How to run memtest on Ubuntu 8.04?

Question

I have Ubuntu 8.04 installed and it's been freezing and doing abnormal restarts (link) so I want to test the memory.

Does anyone know how can I do a memory test?

Thanks!

Solution 1

Boot off a livecd? There is a method to select it off the grub boot menu as well, but I can't remember off the top of my head. I think it is something like hitting the ESC key while booting.

Solution 2

Reboot with the install media in the CD. Select "MemTest" from the boot menu.

You can use any ver. of ubuntu live cd. Or almost any other live distro. Most of them have MemTest as boot option.

I would leave MemTest running overnight - at least 8-12 hours. Just so it can detect problems caused by heat, or not permanent problems.

Solution 3

I like SystemRescueCD for this type of thing. Here's a screenshot of the options page, where you type 'memtest' to fire it up after booting from CD or USB. SystemRescueCD is handy for a lot of other problems as well - I keep it on a bootable USB stick.

As others have said, it will take 8-12 hours to fully test a suspect system.

Comments

[Chopper3]

If you have =>4GB of memory I'd be temped to run 'memtestp' by the way.