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Do Overclocked CPUs Need a "Burn In" Period?
SinnopS asks: "I have been dealing with computers for a few years now, yet there is one thing that i can never find the correct answer too. And that question is wheather or not an overclocked CPU need to have "burn in" time. In my expirience, the Duron that I have was very unstabil for the first few days then worked perfectly. however, some people are saying buring in is not true and a thing of the past. Can some one shed some light on this subject for me?"
The purpose of burn-in testing is to find parts that could fail on the customer. It has no effect on stability other than to eliminate faulty parts.
Most electronic (or at least semiconductor) components follow the "bathtub curve" for failures. This means that components are likely to fail very early after manufacture, or at the end of their operational life (*), with a long stable period in between. You want to try to catch the ones that will fail early before your customer complains about it.
From what I understand of semiconductor electronics, running the system for a while will not help it stabilize or anything else.
(*) For older semiconductor parts, their lifetime was 15-20 years. But for stuff produced now, it's about 5. Constant causes the gates to "wear out". The fancy phrase is "electron migration". The metal in the junctions gets eroded away by the current, weaking the gate. High current, and especially high temperatures accelerate this process.