powerMAX

Hardware
For the CPU test the processor needs SSE, which every chip since the Intel Pentium III provides. The GPU test needs a graphics card with OpenGL 2.0 support or better.

Software
Windows 7 or a later Windows release.

The utility is deliberately bare. Nothing is installed, no file or registry key is left behind, and administrator rights are not needed.

CPU burn-in test
Two workloads are offered: SSE, and AVX where the processor supports it. Which of them heats a given chip more depends on the model, so try both while watching the figures described under Hardware Monitoring below. Either way every logical processor in the system is used and the load sits at 100%.

GPU burn-in test
A deliberately heavy 3D scene is rendered. On a machine with both integrated and discrete graphics the discrete card is picked automatically. Resolution is chosen from a preset list and the higher you go the harder the card works; multisampling is always set to the highest level the card reports.

Important note: in windowed mode the card is only fully loaded while the test window keeps the focus.

Simultaneous CPU and GPU burn-in tests
With both tests running, processor power and temperature often read a little lower than in the CPU test alone, because part of the processor is busy feeding the graphics card. The faster the processor, the smaller that gap.

Hardware Monitoring
powerMAX shows no sensor data of its own. What you use next depends on the value you care about:

• Processor and graphics activity and temperature can be followed in any monitoring tool, for example HWMonitor or HWMonitor PRO.
  
• The same tools report power, but the figure a chip publishes about itself is not always trustworthy. For a dependable number, or when the part reports no power at all, measure at the wall with a plug meter, which is also the simplest way to read total system draw during a combined CPU and GPU run. A power supply with its own monitoring works too; HWMonitor and HWMonitor PRO read most of them (see the list below).

* List of PSUs with monitoring features

• Corsair AXi series.
• Corsair RMi series.
• Thermaltake DPS 850 and 750W.

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In the vast majority of systems, no. Nothing exotic is executed: the instructions are ordinary ones, simply issued without pause. Hardware normally defends itself by throttling back or cutting power when it overheats. The exception is bargain-grade hardware, where those protections are sometimes poorly implemented, and there a sustained maximum load can end badly.

Yes. TDP is a cooling specification, not a ceiling on consumption: it states how much heat the cooler must be able to remove. Desktop processors commonly peak near one and a half times that figure, though the ratio differs from model to model.

Most software stays below TDP, but rendering engines, video encoders and scientific code come close to the limit. Testing at the extreme buys you margin: a machine that survives powerMAX will take everyday workloads, and heavy ones, in stride.

Any number of processors is fine as long as Windows sees them. Graphics testing is limited to a single card.

Mobile parts manage power far more tightly than desktop ones, because a thin chassis can only shed so much heat, so they tend to hold consumption close to their TDP. A well-designed laptop should therefore cope with any load without throttling, and powerMAX is a straightforward way to verify that.

Fullscreen is only available for part of the resolution list.

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