Burn-In Test Application clashes with WinXP SP3?

[Ian (PassMark)]

Malte,

How long into the test was it before they failed (e.g. did they all fail around the same time of e.g. 2 hours)?

We have made some changes in BurnInTest for this type of problem, v5.3.1028.

Can you please use this new build with one of the laptops that failed to:
(i) see if the problem occurs, or whether you at least now get the option to send the error report to Microsoft (which we can get from them);
(ii) reduce the test set to the smallest, e.g. Disk and Memory.
We have another report of this behavior and their testing seems to indicate that it may be related to the disk test, in conjunction with another test (but this may have nothing to do with your problem).

So, if you could first retry the test without the disk test and see if you don't get the problem. If you don't, then could you please try the disk test with SMART turned off and the test pattern set to sequential (rather than cyclic)?

The latest 32-bit build can be downloaded here (currently 5.3.102.
http://www.passmark.com/ftp/bitpro.exe

Please do your testing with Activity trace testing turned off, but periodic logging turned on to e.g. 1 minute.

Thanks.
Ian

[malte]

Hi Ian,
last night we ran a btach of 23 units of the Laptop as written already and only 1 of them passed. All others (with same installation) just cloesed BurnIn test. Tested with BurnIn pro 5.3 Build 1026. Tests running:

CPU - Maths
CPU - MMX / SSE
Memory (RAM)
2D Graphics
3D Graphics
Disk (C: OS)

On this batch we now run test again, but skip one of the running tests. On some other units we only run one of that tests listed above. The problem is, that sometimes if we launch the test once more the unit can pass.

I have another unit, with:
Supermicro M/B X7DBE-X
Quadcore CPU
2GB RAM
2x Matrox Display wall conrtoller. (one card has 8 Monitor outputs)
2x Seagate Rugged HDD running mirrored RAID

CPU - Maths
CPU - MMX / SSE
Memory (RAM)
2D Graphics
Disk (C: OS)

no 3D Test, because Matrox Cards don't support.
All the drivers and BIOS are defenetly the latest that are availabel.
I'll try to collect some more infomration from the event log later.

Regards
Malte

[Ian (PassMark)]

XP SP3 updates a whole bunch of system programs (.exe), system libraries (.dll), system registry entries and device drivers (.sys,.cat,.inf). Just maybe not the ones you are thinking of.

Regards,
Ian

[malte]

1) We have found a couple of problems with Graphics card device drivers lately that will cause this problem with the 2D Video memory test. Could you please try the test without the 2D test and post whether the problem still occurs. If the problem does still occur, can you please reduce the test set until you have the smallest test set that provokes this problem and let us know what this test set is (e.g. just the 3D test).

Ok, I'll give it a try.

2) As the problem is often a faulty device driver, simply check you have the latest device drivers and update accordingly. If you think it is related to the graphics test, then start by updating the graphics card device driver.

I can not imagine that this is a driver issue, because with SP2 and 100% same drivers everything is OK. We're in the defence business, so we can not just update a driver. I can do this for testing, but this will cause a lot of qualification process if we need to change.

3) Get the software error information, such as:
- The specific build number: e.g. BurnInTest Professional v5.3.1026
- The address related to this problem, eg 0x00412345. If this information is not available from a link from the "BurnInTest has stopped working" error window (or you don't see this window) then you can normally get this information from the Windows Application event log. In XP (other operating systems will be similar) the Application event log is here:
Start-> right click "My Computer" and select Manage, double click "Event Viewer" on the left hand side of the window, double click "Application" and find the event of type "Error" around the time the problem occurred. This will contain information like:
"Faulting application bit.exe, version 5.0.1003.0, faulting module bit.exe, version 5.0.1003.0, fault address 0x00412345."

I didn't have the build number on hand, and you're right it's not the latest one. I'll update and see what happens. It's Build 1018

There is no error message. BIT is just closed and that's it.

[Ian (PassMark)]

This is an unrecoverable software exception in BurnInTest. The software error could occur in BurnInTest, a library BurnInTest uses (like DirectX), the Windows Operating System, a device driver, in some cases a hardware error can cause a software problem (like faulty RAM) or even the BIOS. I would say that in most cases it is BurnInTest exercising a Device driver with a bug. In your case, as it is after a long test, then maybe a device driver has a resource leak, such that when the resources are low enough, the device driver fails in some manner. There are a couple of approaches to try and determine where the fault is:

1) We have found a couple of problems with Graphics card device drivers lately that will cause this problem with the 2D Video memory test. Could you please try the test without the 2D test and post whether the problem still occurs. If the problem does still occur, can you please reduce the test set until you have the smallest test set that provokes this problem and let us know what this test set is (e.g. just the 3D test).

2) As the problem is often a faulty device driver, simply check you have the latest device drivers and update accordingly. If you think it is related to the graphics test, then start by updating the graphics card device driver.

3) Get the software error information, such as:
- The specific build number: e.g. BurnInTest Professional v5.3.1026
- The address related to this problem, eg 0x00412345. If this information is not available from a link from the "BurnInTest has stopped working" error window (or you don't see this window) then you can normally get this information from the Windows Application event log. In XP (other operating systems will be similar) the Application event log is here:
Start-> right click "My Computer" and select Manage, double click "Event Viewer" on the left hand side of the window, double click "Application" and find the event of type "Error" around the time the problem occurred. This will contain information like:
"Faulting application bit.exe, version 5.0.1003.0, faulting module bit.exe, version 5.0.1003.0, fault address 0x00412345."


EDIT: You can set up a trace file in Preferences->Logging, Set trace level to activity trace 2. However, often this does not provide specific enough detail for this type of problem. The best debugging tool for an access violation is a Minidump file, but this is only generated if you get the "BurnInTest has stopped", do you want to send this error report to Microsoft. The next best thing is as listed in the points above.

Regards,
Ian

[malte]

We found a similar problem.
we're running following tests @ 100%:

CPU - Maths
CPU - MMX / SSE
Memory (RAM)
2D Graphics
3D Graphics
Disk (C: OS)

OS is windows XP pro SP3 GER (Systembuilder), BIT is 5.3 pro latest build.
The strange thing is, that on some units it passes and other units BIT is stopped. On all XP pro SP2b and SP2c it was no problem.

The computer we're running the test on, is a Laptop with Intel 945GM Chipset and 1.66GHz CPU, 1-2GB RAM, 120GB Toshiba HDD.

Is there a way to create a trace log, that we can see what happened before the test was crashed?

On some units if we start the test for a 2nd time, they pass also.

My problem now is, that our full production test is based on your software. Currently we're not able to ship units on time. So we're really in a hurry to find a solution!

I'll try to find out if we can focus on one test, but that's difficult, because sometimes the test crashes after 3-6 minuts and sometimes after 6 hours.

[Gallan]

Basically, we are running most of the test and they are in 100%.
the following test that are run:
CPU - Maths
CPU - MMX / SSE
Memory (RAM)
2D Graphics
3D Graphics
Disk (C: OS)
Disk (D: Application)
Disk (E: Images)
Network 1
Network 2
Parallel Port
Serial Port 1
Serial Port 2

Thank you for your response...

[David (PassMark)]

We aren't aware of any specific problem with SP3.
What tests do you have running? Are you able to narrow the problem down to a specific test. e.g. just the 3D test or just the RAM test?

[Gallan]

Hi,

I have a computer system running on the following specification:

2X Intel® Quad-Core Xeon 2.0GHz FSB1333MHz 4MB Cache
ServerBoard with Intel(R) 5000P Chipset
2X 1GB FB DIMM RAM
Nvdia GF8500 graphic card
160GB SATA HDD
WindowsXP Professional SP3

We did a Burn-In Test (BIT) on the system, and after a while (say about 1,2 hours) the BIT application closed automatically.
There isn't any message left that tell us what is the error.

BTW, there wasn't any problem encountered before when we are using WindowsXP Professional SP2.

Please advise...

P.S. we've tried both BIT V5.3 and V4.0, V4.0 can slightly sustaining a longer time frame of test.