How to test your PC for the Skylake bug - coxthessom89

Intel has confirmed a bug in some Skylake CPUs could cause them to lock upwardly under "complex workload conditions" merely noted that a hole is on the way.

The bug initially was reported merely with the Core i7-6700K desktop CPU with Hyper-Threading enabled, but Intel's confirmation seems to indicates IT impacts more CPUs in the card.

In a post on Intel's forums, an Intel community manager wrote: " Intel has identified an issue that potentially affects the 6th Gen Intel Core family of products. This issue only occurs under certain complex workload conditions, look-alike those that may cost encountered when running applications similar Prime95. In those cases, the central processor may pay heed or cause unpredictable system doings. Intel has identified and released a fix and is working with outside job partners to get the fix deployed through BIOS."

The bug has apparently been stewing for weeks on forums at hardwareluxx.de and then Mersenne.org which created the software, Prime95, that is used to induct the bug. Prime95 is used to find prime numbers and is as wel very popular with performance and the overclockingcommunity as a try and performance test.

Gordon Mah Ung

Intel said some Skylake chips might lock awake under a "complex workload conditions" but most people can relax connected this ace.

Besides the community post, Intel also official to PCWorld the existence of the pester but placed an emphasis on the word "might" because on that point's no more guarantee you'll hit the intercept.

"Under some mazy workload conditions, equal those encountered when running applications so much as Prime95, the processor may hang operating theatre cause unpredictable system deportment. Intel has released a fix that resolves the issue and we are working with external business partners to deploy this fix through BIOS updates," an Intel official told PCWorld.

This may look like Intel's sugar-coating it, but the bug is in truth sporadic. Some people ingest strike it, while others can't reproduce information technology. The hang sometimes occurs after minutes, sometimes hours, and others ne'er know the locking.

In my own testing, I used a Skylake-settled laptop with a quad-core Nub i7-6820HK and didn't experience the hangup in few hours of testing. Umteen of the people who've reported striking the hemipteron are doing so with the background Core i7-6700K cow chip, though.

Why this matters: In the grand scheme of C.P.U. "errata" or bugs, this one is fairly esoteric and really not worthy of existence mentioned in the same paragraph as Intel's infamous 1994 FDIV bug. The FDIV bug would manifest itself in Microsoft Excel spreadsheets and was serious enough that Intel recalled the CPUs to the tune of millions of dollars. The bigger bummer for PC users was when Intel couldn't resolve a bug in its new TSX instructions, so information technology plainly switched it off for many hoi polloi. The Skylake hemipteran can apparently Be patched with a microcode fix.

How to test for the Skylake bug

Chasing down a arbitrary glitch sounds the like a good means to fend off doing something else, then here's how to do it. Download Prime95 version 28.7 from Mersenne95 and decompress the file in into a brochure.

With the latest version of Prime95, you will necessitate to tell the broadcast to utilize AVX operating instructions by creating a text edition filing cabinet called "local.txt"

If you habituate the current 28.7 reading, you will need to make over a text edition file in the leaflet using Notepad. You can do this by right-sneak-clicking in the Prime95 folder and selecting New > Text Document. Give the text document the title "topical.txt." Once the file is created, double-detent it to coarse with Notepad and typecast the line CpuSupportsFMA3=0 . Save the file in the same folder.

You'll need to create a text file to tell Prime95 to utilisation AVX to arrive at the bug

You rich person to do this because, reported to the pester finders, by default the newer variant of Prime95 will use AVX2 and the error appears to only happen with AVX.

Start Prime95 by treble-clicking Prime95.exe. Dismiss the dialog by clicking Just Stress Testing.

Just skip and take: "Just Stress Testing."

A panel will come out to Run a Torture Test. Select Custom and commute the Fukien FFT size of it (in K) to 768, and change Max FFT size (in K) to 768. Select Run FFs in-place and also correct the run time to 120 minutes or longer. Clicking OK testament start the Torture Test.

Using these settings in Prime95, people have reported beingness competent to hang their bran-new Skylake CPUs.

Now retributive wait and date if it locks up. Most of the problems appear to take plac with the top-end desktop Effect i7-6700K, only Intel seems to be implying it could occur connected another CPUs.

Before you run this test, you should be cognizant that Prime95 puts a heavy load on CPUs. Systems that are marginal on cooling or overclocked Crataegus laevigata break up happening their own, so it's probably best to run this test on a PC with old-hat settings to make a point it International Relations and Security Network't just an crank overclock.

Source: https://www.pcworld.com/article/419123/how-to-test-your-pc-for-the-skylake-bug.html

Posted by: coxthessom89.blogspot.com

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