.svg){kind=icon} Prime95 icon in its "on" state | |
| Developer(s) | George Woltman |
|---|---|
| Initial release | 3 January 1996 |
| Stable release | 30.19 build 20[1]
/ June 2, 2024 |
| Preview release | 30.19 build 21[2]
/ September 14, 2024 |
| Written in | ASM, C |
| Operating system | Microsoft Windows, macOS, Linux, FreeBSD |
| Type | Mersenne prime finder / system stability tester |
| License | Freeware[3] |
| Website | mersenne |
Prime95, also distributed as the command-line utility mprime for FreeBSD and Linux, is a freeware application written by George Woltman. It is the official client of the Great Internet Mersenne Prime Search (GIMPS), a volunteer computing project dedicated to searching for Mersenne primes. It is also used in overclocking to test for system stability.[4]
Although most[5] of its source code is available, Prime95 is not free and open-source software because its end-user license agreement[3] states that if the software is used to find a prime qualifying for a bounty offered by the Electronic Frontier Foundation,[6] then that bounty will be claimed and distributed by GIMPS.
- ^ "GIMPS - Free Prime95 software downloads - PrimeNet".
- ^ "Gimps/V30/30.19 - download.mersenne.ca".
- ^ a b "GIMPS Legalese - PrimeNet". Great Internet Mersenne Prime Search. Retrieved 2019-05-08.
- ^ "How To Run a CPU Stress Test Using Prime95". Appuals.com. 2015-12-10. Retrieved 2019-05-23.
- ^ Woltman, George. "The security code or checksum is hard to forge. This is the only source code that is not published".
- ^ "EFF Cooperative Computing Awards". Electronic Frontier Foundation. 2008-02-29. Retrieved 2019-05-08.