How do I use this MemTest86 to tell if my RAM is bad?

[Chad]

Using Windows XP Pro I'm getting all kinds of crashes. I ran MemTest86 overnight but when I woke up the test was still going (over 11 hours) and had yet to finish. How do I get the test to stop and give me a report?

 

[mcveigh]

it will take that long for a full test, remember most people have MILLIONS of bytes. and there are I think 7 test s it runs on each.

look in the error column. did it say anything? I stopped mine after 30 minutes, it found like 700,000 errors.

 

[tart666]

Look at the number of passes, top left corner I think. If that's above 0, and you still have no error -- good sign.

I think each pass takes about 40 min for a 256MB of DDR266.

 

[thorin]

What's the pass counter at?
Did it report any errors (it does that in realtime in the bottom chunk of the screen)?
I'm pretty sure you can hit 'esc' but there should be information on screen on what various keys do....

Thorin

 

[Chad]

I'm not sure. I Esc out this morning so I could get back on. Where exactly are the errors reported? I think I seen a column that showed errors and there were thousands of them, then there was a column that said Err and had 0 in it. I only have two sticks of DDR memory, both 256 megs, so only a total of 512. But 11 hours seems a bit long for a test. So just to clarify, the test WILL stop eventually? and give a report of somekind? I don't know what I'm looking at, but I'm inclined to think my memory has gone bad... I just wish I could know how to tell for sure.

 

[mcveigh]

I think in the readme file it mentions the time, but yes it will end.

 

[Chad]

It says something about 5 hours... how long should I expect it to run?

 

[mcveigh]

can you run it again for like a half hour.

write down EVERYTHING ON THE SCREEN.

then post it here for us to read the tea leaves

 

[Chad]

That's a whole lot of stuff to write down! Can it not produce a .log file somehow?

 

[RalfHutter]

Attention Everybody:

The Test Will Not End.

It runs in a continuous loop. It will continue running over and over until you shut it off. It can take a while to complete even one loop, depending on what type , speed and quantity of RAM in your system.

Example:

On my rigs:

One loop (7 basic tests) takes about 25 min with 1024MB of DDR400 RAM.

One loop (7 basic tests) takes about 4 HOURs with 512MB of PC133 RAM.

 

[Jeff7]

Originally posted by: RalfHutter
Attention Everybody:

The Test Will Not End.

It runs in a continuous loop. It will continue running over and over until you shut it off. It can take a while to complete even one loop, depending on what type , speed and quantity of RAM in your system.

Exactly. It gives a "report" as the test is being run. Somewhere on the screen it should give the number of errors. Anything more than zero, and you might be overclocking too much or using too aggressive timings. Good RAM shouldn't give any errors.

 

[Texun]

I left it running overnight and during the next day. When I came home it had completed 83 tests with zero errors reported. I didn't know it would run forever, but at that point I figured enough was enough.