From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Received: from pigeon.gentoo.org ([208.92.234.80] helo=lists.gentoo.org) by finch.gentoo.org with esmtp (Exim 4.60) (envelope-from ) id 1NfusX-0005cZ-26 for garchives@archives.gentoo.org; Fri, 12 Feb 2010 12:44:13 +0000 Received: from pigeon.gentoo.org (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by pigeon.gentoo.org (Postfix) with SMTP id B9855E0B13; Fri, 12 Feb 2010 12:43:51 +0000 (UTC) Received: from mail-yw0-f175.google.com (mail-yw0-f175.google.com [209.85.211.175]) by pigeon.gentoo.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 91771E0B13 for ; Fri, 12 Feb 2010 12:43:51 +0000 (UTC) Received: by ywh5 with SMTP id 5so2301712ywh.11 for ; Fri, 12 Feb 2010 04:43:51 -0800 (PST) DKIM-Signature: v=1; a=rsa-sha256; c=relaxed/relaxed; d=gmail.com; s=gamma; h=domainkey-signature:received:received:message-id:date:from :user-agent:mime-version:to:subject:references:in-reply-to :content-type:content-transfer-encoding; bh=8wLkt3ZS+yAlPzoVcJo6re6fZpFIeW7MsQN2hB+6t0E=; b=qEYYOx+XM1CsjTXE8MZ35uy1MbRRVNEpybvyWlVyiO2hdr6AQBuXId4ozgma6QEiAE qBJJQi5e+okvdwZIY8WJJ00RaAUehjXmfygqx/BMlz2xzYyPdoDg1iwrVLa91ZPlmpa+ 7RxxBl2g02i1X1tYprh2cnxw73In2KxWSVcFc= DomainKey-Signature: a=rsa-sha1; c=nofws; d=gmail.com; s=gamma; h=message-id:date:from:user-agent:mime-version:to:subject:references :in-reply-to:content-type:content-transfer-encoding; b=iMbgqKdNqneXbFmBQL4wdBm+L4Swv45T1RoItqYJ0GnzragEf3ExW91/5cxTLYlASE 6km2mOZoXyvlOf5zEY6ByxG1G2MGN5dI3KjhIPIfKvswMQaqDhsFrp+WoIAHeRS2bYR3 yoXg010D8cw7aWWhXS0ZwfxSByZaIGY3nQ3H4= Received: by 10.150.48.33 with SMTP id v33mr2307401ybv.16.1265978631260; Fri, 12 Feb 2010 04:43:51 -0800 (PST) Received: from ?192.168.1.1? (adsl-0-92-152.jan.bellsouth.net [65.0.92.152]) by mx.google.com with ESMTPS id 9sm1329691ywf.50.2010.02.12.04.43.47 (version=SSLv3 cipher=RC4-MD5); Fri, 12 Feb 2010 04:43:48 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <4B754D02.3010700@gmail.com> Date: Fri, 12 Feb 2010 06:43:46 -0600 From: Dale User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; en-US; rv:1.9.1.7) Gecko/20100205 Gentoo/2.0.2 SeaMonkey/2.0.2 Precedence: bulk List-Post: List-Help: List-Unsubscribe: List-Subscribe: List-Id: Gentoo Linux mail X-BeenThere: gentoo-user@lists.gentoo.org Reply-to: gentoo-user@lists.gentoo.org MIME-Version: 1.0 To: gentoo-user@lists.gentoo.org Subject: Re: [gentoo-user] Ramifications of memtest86 References: <20100212085453.GA1207@muc.de> <201002121050.46463.alan.mckinnon@gmail.com> <20100212112221.GA1422@muc.de> <20100212124330.GB1422@muc.de> In-Reply-To: <20100212124330.GB1422@muc.de> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Archives-Salt: 6492499b-5db7-43a5-913c-912621650c2c X-Archives-Hash: 7d6c71969a6dccc934b43f126ef282f0 chrome://messenger/locale/messengercompose/composeMsgs.properties: > On Fri, Feb 12, 2010 at 11:22:21AM +0000, Alan Mackenzie wrote: > > >> On Fri, Feb 12, 2010 at 10:50:46AM +0200, Alan McKinnon wrote: >> >>> On Friday 12 February 2010 10:54:53 Alan Mackenzie wrote: >>> >>>> Hi, Gentoo, >>>> > >>>> My new Gentoo box has become unusably unstable. >>>> > >>>> The first sign was when the compiler threw a segfault whilst >>>> emerging the xfce window manager. I "solved" this by emerging >>>> Openbox instead. >>>> > >>>> Then I got another compiler segfault whilst emerging firefox (yes, >>>> I know there's a binary for this). >>>> > > > >>> everything you mention below is indicative of failing hardware, >>> especially RAM closely followed by PSU. >>> > >> Yes, you're right. :-( >> > >> When I run memtest86 from the gentoo boot disk, it signals millions of >> failures in b11 of 32 bit words. >> > >> I'll try unplugging and replugging these. >> > No help. :-( > > No matter how I plug in the RAM (4 combinations of 2 sticks into 2 pairs > of slots) it is always b11 which fails and always at an address ending > in (hex) 0 or 8. > > How is this DDR3 Ram organised? Is each stick 64 bits wide, or are they > 32 bits wide, being accessed by the motherboard pairwisely? If the > latter, I would have exected the failure to move to address ....4 and > ....C when I swap the two sticks. Am I being prematurely pessimistic in > thinking the motherboard might be the fault? > > >>> alan dot mckinnon at gmail dot com >>> > >> -- >> Alan Mackenzie (Nuremberg, Germany). >> Sounds to me like the mobo may have issues. If swapping the ram around doesn't move the error, then the chips on the mobo that connect to the ram may be bad. I would still rule out power issues if you can. A bad power supply, or a weak one, can cause some pretty weird problems. Hmmm, I would also try putting in two sticks, then running the test and seeing what that says. If it still errors, try the other two sticks. If it still fails in the same place, see if you can put the sticks in the other two slots. Some mobos don't care what slot you have them in. May want to refer to the manual on that. Let's hope for something simple and cheap. ;-) Dale :-) :-)