Overclocked cpu`s & testing them???

[Bartman39]

I know there are several test out there that help with making sure your overclocked cpu is stable. But one of my questions is even though you have a program that uses a cpu @ 100% load (as indicated by monitor programs) and does not crash the system. But certain games or other programs do cause crashes... do they exceed the 100% of cpu load??? Will a graphic`s intense program cause "spikes of load" to the already 100% loaded cpu and cause it to crash??? Are DOS programs more cpu dependant??? Would they be better for testing an OC`d cpu???

I saw in an earlier post about a tested cpu that was overclocked and stable until the guy played Diablo II then it crashed more than likely because of heat (15-20min) My wife`s Celeron II 533a @950mhz 1.80 is stable in every program I can throw at it till she plays D2 for about 1-2 hours and I know its heat because if I take the side cover off it will not crash (I know more fans...)

Ok all the overclocking people give us your thoughts please...

 

[Poof]

I just OC'd my P3-600e to 800Mhz last night. My very first time OCing anything.

After having read alot of posts here and the hardcore OC forums for the past month, I'm currently testing for stability... I played a few hours of UT last night, both online and off. Offline, I ran the notoriously intensive DM-Morbias][ map (which is almost all Rocket Launchers), with 16 adept bots (yikes!), and it held.

After that, I've been running SETI and Folding@home (doing this now).

SETI is FPU intensive and something like RC5 would be integer intensive. If you can run some distributed computing projects (hey - you could join Team Anandtech's RC5 and/or SETI effort... *grin*) and continue to test with the games, that'll cover most of the bases.

As you're seeing, heat is a major factor in stability and in addition to fans and other active cooling solutions, you might want to try some good thermal pastes. I just applied Arctic Silver on my CPU HS/Fan combo last night and it dropped my core temp at idle by like 10C!!!

I'll step back and let the experts post (as I'm following their ssuggestions too), but just wanted to offer what I've discovered so far and what I'm doing now...

 

[Diesel21]

My Celeron 566@934 mhz ran cpuburnin for 30 min, Dnetc RC5 cracking for several hours, but after five minutes of Half-Life counter-strike it crashed with Blue Screen of Death!

Right now I am running it at 850mhz because my TNT2 Ultra is holding me back and not the CPU in games.

Don't know why this happened but it sure did crash

 

[bwgriff]

I have been testing my overclocked machines by running (1) Primordia (a math calculation program), (2) Super Pi (another math program), and (3) 3DMark2000 (graphics/game test) all at the same time. If you have a problem with stability, running those three simultaneously is likely to find show it.

 

[Road Rage]

bwgriff,

Where can I get a copy of Primordia & Super PI? I want to
try those for testing stablity on my system.

Thanks in advance,

RR

 

[ingenue007]

yeah where can you get a copy of those progs? thanks

 

[bwgriff]

Primordia at

http://w3.physics.uiuc.edu/~wilkens/


Super Pi at

http://home.istar.ca/~lyster/chart.html

http://members.nbci.com/bwray90/

http://www.yxq98.ukgateway.net/mathsdefault.htm (at bottom of page)