Re: Memtest86+, ver, 1.65

MaceFace wrote:

JAD wrote:


no one in the business of troubleshooting, tests components
in a suspect machine, its counter productive.



It's sometimes necessary, such as when the fault can't be duplicated
with any other machine

In which case you're not troubleshooting a "component" you're troubleshooting a system (and/or a design).

Of course, you wouldn't know that unless you *had* tested the components in a separate known working machine or proper test bed.

or when there is no other machine. 

Not having the proper test equipment begs the question.

At any rate, you're still not 'testing a component in the suspect machine'.

 You'd know
that if you ever worked on something other than the most mundane
hardware, as a friend of mine has (some of that hardware is no longer
on this planet).

JAD may not be explaining it in the most easily understood manner but he is quite correct and your friend, who has 'out of this world' equipment, would agree with JAD.

If you have a system not working properly and you suspect component A is the reason then how do you test your theory that it IS component A by operating the suspect component in the very system that is not working properly?

Answer is, you can't. You either replace component A and deduce from the system then operating properly that the problem was, indeed, component A (not 100% accurate) or you take component A to a known working system, or better still a proper test bed, and verify it's operation.

The problem with the 'test it with memtest in the system' theory is the deduction that if 'memory fails' then the memory module must be defective when, in fact, there are numerous other things that could be the problem with one of the most obvious being improper memory timings set in BIOS. I.E. it can fail without 'the component (supposedly) under test' being 'bad'.

Memtest may give you a clue, that's what 'diagnostics' do, but the real 'test' is when you go out and buy another memory module and plug it in: the replacement test. And you may discover it doesn't work either because there's something else that's the problem. Even more confusing, the new module might work yet there *still* be nothing wrong with the previous one (an obvious reason might be the previous one not plugged in properly, or dirty contacts, and the act of replacing 'fixed' that problem). And there are many other more subtle possibilities, such as a noisy power supply that some modules might tolerate better than others even though they all meet specifications.

Which is why JAD suggested that whoever was testing with memtest send him all their 'defective' memory modules.




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