What to do about memtest errors- Random reboot?

[mrzed]

Systems specs are:

MSI KT3Ultra2/XP1700+(1467)@default (for now)/1 stick of 256MbPC2700 Samsung OEM Running at SPD.

I get occasional seemingly random reboots, and from reading other threads, thought to try memtest. Sure enough, I get errors. Funny thing is, the reboots often seem to happen when I'm doing nothing taxing (outlook, word, surfing).

This is OEM memory, and I bought it more than 30 days ago so I think I'm SOL for returning it. The system runs Prime95 all night without errors (at 1870Mhz even). Temps are OK (36c idle, high 40's when pushing hard). I have a good PSU.

The reboots are every few days, this annoys me, but it's not a huge deal for now. I am mostly annoyed because I never got these reboots before, and so never thought to check the memory. My bad.

Is there another source of instability I should be looking for? Should I up the VDIMM from default? Thoughts?

 

[mrzed]

bump?

 

[pm]

These are hard ones to debug. One of the reasons why ECC memory is nice.

In the order of most likely to least likely: A bad memory cell, chip, pin, or DIMM. Memory erorrs could be caused by voltage droop. Radioactivity. And extremely rarely, a bad chip in the chipset, bad motherboard routing, or a problem in the CPU.

Voltage droop is easy to test. Just bump the voltage.
A bad memory cell, chip, pin or DIMM is also fairly easy. Run memtest and it should fail on the same memory location (bad cell), same row or column (bad chip), same bit (bad pin or DIMM). Replace the memory. Ideally with ECC memory if your motherboard supports ECC.
High radioactivity sounds like a joke, but it's not. In the unlikely event that you have a radioactive source near the computer (an old glow-in-the-dark clock, old laboratory equipment, a small chunk of radium), move it somwhere else.
A bad motherboard or CPU is rare but possible. These are hard to debug without a spare motherboard or CPU.

 

[JonB]

or, like me, you run a cluster of SETI crunchers in your office at a nuclear power plant

seriously, I do work there, but there isn't anything measurable (yes, it's been checked)
I do, however, have a motherboard prone to random reboots. I was leaning towards underpowered power supply, but will try bumping up the RAM voltage first thing Monday.

keep on glowing !!!