime95 is a well proven stress test program, some of the alternatives are by no means inferior. I chose to keep Prime95 as the recommended CPU stress tester due to its time tested effectiveness. Prime95 is not definitively 'the best', but even Linus uses it. Therefore it must be good

Yes prime95 is good, but what you are saying here, is purely a personal matter. because if one respected person uses it, it doesn't mean it is the best and superior to other stability programs. Linus himself says that he is oldfashioned to use prime95 and that there may be other better alternatives like LinX (wich is my personal favorite, but i don't tend to shove it down someones throat in a guide :P (no offence).

Prime95 is still a great stability tester, but other alternatives can be just as good or even better. examples are: OCCT, LinX and Intel BurnIn test and other Linpacks.

the downside of using a linpack, is that you will not be able to use your system while stress testing if you are using all of your memory. but later on in your guide it says:

Setting the priority to 10 effectively gives all of your system resources to Prime95 while it is running. Any processes running hidden in the background won't be able to steal processing power from Prime95, ensuring the most effective stress test possible.

and

Prime95 should never run in conjunction with any other stress testing programs, period. Prime95 is known and proven to be most effective when run by itself, and is less thorough when used with something else running at the same time.

then again, you could also use a linpack.

A Linpack like LinX is a lot more stress testing. it will increase the temperature of your processor by about 5-8 degrees and the load is even heavier. After 5 hours of this torturetest, you can call your system 24/7 stable (with memory set on all ofcourse). so you don't need to run it the full 24 hours.

Prime95 is getting a bit old fashioned but is still widely regarded as a great program, which i won't denie.

an other point:

For those who do overclock their video cards, 3DMark 11 is an invaluable video card stability testing tool.

same reason as above, You have Furmark and MSI Combuster. the only down draft, is that you need to set your powerlimiet on 20% in msi afterburner, or else the program is so intense that it will draw to much power which results in throttling of your card. But you will notice a flaw faster compared to 3Dmark and you know your max GPU temperature.

Just as good as 3Dmark, is Heaven 2.0 (for the best scores) or higher. you can set this to run for the time you desire and is just as effective as 3dmark.

one sidenote:

You can also choose on 3Dmark other scenarios of gpu load. this do is superior to Heaven, but will never get close to Furmark.

Conclusion:

Prime95 and 3Dmark are great tools but not the best and is really time consuming. they are also getting a bit old, so i won't recommend that as fast, but it will do the job.

And did you know:

You can run prime95 and Furmark at the exact same time. this way is less time consuming and is still as good.

So I believe this guide is functional, but not the most effective.

[Jrjy3]

There is one program that is widely viewed as the CPU stability tester that is better than all other CPU stability testers. This is for good reason, and it is called Prime95.

Many alternatives to Prime95 exist for stressing the CPU, some of which are highly effective and very easy to use. Although Prime95 is a well proven stress test program, some of the alternatives are by no means inferior. I chose to keep Prime95 as the recommended CPU stress tester due to its time tested effectiveness. Prime95 is not definitively 'the best', but even Linus uses it. Therefore it must be good

Yes prime95 is good, but what you are saying here, is purely a personal matter. because if one respected person uses it, it doesn't mean it is the best and superior to other stability programs. Linus himself says that he is oldfashioned to use prime95 and that there may be other better alternatives like LinX (wich is my personal favorite, but i don't tend to shove it down someones throat in a guide :P (no offence).

Prime95 is still a great stability tester, but other alternatives can be just as good or even better. examples are: OCCT, LinX and Intel BurnIn test and other Linpacks.

the downside of using a linpack, is that you will not be able to use your system while stress testing if you are using all of your memory. but later on in your guide it says:

Setting the priority to 10 effectively gives all of your system resources to Prime95 while it is running. Any processes running hidden in the background won't be able to steal processing power from Prime95, ensuring the most effective stress test possible.

and

Prime95 should never run in conjunction with any other stress testing programs, period. Prime95 is known and proven to be most effective when run by itself, and is less thorough when used with something else running at the same time.

then again, you could also use a linpack.

A Linpack like LinX is a lot more stress testing. it will increase the temperature of your processor by about 5-8 degrees and the load is even heavier. After 5 hours of this torturetest, you can call your system 24/7 stable (with memory set on all ofcourse). so you don't need to run it the full 24 hours.

Prime95 is getting a bit old fashioned but is still widely regarded as a great program, which i won't denie.

an other point:

For those who do overclock their video cards, 3DMark 11 is an invaluable video card stability testing tool.

same reason as above, You have Furmark and MSI Combuster. the only down draft, is that you need to set your powerlimiet on 20% in msi afterburner, or else the program is so intense that it will draw to much power which results in throttling of your card. But you will notice a flaw faster compared to 3Dmark and you know your max GPU temperature.

Just as good as 3Dmark, is Heaven 2.0 (for the best scores) or higher. you can set this to run for the time you desire and is just as effective as 3dmark.

one sidenote:

You can also choose on 3Dmark other scenarios of gpu load. this do is superior to Heaven, but will never get close to Furmark.

Conclusion:

Prime95 and 3Dmark are great tools but not the best and is really time consuming. they are also getting a bit old, so i won't recommend that as fast, but it will do the job.

And did you know:

You can run prime95 and Furmark at the exact same time. this way is less time consuming and is still as good.

So I believe this guide is functional, but not the most effective.

I do know that there is a multitude of programs to test all three things - the CPU, GPU, and Memory. I chose to put these three in the guide because they have been used by tons of people for quite a few years now.

Like I said in the original post, many tests are not inferior to the ones put in this post. These are the ones that I believe to work the best. As you said, there may be better alternatives out there. Hardware is always changing. Because of this, methods of testing system stability will also change.

When I said that Prime95 must be good because Linus uses it, I was trying to make a joke. Just because one person uses something most certainly does not mean that it is the best. However, many people on this forum believe that Linus knows what he is doing and would trust him when getting advice on computers. In order to make sure people know I was making a joke, I put in the smiley face, which was meant to imply that there was a sarcastic tone in the last part of that sentence.

[Fordox]

There is one program that is widely viewed as the CPU stability tester that is better than all other CPU stability testers. This is for good reason, and it is called Prime95.

Many alternatives to Prime95 exist for stressing the CPU, some of which are highly effective and very easy to use. Although Prime95 is a well proven stress test program, some of the alternatives are by no means inferior. I chose to keep Prime95 as the recommended CPU stress tester due to its time tested effectiveness. Prime95 is not definitively 'the best', but even Linus uses it. Therefore it must be good

Yes prime95 is good, but what you are saying here, is purely a personal matter. because if one respected person uses it, it doesn't mean it is the best and superior to other stability programs. Linus himself says that he is oldfashioned to use prime95 and that there may be other better alternatives like LinX (wich is my personal favorite, but i don't tend to shove it down someones throat in a guide :P (no offence).

Prime95 is still a great stability tester, but other alternatives can be just as good or even better. examples are: OCCT, LinX and Intel BurnIn test and other Linpacks.

the downside of using a linpack, is that you will not be able to use your system while stress testing if you are using all of your memory. but later on in your guide it says:

Setting the priority to 10 effectively gives all of your system resources to Prime95 while it is running. Any processes running hidden in the background won't be able to steal processing power from Prime95, ensuring the most effective stress test possible.

and

Prime95 should never run in conjunction with any other stress testing programs, period. Prime95 is known and proven to be most effective when run by itself, and is less thorough when used with something else running at the same time.

then again, you could also use a linpack.

A Linpack like LinX is a lot more stress testing. it will increase the temperature of your processor by about 5-8 degrees and the load is even heavier. After 5 hours of this torturetest, you can call your system 24/7 stable (with memory set on all ofcourse). so you don't need to run it the full 24 hours.

Prime95 is getting a bit old fashioned but is still widely regarded as a great program, which i won't denie.

an other point:

For those who do overclock their video cards, 3DMark 11 is an invaluable video card stability testing tool.

same reason as above, You have Furmark and MSI Combuster. the only down draft, is that you need to set your powerlimiet on 20% in msi afterburner, or else the program is so intense that it will draw to much power which results in throttling of your card. But you will notice a flaw faster compared to 3Dmark and you know your max GPU temperature.

Just as good as 3Dmark, is Heaven 2.0 (for the best scores) or higher. you can set this to run for the time you desire and is just as effective as 3dmark.

one sidenote:

You can also choose on 3Dmark other scenarios of gpu load. this do is superior to Heaven, but will never get close to Furmark.

Conclusion:

Prime95 and 3Dmark are great tools but not the best and is really time consuming. they are also getting a bit old, so i won't recommend that as fast, but it will do the job.

And did you know:

You can run prime95 and Furmark at the exact same time. this way is less time consuming and is still as good.

So I believe this guide is functional, but not the most effective.

sarcasm is hard to read, not to hear, especially in a guide.

I wasn't picking on your methods, but for a guide, you do need the best ways possible, if not, at least other alternatives.

[baxter.rs]

I tried installing 3dmark11, but it wouldn't start up. It appears for one second in taskmanager but then disappears

I think that your card has to be Direct-X 11 compatible :/

[Jrjy3]

I had an issue with memtest. When I make a bootable USB my PC will not boot from it. Even though I have USB set to my primary boot device. I realized that it must be only one of the back usb ports. Being lazy I just burned a disc.

That's what I would have done. I have extras laying around that I won't use for anything else, so why take all the extra time to troubleshoot it when a CD will work just fine?

[killereddy]

I just finished my first PC build. I used memtest and it found no errors, I didn't use prime 95 for a full test yet but it was going fine. However, when I try to run furmark for the GPUs I get a blackscreen after only a few seconds. A message pops up saying that the graphics driver timed out but it doesn't offer any fixes beyond reducing the resolution.

Specs:

AsRock Z77 extreme9

intel i7 3770k (LGA1155)

32Gb dual channel DDR3 1600

2x EVGA Geforce 660Ti

1200W 80 Plus Gold PSU

Windows 7 pro 64-bit

All stock settings, and I have installed the latest drivers.

[Jrjy3]

I just finished my first PC build. I used memtest and it found no errors' date=' I didn't use prime 95 for a full test yet but it was going fine. However, when I try to run furmark for the GPUs I get a blackscreen after only a few seconds. A message pops up saying that the graphics driver timed out but it doesn't offer any fixes beyond reducing the resolution. Specs: AsRock Z77 extreme9 intel i7 3770k (LGA1155) 32Gb dual channel DDR3 1600 2x EVGA Geforce 660Ti 1200W 80 Plus Gold PSU Windows 7 pro 64-bit All stock settings, and I have installed the latest drivers. [/quote']

Try going to Nvidia's website and check to see if you have the latest drivers. http://www.geforce.com

[nishank93]

I've always seen 3DMark11 for benchmarks, never for stress tests. I thought FurMark was the preferred utility?

[Ozpa]

Hello, I would just like to add that in the latest Prime95 version (v27.9 build 1) you set the program priority elsewhere (Test -> Worker Windows) and there's no more 'Password' option anywhere.