DISCLAIMER

As my cousin used to say, "All things being equal, they should work the same for you. But the Devil is in the details."

Calculation times and order of finish will vary greatly depending on a number of factors. These factors are contained both within the programs themselves and the differing hardware between your and my computers.

As such, neither the owner of this webpage nor its ISP accepts any liability expressed or implied as to the use, timings reported or rankings of any of the programs downloaded from this site.

The factors effecting your times and rankings are many and as such you may not agree with the "world rankings" as expressed on the mainpage. Your runs may get completely different results. These factors include:

• The speed of your CPU and the amount of RAM.
  • CPU speed is the most direct variable. All other things being equal, you can estimate timings as a simple ratio of your CPU speed to mine.
  • Amount of RAM in your computer is an unpredictable variable because, depending on the programming of each program, calculation may need to store intermediate values on disk. Disk I/O always takes longer than storage in main memory.
    • With not enough RAM, the program may not work at all.
    • With not enough RAM, the program may take an inordinate amount of time for larger digit runs.
    • Differing storage drives have differing read/write rates which can cause further unpredicatibility of timings.

• The cache handling abilities of the program.
  • Unless a program is specifically designed for a known system, its author makes a best guess as to how to make use of caching across individual computers.
  • Thus, your computer may handle caching either better or worse than the test computer and times can vary greatly.

• 32 bit or 64 bit OS
  • Your computer might have a 64-bit processor but unless it has a 64-bit Operating System, it will fall back to 32 bit.
  • Thus, your computer hardware might support the higher standard but not the OS.
  • Even then, differing OS's handle program mechanics differently.

• Free disk space.
  • When any program uses disk I/O, the amount of free space on your target drive will effect greatly each program's performance.
    • With not enough storage, the program may not work at all.
    • With not enough storage, the program may take an inordinate amount of time for larger digit runs.

Therefore, the stated "Stu's World Ranking" and the given times and rankings for each program may not be reproducable for you. They might vary greatly on your system depending on its hardware and the subsequent compatibility with the program's caching.

No warranty expressed or implied is offered with the release of these programs. They all work well on my computer, but no guarantee is made as to their performance on yours.

By downloading these programs and/or running them, you accept all responsibility for their effect.

It may seem crazy to have to say all this, but my cousin is a lawyer.