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Memtest86

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Pobby
Pobby Posts: 5,438 Forumite
I am wondering if anyone has had experience with this program? I have been getting a lot of crashes, often accompanied by an error reading to suggest that the crash is related to a memory malfunction. I ran the program overnight so that it would be an in-depth test and it detected no errors. However, the problem still persist Any thoughts please?
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  • [Deleted User]
    [Deleted User] Posts: 5,186 Forumite
    1,000 Posts Combo Breaker
    Well it doesn't appear to be hardware related then, a memory leak from a dodgy program maybe?
  • Neil_Jones
    Neil_Jones Posts: 9,537 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 1,000 Posts Name Dropper
    Crashes are not always memory related. They can be caused by many things, typically memory, heat and data corruption, sometimes operating system corruption.

    What program is crashing and what error message are you getting? Please don't reply with something generic like "I'm using a program to do <a job> and it just shows an error message" because that sort of reply isn't particularly helpful to us and others who read this in the future. Thanks.
  • Pobby
    Pobby Posts: 5,438 Forumite
    It tends to crash when a fairly graphical game is playing. For example, Need for Speed.
  • mgfvvc
    mgfvvc Posts: 1,225 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 1,000 Posts Name Dropper
    Memtest86 can't detect all memory faults. My experience was I left it running for a weekend and it didn't detect a fault, but changing the memory still fixed the problem.

    If it crashes when playing highly graphical stuff, I would have to guess it's a GPU fault, or possibly a graphics driver bug. I couldn't rule out that the GPU is stressing the system in such a way that it tickles a memory fault.

    Actually it could well be CPU/GPU overheating under load.
  • poppellerant
    poppellerant Posts: 1,963 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 1,000 Posts Name Dropper Photogenic
    Pobby wrote: »
    It tends to crash when a fairly graphical game is playing. For example, Need for Speed.
    What are your system specs and how old is it? The errors may be caused by an ageing or struggling power supply. But perhaps the drivers are to blame.
  • Pobby
    Pobby Posts: 5,438 Forumite
    Thanks to everyone. Actually it is a new AMD r7 system, HOWEVER, it is an old power supply so going to up rate that.
  • [Deleted User]
    [Deleted User] Posts: 5,186 Forumite
    1,000 Posts Combo Breaker
    mgfvvc wrote: »
    Actually it could well be CPU/GPU overheating under load.

    Could be a good shout as just running memtest won't heat up the GPU like a heavily graphical based game. The heat could then be causing problems with memtest although given it's an AMD system and an old PSU I'd go for the PSU as the culprit.

    Something like https://www.cpuid.com/softwares/hwmonitor.html needs to be run in the background while gaming and set to log so the temps and voltages can be monitored.
  • Neil_Jones
    Neil_Jones Posts: 9,537 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 1,000 Posts Name Dropper
    If you want a real work out GPU wise, use this:
    http://www.ozone3d.net/benchmarks/fur/

    Note that this will stress the crap and then some more out of the GPU. If its on its last legs it may push it over the edge.
  • John_Gray
    John_Gray Posts: 5,843 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 1,000 Posts Name Dropper Photogenic
    Carefully remove the memory sticks one at a time, and replace them. Note how hard you have to put them in so that the 'wings' at each end hold the stick in tightly.

    This probably won't improve matters, but it is certainly worth a try. By chance one stick might not be firmly fixed in...
  • esuhl
    esuhl Posts: 9,409 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 1,000 Posts Name Dropper
    Have you checked that you have the latest BIOS updates and video drivers?

    Otherwise, maybe its worth stress-testing the video card before shelling out on a new PSU.
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