Now that the closed Alpha Testing Phase has ended and we fixed the known bugs and compatibility with new CPU architectures. We launched the beta version of the new BlackHoleTec CPU Benchmark software.

Three years ago, ComputerForum.com was the testing base of our own benchmarking software. Without much knowledge of microprocessors, programming or hardware in general I was able to create a so called 'CPU Benchmark'. With loads of instability issues, bugs and a limited set of tests; it achieved something that we can almost call 'a success'. After several exposures on forums, HWBot.org, reviews and even competitions, the benchmark got known to a lot of geeks, overclockers and enthusiasts.

It wasn't the most reliable and stable benchmark ever created, but it certainly did scale well compared to other similar benchmarks.

The benchmark got more and more forgotten and after W10 came out, we even saw incompatibility issues with the new operating system.

In those three years, I've had very limited time to be active on forums, update the benchmark or even write on the website... What kept me busy were my studies at the university, currently my third year industrial engineer.

A year ago I decided to pick up where I left off three years ago and use the knowledge I gathered in the past years to rebuild from the ground up; a stable and more reliable benchmark than it was back in the days.

In the meantime, we're again 1 year later, now that I ensured compatibility for Ryzen and kaby lake, the finalizing beta can be tested.

Alpha-Phase *Closed*

An Alpha version is needed for major bug and stability checking as well as measuring the reliability of the benchmark. In this phase, we have no idea of how good or bad every aspect of the benchmark actually is. Suggestions, recommendations (also for the design), comments, theories and whatever are the key for improvement shaping the next version which will be used in a beta stage.

ComputerForum.com has been chosen for this closed alpha test-phase, only members of this forum can participate.

Beta-Phase *Running*

The alpha phase is officially over; Now only small bug testing needs to be done for things I didn't see in the development. This isn't only limited to testing on the CF forum and can be tested by everyone, everywhere.

Features

The original three divisions: Quad-Threaded, Multi-Threaded and Single-Threaded for which the benchmark will test the performance rate using the stated amount of cores.

Each of the divisions has a Prime Number test:

This test will measure your CPUs capability to search for prime numbers. It's a number that can only be divided by itself (keeping it a round number) and of course 1. Some examples starting from 1 are: 1, 2, 3, 5, 7, 11, 13, 17, 19, ... The test will search for prime numbers between 1 and 2 million (using the formula Sieve of Atkin limited at 2 million) and repeats this several times. The score depends on how fast it can complete the test. The algorithm uses CPU operations (like modulo, multiplications, divisions, ... We use 64bit integer values) to check every number between 1 and 2 million, looping its way through. A prime numbers is marked as a 'hit' and the rest will report nothing. As our tests run Prime parallel with integer and floating point counters, we estimate that the prime test itself uses 2.5MB of memory for each core.​

Each of the divisions has a Compression Test:

created list), decompress this list and compress the decompressed list again. Complex data-structures are compressed using the zLib data compression library by This test will measure the time needed for the CPU: to compress several looped internal Strings (which are added to alist), decompress this list and compress the decompressed list again. Complex data-structures are compressed using the zLib data compression library by Jean-loup Gailly and Mark Adler that uses the DEFLATE data compression algorithm which is a combination of the LZ77 algorithm and Huffman coding . There's no limit of compression/decompression size and is until now one of the most used and effective data-compression algorithms with a compression rate of around 4:1 in this particular test.​

Integer/Floating Point Performance Counters

Running through the two previous tests, there're two kinds of performance counters looping on several other threads (only used in Quad- & Multi-threaded). Those tests include floating point and integer calculations increasing a specific counter while looping through the same calculation. Numbers displayed are the amount of times each calculation (integer/floating point) has been completed during the 2 previous tests. We're using 64-bit integers and floating point numbers (numbers with a fractional part which are handled quite different by the CPU than integers). Operations in these 2 calculations are similar: it adds, subtracts, divides and multiplies these values. Both are good indicators for the raw performance of a CPU. Using much less memory as the prime number test for each running thread.​

Stress/Stability Test (Premium Feature)

Using similar tests as the above to test the stability of your system on the selected amount of threads. As a cause of stability testing, your CPU will heat up the more threads you select.​

Supports up to 32 Threads (will be increased to unlimited with the RC version)

Designed for W7 and higher

Design

The Design is a creation of Tim Hage, suggestions on this part of the benchmark are welcome as well.

preview:

Requirements :

64-bit windows (recommended for W10, W7 & higher also compatible)

Thank you for the help & participation in our testing phase.

You can find the beta testing thread on the CF forum: https://www.computerforum.com/threads/beta-black-hole-benchmark-v5.239542/

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