Dell ram check = fail, memtest 86+ = pass. wha?

I bought my system with 4gb of RAM, after getting it I upgraded to 8GB of RAM.

The other day I was toying around with something and I decided to run a check on the RAM with the tool in the BIOS provided by dell. It would fail every time at a certain point.

Memtest 86 reported no failures after running for about an hour (at which point I stopped it).

I have no performance issues, no BSODs, no problems with the system that are RAM related at all. Is this just an issue with the dell memory testing utility?

 

This isn't an answer, but I'm actually curious as to where in the BIOS the memory test feature is?

 

Sorry, I am talking about the dell diagnostic utility that runs in a pre-boot environment (that looks very similar to the BIOS). It can test the memory, the video card and other system components.

 

i did the same thing recently, but i used win7's memory diagnostic test and memtest86

both passed.

note: my memtest86 took 1 hour 40+ minutes to perform 1 complete run, and i only stopped it after it started the 2nd run.

did you make sure memtest 86 completed a full run?

 

I did the same thing. Yeah I let it run the full test. I forgot how long it took exactly because I did it a long time ago, but yeah, I figured it was just something with the dell diagnostics not liking my RAM or something.

 

maybe the dell test is wonky? ... give the memtest another go and see if it still passes ..

try the windows7 mem test too (at bootup, press F8 to get the boot selection then press ESC to get diagnostic menu)

 

yeah, both still pass. i assumed the dell test was wonky when it was the only one failing lol.

 

I had exact same problem going from Dell provided 8gb to crucial 16gb. Some weird memory limit error message with suggestion to call dell support. Since my pc was still under dell warranty, I called them. Apparently dell's psa diagnostic looks for Dell memory part identification on the sodimms and it will not proceed with the test if it is not dell. They told me they Have noted this and if I have any trouble with the motherboard in the future that it will void the warranty. Nice. Also, win7 runs fine and recognizes the ram and windows memory check passed. This is a terrible design. Shame on dell.

 

It might be that the Built-in diagnostics may be detecting wrong hardware. I think it might not be working properly, don't worry about it.