----- Original Message -----
From: "Ian" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Friday, March 14, 2003 6:31 PM
Subject: [PCSOFT] W98 spontaneous reboots


> Thanks for that.  But Gold Memory, in it's trial version, is too crippled
to
> be of much use.

The unregisted version is sweet to use, just you don't have any options and
have to wait 60sec before the test start.  I've found it is much better than
many other DOS based programs.  I used to use Simmtester, but compare to
GoldMemory, Simmtester is nothing.  Anyway, if a product is great on use, it
is fair to pay for it.

>
> I installed 3Dmark 2001SE, as you suggested.  But I wasn't sure what you
> meant by 'just loop the benchmark', perhaps you'd expand on that.
>

You have options to run the benchmark as many times as you wish before it
gives final result, you can tell it to run forever, which is the best stress
test for single CPU system.

> A point about 3Dmark 2001SE - wouldn't using this prog in Windows hamper
the
> performance of a ram test?
>

It does give an ideal of performance, but if you have faulty stuff, it won't
run/finish benchmark.  So let it burn-in over night will pick up most of
problems.  It is very good to test RAM, I had experience that a bad RAM
won't be picked up in GoldMemory (or other DOS based programs), won't be
picked up by Prime95, windows runs fine, BUT 3Dmark won't run/finish with
it.  Especially on RAM timming issue, usual tests cannot pick it up, but
3Dmark will.  Sometimes, RAM problem is so "don't seems like" that 3Dmark
will run the demo, but crash in benchmark, and after all, they turned to be
faulty RAM!

> MemTest86 v.3.0, seems to work pretty well in DOS.  So far, I've used it
to
> do a continuous 10 hour test but the ram hasn't returned any faults
>

I wouldn't trust it, as I wouldn't trust Simmtester, I already had few times
that they couldn't pick up bad RAMs but, GoldMemory could.  But still,
GoldMemory missed quit few times on bad RAMs, so I only trust 3Dmark for the
work.  There are time that 3Dmark won't run if the PC isn't powerful enough
(eg. slow slow video card, or OpenGL only workstation card), in that case, I
run SpecView Perfessional OpenGL benchmark.

Jun Qian

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