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Memory Test
I'm increasingly convinced that my computer has a memory problem. It
will stall out and I see the little icon going around in circles for several seconds or sometimes minutes then it will recover and all is fine until the next time. This happens about four or five times each hour. I've had this problem for several weeks and have tried everything I can think of to determine the cause. I'm running Windows 7 Home Premium with the latest updates. This is installed on a homebuilt computer with an AZUS P7P55D motherboard. I have plenty of free disk space and have checked the hard drives several times but found no errors or bad sectors. I am considering downloading and running the computer memory test software from this site: http://www.ehow.com/print/how_550796...emory-ram.html Can anyone tell me if this software will do what it claims and is it safe to use? Thanks, Gordon |
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#2
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Memory Test
"Antares 531" wrote in message ... I'm increasingly convinced that my computer has a memory problem. It will stall out and I see the little icon going around in circles for several seconds or sometimes minutes then it will recover and all is fine until the next time. This happens about four or five times each hour. I've had this problem for several weeks and have tried everything I can think of to determine the cause. I'm running Windows 7 Home Premium with the latest updates. This is installed on a homebuilt computer with an AZUS P7P55D motherboard. I have plenty of free disk space and have checked the hard drives several times but found no errors or bad sectors. I am considering downloading and running the computer memory test software from this site: http://www.ehow.com/print/how_550796...emory-ram.html Can anyone tell me if this software will do what it claims and is it safe to use? Thanks, Gordon. Windows 7 has that program already installed. Go to Start and type windows memory diagnostics in the search box. The first result should be the one you want. You'll have the option of rebooting and running it now, or scheduling it to run the next time you restart your PC. It's a pretty decent memory checker, but a better option is Memtest86+ from he http://www.memtest.org/ . The procedure is pretty much the same; create a boot CD with it, then boot from it. It does a more thorough testing of your RAM, and will usually show any errors after one pass. -- SC Tom |
#3
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Memory Test
"Antares 531" wrote in message ... I'm increasingly convinced that my computer has a memory problem. It will stall out and I see the little icon going around in circles for several seconds or sometimes minutes then it will recover and all is fine until the next time. This happens about four or five times each hour. I've had this problem for several weeks and have tried everything I can think of to determine the cause. I'm running Windows 7 Home Premium with the latest updates. This is installed on a homebuilt computer with an AZUS P7P55D motherboard. I have plenty of free disk space and have checked the hard drives several times but found no errors or bad sectors. I am considering downloading and running the computer memory test software from this site: http://www.ehow.com/print/how_550796...emory-ram.html Can anyone tell me if this software will do what it claims and is it safe to use? Thanks, Gordon You should already have the memory tool installed: Control Panel (icon view) Admin tools Memory Diag. I've never used it so I don't know if it's any good. |
#4
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Memory Test
On 8/20/2012 1:07 PM, Antares 531 wrote:
I'm increasingly convinced that my computer has a memory problem. It will stall out and I see the little icon going around in circles for several seconds or sometimes minutes then it will recover and all is fine until the next time. This happens about four or five times each hour. I've had this problem for several weeks and have tried everything I can think of to determine the cause. I'm running Windows 7 Home Premium with the latest updates. This is installed on a homebuilt computer with an AZUS P7P55D motherboard. I have plenty of free disk space and have checked the hard drives several times but found no errors or bad sectors. I am considering downloading and running the computer memory test software from this site: http://www.ehow.com/print/how_550796...emory-ram.html Can anyone tell me if this software will do what it claims and is it safe to use? Thanks, Gordon I doubt that it's RAM causing the problem. Memtest 86 and the windows memory checker are easily available. A more problematic memory to test is the memory on the video card. I don't know of a way to easily test all of the video card memory. Looking for video artifacts, and unusual video corruption seems to be the usual method. I'd ask if you have considered such things as buffering to disk, malware, and whatever background programs are running? For all I know, your P/C might be checking for email and such things every five minutes or so, and the server or IP is causing the delay. Stranger things happen. A recent bandaid to a nagging video problem involving Xfire and a couple of ATI/AMD video cards - - The problem has occurred over a several year timeframe. Exact symptoms have changed with driver and windows updates. Temperature has a minor effect. Applications involved are generally first person shooter or those with high speed and high resolution graphics. Far Cry 2 seems to currently be the worst offender. In the past Crysis2 was as bad or worse. Symptoms occurring at various times Video corruption of various kinds, usually falling into the below - - Windows error - video card failed to respond in the allotted time. Application lock, corrupt desktop icons System lock System crash (blue screen, last driver version) Various errors pointing to video driver modules and occasionally DX modules. Error occurs more frequently with xfire enabled. (Two video cards) The System Memory passes every memory test you can think of. Video memory can only be formally tested up to about 1/4 of the on card memory. On to the band aid. Of all things, changing RAM from 1T to 2T make the symptoms go away. DDR2, 4G system, 2G Video card memory, Win7-32 Note that the memory passes all testing at 1 or 2 T. |
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Memory Test
On 8/20/2012 12:07 PM, Antares 531 wrote:
I'm increasingly convinced that my computer has a memory problem. It will stall out and I see the little icon going around in circles for several seconds or sometimes minutes then it will recover and all is fine until the next time. This happens about four or five times each hour. I've had this problem for several weeks and have tried everything I can think of to determine the cause. I'm running Windows 7 Home Premium with the latest updates. This is installed on a homebuilt computer with an AZUS P7P55D motherboard. I have plenty of free disk space and have checked the hard drives several times but found no errors or bad sectors. I am considering downloading and running the computer memory test software from this site: http://www.ehow.com/print/how_550796...emory-ram.html Can anyone tell me if this software will do what it claims and is it safe to use? Thanks, Gordon Lots of others have given you advice about checking your memory. And I too trust memtest86+ as well. And if you have a Linux Ubuntu CD, it is on their too. And you don't run Linux to use it either. It is one of the options on the boot menu. Now about keeping your computer up-to-date. I have 20+ laptops here and about 5 years ago, I started testing some of them without updates. And one thing is very clear, the ones that gets updates gets slower and slower and the ones that doesn't, stay working just like they always did year after year. This particular Windows 7 machine I am on right now lost a bit of ground after SP1 was install. Even the Windows Experience Index dropped a bit. And the Windows Media Center now plays the TV choppy. So all of this testing and experience, I generally prefer non-updated machines vs. updated machines. They work so much better. And I haven't gotten any trojan or virus either. I do keep my antivirus checkers up-to-date though. ;-) -- Bill Gateway M465e ('06 era) - Thunderbird v12 Centrino Core2 Duo T7400 2.16 GHz - 4GB - Windows 7 SP1 |
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Memory Test
On Mon, 20 Aug 2012 12:07:45 -0500, Antares 531
wrote: I'm increasingly convinced that my computer has a memory problem. It will stall out and I see the little icon going around in circles for several seconds or sometimes minutes then it will recover and all is fine until the next time. This happens about four or five times each hour. I've had this problem for several weeks and have tried everything I can think of to determine the cause. I'm running Windows 7 Home Premium with the latest updates. This is installed on a homebuilt computer with an AZUS P7P55D motherboard. I have plenty of free disk space and have checked the hard drives several times but found no errors or bad sectors. I am considering downloading and running the computer memory test software from this site: http://www.ehow.com/print/how_550796...emory-ram.html Can anyone tell me if this software will do what it claims and is it safe to use? Thanks, Gordon Thanks to all for your answers. I don't understand the problem at all. The drive light goes on full time and the drives are whirring every time I get this stall out. I checked the drives and they all have an abundance of free space. I did a defrag and error check but this didn't change anything. It acts like something like an intricate backup process goes into action every few minutes but when I check the Action Center I get the message, "No current issues detected." I have Microsoft Security Essentials on this computer and have it updated regularly. It has never indicated any form of malware invasion. Baffling??? Gordon |
#7
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Memory Test
Antares 531 wrote:
On Mon, 20 Aug 2012 12:07:45 -0500, Antares 531 wrote: I'm increasingly convinced that my computer has a memory problem. It will stall out and I see the little icon going around in circles for several seconds or sometimes minutes then it will recover and all is fine until the next time. This happens about four or five times each hour. I've had this problem for several weeks and have tried everything I can think of to determine the cause. I'm running Windows 7 Home Premium with the latest updates. This is installed on a homebuilt computer with an AZUS P7P55D motherboard. I have plenty of free disk space and have checked the hard drives several times but found no errors or bad sectors. I am considering downloading and running the computer memory test software from this site: http://www.ehow.com/print/how_550796...emory-ram.html Can anyone tell me if this software will do what it claims and is it safe to use? Thanks, Gordon Thanks to all for your answers. I don't understand the problem at all. The drive light goes on full time and the drives are whirring every time I get this stall out. I checked the drives and they all have an abundance of free space. I did a defrag and error check but this didn't change anything. It acts like something like an intricate backup process goes into action every few minutes but when I check the Action Center I get the message, "No current issues detected." I have Microsoft Security Essentials on this computer and have it updated regularly. It has never indicated any form of malware invasion. Baffling??? Gordon Keep Task Manager open. Click the top of the CPU column, to "sort by % usage". Make sure the box is ticked to show all users in the list. Then, when all the "whirring" happens, go look at Task Manager, and see what's chewing up cycles. Sure, it could show as Explorer, and then you'd be no further ahead. But, perhaps the guilty party will show 100% usage. And if the guilty party is the AV software, you could be having a "knife fight" between a piece of malware and the AV. I used to get those, when I had a Kaspersky subscription, and I'd use certain Sysinternals programs. Kasperksy would go nuts, and the machine would go to 100%, and input was useless. And it was because the Sysinternals program would make a request, Kaspersky would block it, over and over again, in an infinite loop. Paul |
#8
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Memory Test
On 8/20/2012 7:36 PM, Antares 531 wrote:
On Mon, 20 Aug 2012 12:07:45 -0500, Antares 531 wrote: I'm increasingly convinced that my computer has a memory problem. It will stall out and I see the little icon going around in circles for several seconds or sometimes minutes then it will recover and all is fine until the next time. This happens about four or five times each hour. I've had this problem for several weeks and have tried everything I can think of to determine the cause. I'm running Windows 7 Home Premium with the latest updates. This is installed on a homebuilt computer with an AZUS P7P55D motherboard. I have plenty of free disk space and have checked the hard drives several times but found no errors or bad sectors. I am considering downloading and running the computer memory test software from this site: http://www.ehow.com/print/how_550796...emory-ram.html Can anyone tell me if this software will do what it claims and is it safe to use? Thanks, Gordon Thanks to all for your answers. I don't understand the problem at all. The drive light goes on full time and the drives are whirring every time I get this stall out. I checked the drives and they all have an abundance of free space. I did a defrag and error check but this didn't change anything. It acts like something like an intricate backup process goes into action every few minutes but when I check the Action Center I get the message, "No current issues detected." I have Microsoft Security Essentials on this computer and have it updated regularly. It has never indicated any form of malware invasion. Baffling??? Gordon Yes I see this a lot under Windows 7. Especially coming back from hibernation. This is one of the things I really don't like about Windows 7. Vista was worst and Microsoft fixed it sort of so things appear to happen faster, but parts are really lugging and Microsoft hopes you don't notice. Adding more memory seems to help. I don't know how much you have or anything or even 32 or 64 bit. As it that makes a difference. And I am not surprised that defragging didn't help. I have heard this for decades. Back in the 80's it did make a big difference with MFM drives. But since IDE drives, nothing to write home about. But the story continues. I usually defrag mine about once every two years and I check the boot up times and loading application and data before and after. And the best times I ever got after defrag was about an 1% increase. :-( -- Bill Gateway M465e ('06 era) - Thunderbird v12 Centrino Core2 Duo T7400 2.16 GHz - 4GB - Windows 7 SP1 |
#9
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Memory Test
On 20/08/2012 8:36 PM, Antares 531 wrote:
Thanks to all for your answers. I don't understand the problem at all. The drive light goes on full time and the drives are whirring every time I get this stall out. I checked the drives and they all have an abundance of free space. I did a defrag and error check but this didn't change anything. I assume that this means that you've now run the memory test and found nothing wrong with your RAM? If so, then I think that sounds right, the symptoms you were describing didn't sound like RAM problems to me at all, it sounded like disk problems to me instead. It acts like something like an intricate backup process goes into action every few minutes but when I check the Action Center I get the message, "No current issues detected." That's because that's not Action Center's job. Action Center looks for things like whether backups are being run, or if an anti-virus is installed. For errors, you have to go into Event Viewer. Look for ATA or ATAPI disk errors. I have Microsoft Security Essentials on this computer and have it updated regularly. It has never indicated any form of malware invasion. Yup, the symptoms don't sound like viruses either. Yousuf Khan |
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Memory Test
Antares 531 wrote:
Thanks to all for your answers. I don't understand the problem at all. The drive light goes on full time and the drives are whirring every time I get this stall out. I checked the drives and they all have an abundance of free space. I did a defrag and error check but this didn't change anything. It acts like something like an intricate backup process goes into action every few minutes but when I check the Action Center I get the message, "No current issues detected." Have you carefully examined any backup software you may have to see if there's an automatic backup enabled? Your comment above may be what's actually happening if something is trying to backup your whole PC... -- XS11E, Killing all posts from Google Groups The Usenet Improvement Project: http://twovoyagers.com/improve-usenet.org/ |
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Memory Test
On Mon, 20 Aug 2012 12:07:45 -0500, Antares 531 wrote:
I'm increasingly convinced that my computer has a memory problem. It will stall out and I see the little icon going around in circles for several seconds or sometimes minutes then it will recover and all is fine until the next time. This happens about four or five times each hour. I've had this problem for several weeks and have tried everything I can think of to determine the cause. I'm running Windows 7 Home Premium with the latest updates. This is installed on a homebuilt computer with an AZUS P7P55D motherboard. I have plenty of free disk space and have checked the hard drives several times but found no errors or bad sectors. I am considering downloading and running the computer memory test software from this site: http://www.ehow.com/print/how_550796...emory-ram.html Can anyone tell me if this software will do what it claims and is it safe to use? Thanks, Gordon I get this when my wireless printer is turned off. Not sure if any disk activity since it's a laptop. |
#13
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Memory Test
That could also happen from a bad sata cable from the hard drive to the sata
port. Try another sata or new sata cable. Antares 531 wrote: I'm increasingly convinced that my computer has a memory problem. It will stall out and I see the little icon going around in circles for several seconds or sometimes minutes then it will recover and all is fine until the next time. This happens about four or five times each hour. I've had this problem for several weeks and have tried everything I can think of to determine the cause. I'm running Windows 7 Home Premium with the latest updates. This is installed on a homebuilt computer with an AZUS P7P55D motherboard. I have plenty of free disk space and have checked the hard drives several times but found no errors or bad sectors. I am considering downloading and running the computer memory test software from this site: http://www.ehow.com/print/how_550796...emory-ram.html Can anyone tell me if this software will do what it claims and is it safe to use? Thanks, Gordon -- The Grandmaster of the CyberFROG Come get your ticket to CyberFROG city Nay, Art thou decideth playeth ye simpleton games. *Some* of us know proper manners Very few. I used to take calls from *rank* noobs but got fired the first day on the job for potty mouth, Bur-ring, i'll get this one: WHAT'S YOUR PROBLEM JERK!!? We're here to help you dickweed, ok, ok give the power cord the jiggily piggily wiggily all the while pushing the power button repeatedly now take everything out of your computer except the power supply and *one* stick of ram. Ok get the next sucker on the phone. Deirdre Straughan (Roxio) is a LIAR (Deirdre McFibber) There's the employer and the employee and the FROGGER and the FROGEE, which one are you? Hamster isn't a newsreader it's a mistake! El-Gonzo Jackson FROGS both me and Chuckcar (I just got EL-FROG-OED!!) All hail Chuckcar the CZAR!! Or in F-R-O-Gland Chuckcar laFROG laCZAR, ChuckZar!! I hate them both, With useless bogus bull**** you need at least *three* fulltime jobs to afford either one of them I'm a fulltime text *only* man on usenet now. The rest of the world downloads the binary files not me i can't afford thousands of dollars a month VBB = Volume based billing. How many bytes can we shove down your throat and out your arse sir? The only "fix" for the CellPig modem is a sledgehammer. UBB = User based bullFROGGING Master Juba was a black man imitating a white man imitating a black man Always do incremental backups of your data or you'll end up like the A-Holes at DSL Reports. Justin says i made a boo-boo. Yeah boo-who. Updates are for idiots. As long as the thing works there's no reason to turn schizophrenic and develop a lifelong complex over such a silly issue. Adrian "jackpot" Lewis is a mama's boy! Jimmy Fricke is good for the game of poker Using my technical prowess and computer abilities to answer questions beyond the realm of understandability Regards Tony... Making usenet better for everyone everyday This sig file was compiled via my journeys through usenet |
#14
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Memory Test
Check the sata cable from the hard drive to the sata port. Interchange it with
the one from the DVD/CD drive. Antares 531 wrote: On Mon, 20 Aug 2012 12:07:45 -0500, Antares 531 wrote: I'm increasingly convinced that my computer has a memory problem. It will stall out and I see the little icon going around in circles for several seconds or sometimes minutes then it will recover and all is fine until the next time. This happens about four or five times each hour. I've had this problem for several weeks and have tried everything I can think of to determine the cause. I'm running Windows 7 Home Premium with the latest updates. This is installed on a homebuilt computer with an AZUS P7P55D motherboard. I have plenty of free disk space and have checked the hard drives several times but found no errors or bad sectors. I am considering downloading and running the computer memory test software from this site: http://www.ehow.com/print/how_550796...emory-ram.html Can anyone tell me if this software will do what it claims and is it safe to use? Thanks, Gordon Thanks to all for your answers. I don't understand the problem at all. The drive light goes on full time and the drives are whirring every time I get this stall out. I checked the drives and they all have an abundance of free space. I did a defrag and error check but this didn't change anything. It acts like something like an intricate backup process goes into action every few minutes but when I check the Action Center I get the message, "No current issues detected." I have Microsoft Security Essentials on this computer and have it updated regularly. It has never indicated any form of malware invasion. Baffling??? Gordon -- The Grandmaster of the CyberFROG Come get your ticket to CyberFROG city Nay, Art thou decideth playeth ye simpleton games. *Some* of us know proper manners Very few. I used to take calls from *rank* noobs but got fired the first day on the job for potty mouth, Bur-ring, i'll get this one: WHAT'S YOUR PROBLEM JERK!!? We're here to help you dickweed, ok, ok give the power cord the jiggily piggily wiggily all the while pushing the power button repeatedly now take everything out of your computer except the power supply and *one* stick of ram. Ok get the next sucker on the phone. Deirdre Straughan (Roxio) is a LIAR (Deirdre McFibber) There's the employer and the employee and the FROGGER and the FROGEE, which one are you? Hamster isn't a newsreader it's a mistake! El-Gonzo Jackson FROGS both me and Chuckcar (I just got EL-FROG-OED!!) All hail Chuckcar the CZAR!! Or in F-R-O-Gland Chuckcar laFROG laCZAR, ChuckZar!! I hate them both, With useless bogus bull**** you need at least *three* fulltime jobs to afford either one of them I'm a fulltime text *only* man on usenet now. The rest of the world downloads the binary files not me i can't afford thousands of dollars a month VBB = Volume based billing. How many bytes can we shove down your throat and out your arse sir? The only "fix" for the CellPig modem is a sledgehammer. UBB = User based bullFROGGING Master Juba was a black man imitating a white man imitating a black man Always do incremental backups of your data or you'll end up like the A-Holes at DSL Reports. Justin says i made a boo-boo. Yeah boo-who. Updates are for idiots. As long as the thing works there's no reason to turn schizophrenic and develop a lifelong complex over such a silly issue. Adrian "jackpot" Lewis is a mama's boy! Jimmy Fricke is good for the game of poker Using my technical prowess and computer abilities to answer questions beyond the realm of understandability Regards Tony... Making usenet better for everyone everyday This sig file was compiled via my journeys through usenet |
#15
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Memory Test
On Tue, 21 Aug 2012 02:11:29 -0400, Yousuf Khan wrote:
I assume that this means that you've now run the memory test and found nothing wrong with your RAM? If so, then I think that sounds right, the symptoms you were describing didn't sound like RAM problems to me at all, it sounded like disk problems to me instead. Years ago I had a computer which repeatedly passed the two RAM tests that I had then (I do recall that one was memtest86; maybe the other was called DrMem?). But, being telepathic, I really thought it was a RAM problem, so I used the two sticks one at a time instead of as a pair, and the intermittent failures disappeared when I used stick A, but not with stick B. I replaced both sticks. Of course, this is very old and very anecdotal cautionary tale. -- Gene E. Bloch (Stumbling Bloch) |
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