Burning in

Just wondering how long would be long enough really. Have an XP 2100+. I've tried running Prime95 torture test and 3DMark2001SE together but eventually(few hours) my computer hard locks. I can run just Prime95 torture test so far non-stop. It's been running for close to 12hrs now with no problem.

Also wondering since I can't seem to run Torture test and 3DMark at the same time, would it be better to run just Prime95 doing it's normal thing and 3DMark at the same time assuming they would run together. Or is the Torture test enough?

In my opinion, if the CPU is at 100% load, it doesn't matter how you get there. Running two programs at the same time is more difficult and will slow down both and perhaps might stress any parts that have to do with multitasking, but when it comes down to it, the CPU can only run one app at a time, so I think you're just wasting time running two. I guess I could be wrong, though . . .I think 12 hours is the least you would want to do it, although probably good enough. If you really want to be sure, burn it in until you get bored waiting for it.

Z

zachj said:

In my opinion, if the CPU is at 100% load, it doesn't matter how you get there.

Click to expand...

It does matter. Different programs stress different parts of your CPU. Your CPU can only go as fast as the weakest transistor will let it. Prime95 beats up your FPU, cache, and memory system. I don't know anything about 3DMark, but lets assume it beats up the integer units. If the FPU is the weakest part of your chip, prime95 will fail while others work just fine. If your integer units are the weakest part of your chip, then 3DMark will fail while prime95 happily chugs along.

The best stress test of any CPU is to run 3 or 4 of your favorite stress test programs. Its probably best to run them one at a time rather than at the same time.

Well was just running Prime95 doing it's normal thing and 3DMark Demo looping. While it didn't hard lock, after about 1hr it gave me an out of memory error. Oh well. I can run Prime95 torture for at least 12hrs with no trouble so I think my system is at least semi-stable. As far as burning in, I'm bored waiting on it now but at least I have another computer to goof with. Just wondering how long most people burn in.

to burn in, just run prime95 at a stable clock at the most speed that would not give an error with the heightened voltage if voltage is added, put ram timings at the lowest, most relaxed settings to make sure it's not the ram screwing up, memtest86 is a much easier and faster way to make sure ram is running fine, the default tests only take my system 14 minutes to run, and mine is kinda sluggish compared to most people here, a lot of prime95 problems are due to ram as i had found out and i ran prime95 for days to finally realize that i didn't have to, except to burn in.

What I meant by that was really just, whatever program you're using, if it's loading the processor up to 100%, then it's stressing the CPU. Like I said, there are different parts of a CPU and different programs utilize different parts more than others. All I was intending to say was that he didn't need to run both at the same time. One at a time is the best way to go. If you have a small amount of memory, that could be the answer . . .3DMark is almost like a game, so it takes memory to run. It's not, so I'd prefer if people would refrain from saying "it's not a game". I know it isn't, I'm just saying that it plays game demos for you, so it utilizes the same features a game does, and that's memory, graphics and CPU.

Z

Well I had Prime95 setup to use so much memory. Running 3DMark at the same time with that memory usage eventually caused me to run out. Just lowered the amount Prime95 was using and could run both at the same time.