Yes, there are software solutions designed to assess the condition of physical system parts.
Yes, there are software solutions designed to assess the condition of physical system parts.
Userbenchmark performs this task as well, though it isn't perfectly dependable. Running several tests—around 5 to 10—is recommended for better insight. It isn't labeled malware, and it can highlight specific problems with your system. However, it doesn't catch every issue, so it remains somewhat unreliable. Still, it's the most useful option available and closely matches what you're looking for. You can see its performance by running it multiple times and sharing the results here.
yeah, but honestly something is off with that... like my infamous Kingston A400 drive... smart data says "good" no apparent errors etc, yet the speed is down to like 2.5mb/s max (doesn't matter if the drive is full or empty, new fw, old fw etc...) And you know how i actually figured out what's slowing down my whole system (the Kingston "A400")? Yeap, userbench, told me right on the head the drive is faulty (probably simply by checking actual read/write speeds instead of "smart") Removed the drive and my pc immediately became "responsive" again.
Even considering their claim of editorial independence, their approach to assessing performance is questionable at best when based on a single sample. The testing duration is insufficient to reveal any thermal problems. If they claim your SSD is defective despite perfect data integrity, it’s a risky assumption.
But they were correct...? You understand how slow it is, right? Lol (I still have the drive, but not near my PC, and it's still really slow—tested on my laptop). ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ We should definitely interpret the results, especially concerning performance. It can still offer some clues (like with my A400). Or it might mean the GPU/CPU is near the bottom, which suggests something might be off—after all, that’s what matters. It’s really better than nothing, especially for beginners who might struggle with the interpretation. But it shouldn’t be a problem for more experienced users, who can use these findings to assist. That’s why I mentioned it isn’t 100% reliable—it could miss real issues, or sometimes just guess. In other situations, it might point out faulty or suspicious components (which is better than nothing or just guessing).
they were? was there a hardware problem inside the SSD? have you attempted to reformat it? will they always be correct? even a broken clock is accurate twice a day, but I won’t go into it further to avoid derailing the discussion. I just don’t want to rely on what seems like a lucky guess to confirm that a benchmarking tool that wasn’t reliable before suddenly becomes trustworthy.
It's really about the subject, though you might want to reconsider that. It's obvious there are ideological concerns with userbench rather than the test itself—actually, it functions more as a troubleshooting aid. You should definitely overlook the "editorial freedom" you mentioned; it's not fully dependable and requires interpretation. From the start, I thought it was still much more valuable than guessing blindly in many situations. I concur the test is too brief, but that still makes it worth considering as a better alternative.
yes, absolutely, i agree. but for everything it does, there is an alternative that is better than userbench. *that* is my problem. - disk: crystaldiskinfo reads out the smart data, crystaldiskmark gives you a clear image of the speed of the drive in different circumstances (despite what you seem to claim.. 2.5MB/s or Mb/s depending on which one you meant.. is still faster than a normally operating mechanical drive in some circumstances) - cpu: prime95 will bring up just about any instability you may have, cinebench will do a very realistic load to do longer term thermal load tests. - memory: 7-zip's benchmark will make memory errors show up faster than memtest in some cases. besides that it's also a very realistic CPU load that can run overnight. - gpu: the unigine benchmarks, and well.. hundreds of other options. - other sensors: hwinfo64 oh.. and if you want something that'll do all tests at once, and poop out a report... AIDA64 trial. i'm pretty sure the trial will still poop out a report.
you need to understand things from a beginner’s point of view as well... those tests you talked about are even trickier to execute and decipher. UB is basically just a quick glance, pretty straightforward once you get the hang of it... if you’re lucky it gives you some insight (like with my A400), otherwise you keep going... by the way... I don’t have Aida64 without trying, it doesn’t help much for me. It might show my RAM latency (good!) and I can use it as a plugin for Afterburner, but that’s essentially all the value it provides. Just like these tools often aren’t very user-friendly or clear. P.S.: there’s a report that can indicate problems? I wasn’t aware of it, but that would be helpful. Yeah, I don’t really know, but the main point is my other drives are about 500mb/s, and my regular HDDs are around 130mb (or faster), so Kingston is definitely lagging. That’s roughly the same as a floppy drive speed or even slower? ^this is with CrystaldiskMark (since I had to double-check UB, obviously, and you know it...) edit: apparently it’s MB/s)
it comes with a variety of built-in tests and gathers a lot of system details. it doesn’t flag issues like “this part is faulty” unless the data clearly shows it. when something really breaks and affects performance, it’s usually easy to spot. for example, i’ve got a couple of broken SSDs that stop working completely during sequential tests. actually, i own two of them. even though you might say it’s just a coincidence when it pointed to the issue, back in the day there were many discussions about userbenchmark revealing underperformance. but it’s mostly due to overly strict thresholds they set without proper testing. if this were simple—just a software warning—it wouldn’t be necessary for skilled technicians anymore. until about a year ago, i worked in an environment where people kept sending parts back because the shop didn’t troubleshoot properly. this shows there’s more to it than just a quick fix.
it still does that... that's where the interpretation thing comes in... like for example is it "underperforming" at 96% (it really does say that sometimes lol) or is it "underperforming" at 11%? <-- there's definitely a difference in severity here... yes, true, there isnt a software that can do that reliably, but the ub thing is the closest thing to do that, as i said you really have to forget about it as a yes/no/good/bad* thing primarily, more like "where is something that doesn't perform as expected" and then you still need to interpret it... for example it kept telling me my ram latency is bad , yes, but only by ~10 ns... its really not something I care much about, but it was still shown in *red* hence i needed to look it up, compare with other data, etc. *the main reason they do things as they do is to sell you new parts through their affiliate links, hence you really need to see through that and concentrate on the actual results and if they could really be an issue and not *their* interpretation thereof (so in no way its a perfect test or anything, it can just give some hints really) i did kinda too actually, for 3 months as a "volunteer" it was actually fun and i learned a lot -- but that actually funny enough didn't happen often... i just recall 1 case now where someone had a "prebuilt" with a way too weak power supply as an example where another shop messed it up... mostly was: - it doesn't work - its slow - i think i may have a gazillion viruses installed "by accident" - i forgot my password / my ex changed my password (lol) also lots of half dying hdds and power supplies, sometimes mobos... ps: my absolute favorite: "my wifi doesn't work and i did not turn it off!" - every single time they turned off the wifi, sometimes even with a physical button (on older laptops) Also sidenote, there were a lot of long-term returning customers, you just knew its a good repair shop, and it was cheap as well, and also we had 1 guy (unofficial boss) that really knew 99% what's wrong immediately even with the lousiest of error descriptions... and yes, we definitely had some customers who came back the next day just to say that its really fixed! : p (like dead mobos etc) oh, and thats also where i built my first "gaming pc" ... no instructions and it worked perfectly... the only thing i didn't use the standoffs (because i never seen that before, definitely looked like junk to me lol) but *that* the boss told me right away, i better install those. : D ^ the standoffs also were clear plastic... ive never seen anything like that that again lol