Want to make sure my overclock is ROCK solid

I am working on getting a good overclock for my new i7 and I want to know your suggestions for stability testing. I plan on keeping this system a few years and I want to make damn sure my overclock is 100% stable so I can set it and forget it.

Right now I'm thinking something like
100 passes of LinX
24 hours of Prime 95 small ffts
24 hours of Prime 95 blend
24 hours of Memtest

how does that sound? any other programs?

also, would like something to stress the GPU, basically a real torture test to make sure it will handle any load

I been doing serious overclocking since 2.4c was the hot cpu and prime95 blend overnight, usually how long I sleep, 7-9 hours. Never that method never failed me, some people say 24 hours but thats over kill imo.

just run 50 passes of intel burn test..

50 passes = about 5 years of full load stress testing.. yet takes half the time p95 takes to do the same thing..

if you really want to go nuts.. run furmark while running IBT.. that will stress the gpu as the cpu's being stressed.. just make sure you watch your chipset temps..

Thats kinda what I do but I throw in:

Intel Burn-In for 24 hours
http://downloads.guru3d.com/IntelBurnTest-v2.1_d2047.html

3DMark 06 and 01 loop 24 hours
http://www.futuremark.com/

You seem set on 24 hours so I just added those, I usually stress mine for 48 hours with everything over the course of those 48 hours.

Intel Burn In from my experience gets your CPU 10c+ hotter than small fts with Prime95

1.. furmark is better then 3dmark06 in every way for stress testing.. running 3dmark for 24 hours is 100% waste of time because it no longer stresses the gpu for shit anymore unless you run it at 1900x1200 with 8xAA or higher.. then maybe.. just maybe the gpu will become the bottle neck and it will be under full load.. but still doesnt mean your stressing the entire card... furmark will put the gpu and shaders under 100% load at any resolution..

2.. theres no reason to run IBT for 24 hours.. since it stresses the cpu a lot more then p95 does.. which is why 24 hour stress testing with p95 is recommended..

Also a good stress is just playing a x264 1080p movie, it's a great test of your GPU's stream processors (which are used to accelerate the decode). I've seen cards that pass Furmark for hours but fail within 5 minutes of a video, probably because shader errors in 3D can go unnoticed, but not in GPU compute apps.

Beside the software you need to consider the test environment as well.


You don't just want this thing to be rock solid; you want it to be rock solid on a scolding hot day.

So to properly test the system I would lower your fans to a setting singnificantly lower than you'd actually run, and do whatever you can to make your room unusually warm. THEN run all your test software.

How many times do you guys run Intel Burn Test to make sure the system is stable? I've been doing it 10 times but I see people saying they run it all day long?

Right now I'm thinking something like
100 passes of LinX
24 hours of Prime 95 small ffts
24 hours of Prime 95 blend
24 hours of Memtest

how does that sound? any other programs?

Click to expand...

If you're overclocking the memory, I'd probably go for a few passes of Memtest first. Once you're clear on that, move forward to IBT or Linx. If it's passing IBT/Linx, there really isn't a need to also run Prime.

The best way to stress test the i7, in my opinion, is with all cores at 100% while also hammering the hell out of the memory controller. Linx (and the latest version of IBT) allows you to set the memory size to be used while testing. When you're really ready to see how well your overclock will hold up, set the memory size to ALL and fire away.

It should be noted that the larger the memory size, the longer it will take for each pass.

Below is a screenshot of my WAY OVERKILL stress test for my i7 with 12GB.




Like sirmonkey said - 24hrs. is usually unnecessary with IBT/Linx.

Xeth said:

Also a good stress is just playing a x264 1080p movie, it's a great test of your GPU's stream processors (which are used to accelerate the decode). I've seen cards that pass Furmark for hours but fail within 5 minutes of a video, probably because shader errors in 3D can go unnoticed, but not in GPU compute apps.

Click to expand...

IF you are using a CUDA/DXVA decoder... else you are using the CPU and thats all.

20x passes of LinX. If it passes that, its fine. I generally keep OCing till 3x passes fail, then raise vcore and continue till Im at the max temps, then run 20x passes. If it passes, then its stable. If not, I lower speed a little till it is.