Best utilities for stress testing in 2020

[Regenerati0n]

New threads related to unstable overclocks and defective hardware pop up on a regular occasion. It is often asked how to stress test some component. Below you'll find my top picks after weeks of testing - updated for 2020.

GPU
Unigine Heaven
FurMark / MSI Kombuster
*GPUs tend to clock down due to power and thermal limits when running FurMark*
*Lower resolutions put more stress on the VRMs*

Video RAM
Final Fantasy XV Benchmark
*Set to maximum quality and run in a loop*

Memory modules (configuration, timings and overclock)
MemTest64
HCI MemTest (one instance per thread)
*Best run from safe mode without a pagefile*
Linpack Xtreme

Memory modules (physical integrity)
MemTest86

Processor
Linpack Xtreme
Prime95 small FFTs

Integrated Memory Controller
Prime95 custom run of FFTs from 512K to 1024K with 90% of RAM
Linpack Xtreme

Northbridge, bus and PSU
Prime95 custom run of FFTs from 512K to 1024K with 80% of RAM + LuxMark or FurMark running in the background at 720p.

[ir_cow]

Good list. I'll pin it!

Personally I use 3DMark for GPU stress testing along with MSI Kombuster. I used Unigine Heaven before and wrote OC guides using it, but I found it isn't perfect. Heaven will be stable for hours, but a real game will instantly crash. Can't go wrong with free, but it isn't very stressful on the GPUs from the last few years.

Once I have what I think is stable clocks with Kombuster (AKA not crashing). I'll run TimeSpy Extreme stress test which does 20 loops. If it comes back at 98% or higher I'll try whatever game i'm playing at the moment. I've found you can have stability in one game, but not another. So you need all 3 to make sure its stable in everything. Very rarely does 3DMark Stress complete with a 98% or higher and the games are not stable.

[Nyt]

Nice list! Definitely going to try a few of the tools mentioned above.

I recently figured out how useful MemTest86 and HCI MemTest are, whilst troubleshooting some random game crashes.
After a bit of trouble shooting (testing two sticks, one stick, then the other stick) it turns out one of my sticks were faulty and were causing errors.

For my CPU overclock I found that 30 minutes of Cinebench was useful for a quick test.
And then a 1hr Realbench run which gives me a good idea of stability as well as how hot things get.

For my GPU overclock I found that running Unigine Valley at 4K was useful. You normally see any artifacts and then can dial it back a bit and leave it running.
I never found much use for Furmark/Kombustor as the clocks are dropped way down and it didn't seem realistic to me. 

 

Does Linpack Xtreme and Prime 95 reach crazy temps because of AVX ? I remember certain versions of Prime95 used to hit 100C within a few seconds which is crazy.

I also find Battlefield V is one of the more intensive games out there. If you play few hours without crashes your CPU/GPU is pretty stable for gaming.
 

[Guest_Jim_*]

FFmpeg script to convert with x264 is a pretty good stress test, but it is data intensive. You do need a good length input video after all, but I have had times when the system was completely stable, until I tried to re-encode something. For example, my desktop's 1950X can actually be run at 4 GHz for most anything, but I have to run it at 3.8 GHz because above that it will hard lock while encoding very consistently.

[Nyt]

35 minutes ago, Guest_Jim_* said:

FFmpeg script to convert with x264 is a pretty good stress test, but it is data intensive. You do need a good length input video after all, but I have had times when the system was completely stable, until I tried to re-encode something. For example, my desktop's 1950X can actually be run at 4 GHz for most anything, but I have to run it at 3.8 GHz because above that it will hard lock while encoding very consistently.

That's one of the reasons I like Realbench.
One of the tests uses Handbrake h.264 video compression.
And at the same time it runs two other tests - one is single threaded GIMP Image Editing and the other is OpenGL Luxmark on the GPU.

[Braegnok]

I mostly use Realbench 2.56, and Prime 95 AVX disabled small FFT.

Edited July 5, 2020 by Braegnok

[Regenerati0n]

RealBench is oudated and not brutal enough for "absolute stability". But it is very useful in test scenarios of high LLC, C-states, dynamic voltage.

Does Linpack Xtreme and Prime 95 reach crazy temps because of AVX ?

Partially. Mass equation solving is a demanding task.

Edited July 8, 2020 by Regenerati0n

[JustinMJackson1]

I used Unigine Heaven before and wrote OC guides using it

[Kailey]

MSI's Kombustor comes with a CPU stress test, but it doesn't use AVX instructions. As a result, Kombustor only generates about 110W, which is similar to the loads generated by demanding games.

[Fast_N_Curious]

AIDA64 with cache, FPU, and CPU checked. 

For memory, check memory and that is sufficient. 

Prime95 is way over the top and not realistic. 

[paunboli2]

what is the normal temperature of i5 12600kb on 5.0 ghz