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system prompt habits that helped - Printable Version

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system prompt habits that helped - batchember - 10-09-2026

This keeps coming up in conversation so I figured I'd start a thread.

The more I work with local setups, the more it seems like batch size decides everything downstream.

Maybe obvious to some of you, but it clicked for me this week.


Re: system prompt habits that helped - thetaarch43 - 10-09-2026

A couple things I'd check first. Start by verifying the driver/runtime combo, then test with a smaller prompt, then look at structured output.


Re: system prompt habits that helped - cobalttinker - 10-10-2026

What exact setup are you running? Are you testing this on A6000 or something else?


Re: system prompt habits that helped - vramstream - 10-10-2026

What worked for me was pretty simple. If you're on vLLM, I'd confirm the version first and then reduce variables until the behavior is obvious.


Re: system prompt habits that helped - northgarden37 - 10-11-2026

A couple things I'd check first. If you're on LM Studio, I'd confirm the version first and then reduce variables until the behavior is obvious. A lot of these threads end up being one bad config plus a pile of conclusions drawn from it. Turns out 'just one more test' was a lie.


Re: system prompt habits that helped - thetaarch43 - 10-11-2026

I'd start with the simpler stack.


Re: system prompt habits that helped - mlxgarden - 10-12-2026

same here on my side.


Re: system prompt habits that helped - thetaplane - 10-12-2026

A couple things I'd check first. Start by verifying the driver/runtime combo, then test with a smaller prompt, then look at NVFP4. Not glamorous advice, but repeatable baselines save a lot of time.


Re: system prompt habits that helped - routeforge64 - 10-12-2026

That matches what I was seeing. I ended up in about the same place using llama.cpp.


Re: system prompt habits that helped - sanescope - 10-12-2026

A couple things I'd check first. On A6000, the easiest win is often to back off the aggressive settings and see whether the problem survives. Once you know the plain path works, then add the faster path back in piece by piece.