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Good, Affordable PC Diagnostic Software?
"The premise of PC diagnostics software is simple: provide an easy way to test for PC hardware problems, independent of software configuration. Some hardware vendors (like Dell) provide diagnostics with their systems, but they are usually model-specific and not even all major vendors provide them. Of course there are free utilities like the well-known memtest86, but I was wanted something more comprehensive.
So I started my research, and found a variety of packages, including PC Doctor, PC Check, Microscope, PC Certify, Tufftest Pro, among many others, ranging in price from $500 to $35. Some come with associated hardware, such as loopback connectors for parallel, serial, network or USB ports, or ISA / PCI cards that will show low-level POST codes for machines that appear completely dead.
Some of the vendors provided demos, but most were severely crippled. The cheaper software tended to be outdated and incomplete, lacking support for newer hardware features. Almost all practiced high-pressure sales tactics over the phone, and I discovered that one company was actually a spinoff of another by a disgruntled former employee, resulting in a bitter, lawsuit-ridden feud.
Microscope, by Micro 2000, seemed to have the most online feedback, mostly positive, but they didn't provide a demo. After contacting their sales, they suggested that if I bought a full copy for my evaluation, I could return it in 30 days if it didn't meet my needs. Well, it turned out to be buggy and missing important features found in other, cheaper products. When I called to return the product, the salesman disclaimed all knowledge of the promise they made, and they've refused to take it back. Some further digging found that I'm not the first person to be taken in by these tactics.
I still would like to find worthwhile PC diagnostics software, but the (a) lack of independent reviews, (b) shady industry sales tactics and (c) poor performance of a 'well regarded' package leave me wondering... am I a sucker for buying into the whole concept in the first place? Can anyone point me towards a reputable vendor, or an alternative set of independent tools that will do the same job?"
SiSoft's Sandra is good for some basic hardware info on the machine.
It was nice finding out that the RAM I bought from Coast-to-Coast memory that I got a "deal" on was actually a step down in terms of speed (which they were selling for the "sale" price...so it all worked out).
They have diagnosit tests, but I've only used the free version. But its a nice first-line strategy for sizing up machines.
In the future, I would want to not be isolated from my friends in the Space Station.
A low-cost alternative is a bootable copy of Knoppix, escpecially usefull if equipped with a virus scanner - like/ 93.php>Knopicillin - sorry no ISO Image found - it was once in the C'T magazine...
http://www.linuxforum.com/linux_wallpapers_full
Spelling mistakes: My is english spoken not tongue of mother.
If you like dell diagnostics, then you should probably buy PCdoctor. Atleast some of the diagnostics in the earlier versions of Dell servers were sublicensed from PCdoctor. Just go into the installation folder and liik at the DLL names, or read a config file.
.ACMD setaloiv siht gnidaeR
The Troubleshooter by SmartCertify direct. It comes as a bootable floppy, with a couple of dongles and a CD-ROM to test ports while in diagnostic mode. This has worked excellently for us...we were able to diagnose some odd, random computer issues as being caused by bad video RAM
If you're not outraged, you're not paying attention.
Nothing beats experience and a supply of 'known good' replacement parts. I have been out of the repair and troubleshooting business for years, but I always remember being frustrated at useless memory and system testing software that could not find anything wrong with memory chips, etcs, that were obviously bad. Even most hardware units (like ram testers) were almost useless. If the POST testing didn't find anything wrong, it seemed almost nothing else would either, most of the time. If you think the part is bad, swap it out with an equivalent and see if the problem goes away.
You can get so much information from a knoppix CD, it's just not worth looking anywhere else.
And that's why... Most technicians do it by instinct and years of experience. If this peticular thing is happening, you know it could be one of x, y, or z.
:)
That's always worked better for me than anything else. Although it would be nice to have something tell me what's wrong
Sandra is a good info/benchmark util.
For windows machines, I found a little app called RegSupreme which actually does a good job of cleaning/fixing keys in the registry.
Best "tool" for tech support is a good working knowledge of the PC. If you're looking for a piece of software to do support for you, then I'm sure the rest of the self proclaimed "IT Guru's" here at slashdot will warm a spot for you in the unemployment line.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
This is slightly OT, but I've found one of the best ways to test (as opposed diagnose) hardware is to install FreeBSD then run "make buildworld" on it... If it completes with no problems, it's a pretty good indication that the hardware is in good condition.
I say screw the software. You spend more time running the diagnostics that actually fixing the problem. Not that hard to carry some spare AGP cards, memory sticks, and power supplies. Quicker to start swapping in new stuff and seeing if you can get past post. I do run memtest on memory from time to time, but that's about the only software I use.
"Of course there are free utilities like the well-known memtest86, but I was wanted something more comprehensive"
Read the post.
But Knoppix does not check parallel or serial loopback, and cannot suffice for the story, no?
A tip: run it as Administrator or you'll get limited information out of the BIOS. And if you're using *nix, you'll have to look elsewhere.
When I am king, you will be first against the wall.
Norton Utilities is still the best choice if you want to teach the user to manage his or her own diagnostics after time. I've found SiSoft's Sandra to be useful when identifying problems.
"It is the mark of an educated man to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it." - Aristotle
After demonstrating the (reproducible) problem the vendor replaced the second SIMM and all was well.
there was an article over at yahoo (most popular)
about free programs an editor at yahoo recommends.
i think there was a free "pc testing software"
mentioned too.
stressing under the weight of years worth of hardware & software Bibles. If there is such a miracle as a good diagnostic program that can keep up with the daily onslaught of new hardware, protocols and standards, then I have wasted a lot of my time but wish you the best of luck on your quest.
-- I'd give my right arm to be ambidextrous
True, in a world where a faulty SCSI terminator can cause intermittent behavior (Thanks a lot, SUN!) There's nothing like spare parts to swap in and out.
In the future, I would want to not be isolated from my friends in the Space Station.
Memtest is a great tool, however it is specificaly mentioned in the article itself.
If you read the article, RebornData is looking for something more comprehensive than memtest offers. (ie: more than just a memory test. I assume to include disk, bios, video, cpu information, and a variety of other system tests and checks.)
I myself question the need for much more than a disk-surface-scan tool and a copy of memtest, but it's what RebornData is looking for.
-Matt
Event Viewer in Administrative Tools in Control Panel.
This guy is way out there
The best tools for checking memory are memtest86 and the follow-up memtest86+.
Both of these are free to download and use. I usually leave them running for roughly 24hrs for a reasonable level of confidence. You should also burn-in the other major components too but memory is the best place to start.
#1 TuffTEST pro is a cheap, bootable, hardware-only diagnostic. It supports all current x86 processors. It does not work on top of DOS or Windows or anything, so it's convenient for eliminating the hardware as a problem. Works great, I use it all the time. As a side note, if you use it on Dell machines, Dell seems to have an internal loopback on the serial and parallel ports. It will report the ports are OK even if they're not. http://www.tufftest.com/
I use the ulitmatebootcd. It consolidates several good boot floppy images onto one cd, including many free hardware diagnosis programs.
see subject
It is not possible to diagnose hardware by running software on it. At best you can determine if there is a hardware failure, but no software will be able to nail it down to a specific component all of the time.
Consider a motherboard failure for instance - a failing motherboard can in effect emulate any other hardware failure - ide controller bad? Your software may blame the hard drive. Bus problems can cause memory checks to fail.
I recommend you carry a simple bootable cdrom that loads the entire system (disk i/o, memory i/o and cpu load) and checks for errors. When a system fails these checks all it tells you is the problem is definately hardware and not a buggy driver or other software issue.
See BartPE for a good free solution.
PC hardware is shit. Made as cheaply as possible, knocked out by the million. Nothing gets repaired - nothing is repairable. If it's broken, buy a new one.
PC software is shit. Software is still in the dark ages. No qualifications to show who has the first clue about quality, security, extensibility etc.
If you get any problem you can't fix in 30 mins, best to make sure you've backed up everything important (naturally you never need to ask anyone whether this is the case, because everybody always backs up their important data on a daily basis, right?), then just format or ghost the fucking disk. End of problem, and no tedious troubleshooting what happens when you try and get a LameSoft2000 graphics card working with a ShysterTronics printer.
"Some things have to be believed to be seen." - Ralph Hodgson
The error codes generated by these disks will save you a ton of time on the phone, since they'll tell the tech on the other line what needs to be replaced. I'd also recommend getting hardware certs from any of the OEM's you'll may deal with.
invest in a vacuum cleaner.
...
solves 95% of all "hardware
problem" cases.
damn i've seen dust that would rival
the lunar/martian surface around
CPU fans and grafic cards.
oh, and if your customers/employees
get sick alot, maybe also check out
the ventilation system (DUST!).
i'm sure the SARS virus is still
looming in the ventilation system
of some high class singaporen,
hongkong hotel
...the best software i've ever encountered was inside my skull....
if electricity is created by electrons, is morality created by morons?
I have yet to find diagnostic software that is more reliable than my own expereince/instincts. I haven't really done an exhaustive search, but the handful that I have used tend not to work well (and take...too...long...).
Most OEM's are fairly accomodating if you describe problems in a decent amount of detail (and the machine is under warranty).
If these are white boxes, you're probably better off keeping a pile of spare parts around. A quick swap can get a machine up and running quickly.
Good Luck!
I will resort to diagnostics only when other troubleshooting is unrevealing, but the diagnostics for whichever hardware you have are usually provided by the manufacturer. For example, each hard drive manufacturer will have its own diagnositcs and if you expect warranty returns, you will have to run their program and tell them what fails.
> The best tools for checking memory are memtest86 and the follow-up memtest86+.
Can't you read the article before you post? He knows about memtest86, even gives the link himself.
Free for personal use, businesses must register. Well worth it.
Computers are useless. They can only give you answers.
-- Pablo Picasso
I agree. If a program could do all that, you would not have a job. You are the diagnostics. You are the one who provides fixes. I find posting to discussion forums helpful for problems that I cannot figure out alone.
Hardware of ALL kinds is so cheap these days, that your time is more expensive.
If you think something is broken, replace it. You should have a stock of "standard" parts, like hard drives and RAM.
If replacing a few parts doesn't work, replace the whole damn PC. You don't want your customers stuck with a PC that has already had severe hardware problems.
If the jerks won't take back their shoddy merchandise, document the steps to took and the letters you wrote - then get your credit-card company to 'chargeback' the purchase price.
More info from the AG of California here
Moneyed corporations, non-working 'poor' and criminal prisoners are turning productive citizens into tax-slaves.
aida32 is a very good tool to get information about your hardware and software... (similar to sandra)
And it is free.
http://www.aida32.hu/aida32.php
Certainly you can pinpoint with some accuracy what's wrong. Pull it, smash it, and replace it. Nothing beats good hardware, or quality hardware ... or just replacing stuff. Everything is so cheap nowadays, that you could buy the network card for $5, the video card for $20 ...
Parrallel loopback cable? Scrap it, move to USB.
And, please, don't buy eMachines --- my monitor caught fire, the NIC stopped working, and the video card stopped working. Monitor on their dime, others on my $5.
Good luck, and not to credit windows for much, but I've found that, in XP, the system will detect or analyze hardware problems reasonably correctly.
-Rob
terpmotors.com
Most all the modern distros have comprehensive tools for checking the filesystems and analysis of the machine's hardware (including cool stuff like tweaking the hard drives/etc).
Random case studies WRT normal Linux operations vs. normal MS-Windows operations in the case of 'marginal' hardware situations:
Case 1: Gateways' shiped with the 'dreaded' Quantum SCSI disk drives:
We bought a couple of Gateway workstations that Gateway shipped with Quantum 9gig W/F SCSI disk drives (avoid these like the plague). With one machine, we tossed the pre-installed MS-Windows (95?) and installed RedHat Linux (5.2 or maybe 6.1). The other machine got MS-Windows NT 4.0 installed. After about 1 month, the machine with Linux installed reported disk I/O errors (and crashes). The machine would recover (fsck after hard reset in a couple of cases) -- the disk had not totally farmed, just started to lose it. We got a replacement disk (IBM) from Gateway and did a disk-to-disk transfer (dump | restore, partition by partition) and used a boot floppy to re-boot and install lilo. This was some years ago. The 'NT box reported no problems until after about 6-7 months of use. Then crashed and refused to reboot. Disk was close to complete death. We suspect that the disk in the 'NT box was probably starting to go at the same time as the disk in the Linux box, but MS-Windows NT failed to notice *minor* disk I/O errors.
Case 2: Token MS-Windows box goes off line and gets converted to a take-home Linux machine:
We had a Gateway G6-200 (PPro 200mhz) machine that was the lab's 'token' MS-Windows box (NT 4.0). For various reasons (including lack of serious use), we took it off line. Later we needed a take-home box, so we *tried* to install Linux on it. The install kept crashing. No apparent reason way. Finally, we swapped out the RAM SIMMs, and presto, Linux installed properly. I guess the RAM had developed some bad bits, and MS-Windows NT failed to notice...
*Maybe* 'NT is notorious about not noticing hardware failures. Maybe Linux is really very sensitive to "minor" hardware problems (slowly developing failures).
If diagnostics software actually worked... you wouldn't have a business, and PC manufacturers wouldn't operate call centers.
Learn to troubleshoot the hardware that you are fixing rather than learning to divine meaningful answers from some stupid piece of software.
BTW the magic diagnostic software is probaly just dumping tables from WMI (Windows Management Interface) anyway. you can do the same with a SQL client and driver available from Microsoft.
Conformity is the jailer of freedom and enemy of growth. -JFK
The only effective hardware tests I've used in the ten years I've been supporting all kinds of hardware and software have been SpinRite and Memtest86. Between these two, I can check for the most insidious and hard-to-detect hardware problems; i.e. flakey hard drives and RAM. A cheap $20 POST card is highly useful for dead machines. You don't need all the extra features the Microscope card gives you unless you are designing motherboards or doing some other such serious work. No software will replace your own experience and ability to know where a problem is forming based on the specific failure of the machine. All the rest of the so-called diagnostic software is more or less useless from a practical perspective, aside from testing serial ports with loopback plugs and printing cute certification reports for anal customers. This is detective work. You have to suss out the exact problem based on clues left by the failure of the system. Learn how the hardware works, and it's easier than you think.
Learn how a CPU works before you learn to program. Seriously.
Try Fire - http://sourceforge.net/projects/biatchux
for tweaking your display. An absolute must have.
So what about testing of the Com, Parallel, USB, Firewire, PS/2 and network ports? Is there some package out there where you can attach a loopback device to each port to test them? It's disgusting seeing so much snakeoil being sold today.
I have tried to find this, but the problem with getting flawed hardware to run software to detect it is flawed is just that in concept.
First of all, if it is an issue with hardware, the machine may not boot at all. If it is a ram issue, the diagnostic software may generate errors.
Second, even if it highlights an error in a configuration, it could be generated with the analysis software.
Third is that failed hardware often will not register as failed unless it is operating. Such as, a failed modem will not become noticable until it is used and then it may lock the computer up which could stop the software diagnosing the issue.
Your best bet is to use a cause and effect analysis. Then trial and error. The machine won't boot, find every possible cause of it not booting and eliminate each one as a possible cause. Continue on this until the issue is completely solved. Make a checklist for yourself so you don't forget anything.
It is how I do freelance repairs and it has proven bulletproof compared to the Voodoo Computer Repair Experts that try random things in the hope that it fixes the issue. (Install drivers, reinstall OS, Check CPU)
yeah, nothing beats experience. But techies at BestBuy use Pc Certify. I still trust my instincts, but to double check myself I still burn it in w/ Sandra or MemTestx86. Knoppix works good too, but some new hardware is not recignized properly and it hates my Gigabyte 8sq800 sis655fx board, but so do many other distros.
Its free and will tell you if your memory sucks.
"Have you ever thought about just turning off the TV, sitting down with your kids, and hitting them?"
I've heard and read great things about Spinrite from Steve Gibson, for hard drive diagnostics and I have friends that swear by it. The only drawback to his current version is that it won't do a thing for NTFS partitions. That being said, he is working on Spinrite 6.0 that WILL read NTFS partitions. This new edition is due out any time now. If you buy Spinrite 5 you get a free upgrade to 6 when it becomes available. As far as a general software based, pc diagnostic tool, I've yet to see any that actually work with any degree of certainty. SiSoft Sandra, as others have mentioned, is pretty good at letting you know what hardware is in the box. That along with some available "known good parts" is what I do to diagnose issues. I have also found the book Upgrading and Repairing PC's to be particularly valuable and a must have in my collection.
Money not found! A)bort, R)etry, D)eclare Bankruptcy
I'm not going to link this because I don't want the poor guy to get slashdotted. But those that are truly interested can search Google or Freshmeat and find it.
It's completely free and contains almost 50 bootable utilities ranging from hardware diagnostics to offline NT password/registry editor to linux recovery distros.
As others mentions, memtest86 and knoppix are invaluable tools.
/var/log/messages ;-)
Other tools you might be interested in;
Aida32 basically lists all of your devices, drivers, wmi software entries, pci devices, etc. for windows - needs an install, though.
OnTrack sell Easy Recovery Professional; the "file repair" options are pretty crappy, but for serious, near-forensic recovery on fscked up filesystems, ERP is a fine tool. Some of OnTrack's software (i.e. SMART tests, usually) may be licensed by the manufacturer of your harddrive, so check those pages out.
SiSoft Sandra is recommended a lot, but I don't find it offers a lot of diagnostics, though it is prone to crashing.
On windows, you might want to check out the Event Viewer, hidden in the Computer Management section of the (classic) Control Panel -- it will list all sorts of errors and notifications, kind of like
SCO employee? Check out the bounty
I've taken an ailing HP Omnibook 4150 laptop to my local computer repair place where I was told (in this order) :
1. I needed a new power supply.
2. I needed a new motherboard.
3. They didn't really know what was wrong with it.
It suffers from intermittent power failure, otherwise it runs fine. I wish I knew how to locate the trouble or if I'm just wasting my time thinking this machine can be fixed. I'm loathe to take it to another repairman, I'm already out some $$ that got me no closer to a real solution. I hope this is an appropriate question to ask, 'cause I like that machine and would rather not junk it. Any civil advice will be vastly appreciated (including suggested URLs for diagnostic tools such as those mentioned in the original article). TIA!
Btw, the repair house told me that their "diagnostics" consisted of letting the machine run for a day or two. I paid them their bench fee and swore I'd never take another machine there again.
free memory tester here
-- SKYKING, SKYKING, DO NOT ANSWER.
Belarc offers a free PC audit tool that I have found VERY useful in trying to discover exactly what h/w and s/w a user has installed. And it free.
A great, free, Windows program is AIDA32. It gives lots of valuable info. It's not perfect, but it's constantly in development and improvement. Up until about a week ago there was a DOS/16-bit version available, but due to lack of demand it was discontinued (sadly). Another ok program is PC-Config, which is no longer being worked on, but it's pretty good. And NSSI is really pretty nice as well.
Check those out.
Knoppix - verify the part under another OS.
Tomsrtbt - I forget if Knoppix has badblocks or not. If it doesn't, Tomsrtbt does.
memtest86 - Memory tester.
Spare HDD - good for having a clean install of windows to check things on.
Spare low-density memory.
Spare older computer for testing daughtercards.
That's about it.
Of course, sooner or later you *will* get the machine from hell with an intermediate fault that ends up locking windows for no damn good reason every so often. Then life will suck. But that's why they call it work.
If you pay with a credit card and the vendor tries to screw you over you can contest the billing and return the unsatisfactory product, In fact I am in the process of cancelling an order i placed for Serif's Photoplus 7 because the site selling it never mentioned that it was old and shitty, but they were perfectly happy to tell me how bad it was when they called me asking if i wanted to pay $50-$90 to upgrade to version 8 or 9... obviously contesting the charge is a last resort but overall I feel much more confident buying software online because i know that i am not out the money untill i actually pay the credit card bill (for internet purchases there is no signature)
Snowden and Manning are heroes.
I was a PC repairman for many years. I say from experience that all those software diagnostics suck.
Microscope from Micro2000 is actually the best of the bunch, but that's not saying much. If your computer won't even post, non of these tools will do you any good. (They do have some good training materials for those wanting an A+ or N+ COMPTIA cert.)
The PCI cards that display diagnostic codes are better than the software in those cases. They still aren't very helpful though. Basically they will tell you there is a problem with the memory, or the parallel port, etc., but they won't tell you exactly what's wrong so they aren't of much use either.
Here's my advice:
1. Get the power supply tester from PC Power & Cooling. It's $20, and in my experience most of the time the reason a computer won't even post is because the cheapass power supply that came with the case died.
2. Carry a bunch of known good parts: an AGP and a PCI video card you know work, a PCI network card and PCI modem, some known good RAM (PC 100 and DDR), and a good hard drive. Ideally, these are all in a fully working computer you've brought to the site so you can swap between the working computer and the not-working computer and narrow down the problem. Resist the temptation to fix the system with your known good parts; make them buy new, name-brand components with a warranty.
3. Bring a USB keyboard and mouse. I've seen lots of 3+ year old computers have their PS/2 connections short out or stop working but their USB ports are just fine. They can solve input problems.
4. Have a Knoppix CD in your kit. The linux forensic toolkit can be of great use recovering files and finding problems.
obviously no deficiencies vs. no obvious deficiencies
That the free stuff is just as good (if not better) than high-priced diag software.
Allow me to give you some background:
I have done IT work for 4.5 years. I work with Novell, RedHat, all (disgusting) flavours of Windows, BeOS, Sun, SGI, Apple (Mac) and QNX. I support everyone from Joe Grandma to major Universities and Medical Colleges.
I have several CDs worth of useful tools at my disposal, all of them free:
Ad-Aware: I consider this to be my single best resource in the fight against Windows NT (and up) flakery.
www.trendmicro.com does an on-line virus scan. Not perfect, but usually finds the major ones.
Demos of Anti-Trojan. Again, good enough for the closing of trojan ports left open.
AVG Anti-Virus software. Good, free AV software, if Norton isn't available.
Winzip: Obviously a good thing, many many drivers come zipped.
A CD full of the most common NIC drivers from the biggest vendors.
nVidia and ATI drivers.
Via drivers
All the latest browsers on another CD.
MemTestx86 (as you have found): Allow me one point further int he favor of it, major memory makers will accept their RAM bad, no questions asked (in my experience) if you tell them it was checked and found bad, via MemTextx86.
SiSoft Sandra, if for nothing else than the CPU-Burn wizard. If the CPU is bad, Sandra will find out.
Emergency Boot disks and cd-rom access disks (sadly, the Win98 boot disk is pretty handy)
A live Linux and live BeOS CD (very handy for recovering data of hosed systems)
And last, but not least, a good Google search. Another thing that has saved my skin time and again is to input exact error messages and see what Google turns up.
This whole cd-wallet has set me back perhaps $20, and does far more than "professional" diag tools can hope to accomplish.
So rise up, all ye lost ones, as one, we'll claw the clouds.
For most uses, a very simple combination of tools works:
If a specific device does not work, you can usually identify the problem by replacing it with a known good one (Harddrive, CD writer, whatever).
If it is an intermittent problem, I usually check the RAM first (memtest).
If the problem still hasn't been identified, I remove all components the system doesn't require and run some appropriate stress tests on it (24 hour burn in, or some network test, whatever is appropriate to the problem).
If it works, I start adding in the other components one by one - and find the problem this way. If it doesn't work, the problem still has been narrowed down quite a bit: Then I rip the system apart, and mark the individual parts as suspect. So if I use them later on in non-critical systems and an error occurs, I toss them, no questions asked.
All these steps are fairly simple, and don't involve hunting for obscure problems, yet I guess I throw very few working parts away.
If you bought the product that doesn't work with your credit card and you have tried to resolve the issue with your vendor call your credit card company and explain the situation to them they will most likely help you out
if you can install freebsd, openbsd, netbsd, fedora, gentoo, and debian on the machine, all within 24 hours - then you can count on the hardware working for awhile.
the only device(s) i've replaced on my primary machine in 10 years is the drive(s) (none of the older drives died, but i felt i had to replace them due to their smaller size). this one time i had an obvious hardware problem, so i put in a bunch of output into a google browser and found out that I probably had to clean all the dust out of my machine and cpu-fan. good thing i didn't have to replace anything.
that machine was made of high quality parts that i spent a few short weeks researching on what to buy and where to buy it. i used all scsi and a non-intel processor/motherboard (scsi and non-intel were more important 10 years ago than today probably).
No software can replace the need for hardware knowledge. You are going to need to know hardware cold to run continous IT/Operations, whether Apple, Intel, or AMD/Sun.
IPv4 allocations for hobbyists? join the ipalloc-l mailing-list! www.operations.net/mailman/listinfo/ipalloc-l
I had a problem with a faulty SIMM. I was getting flakey video errors when running Windows. I downloaded a diagnostic (DOS) program and it tested the memory for hours without finding a single problem. Yet when I changed the SIMM the
problems when away. I remember similar results with motherboard errors. The only diagnostic program that I have found that actually do anything useful are the disk checking programs (i.e. scandisk).
I manage a second level support group at a fairly large company. We've found that On-Track's
Easy Recovery Professional is AWESOME. It fixes 200-some file extensions. All office suite files, zips, etc. We used it a lot on enormous PST files that would blow up at 2gb~. It fixes them in half the time of M$'s ScanPST tool.
Further, this product will do all sorts of HDD checks, and can does great file recovery. It's saved our asses a bunch of times. Just take a read.
It might seem kind-of expensive to someone on their own, but not to a mid-sized company. It's worth it's weight to me. They do have different licensing options and offer different/lighter versions of the product for less $$$.
The sucky thing about it's licensing scheme is that it's based on how many drives you run it on.
I've also heard that wininternals has an great product but if I remember correctly it was really expensive.
Can't beat memtest86 for those hard to find memeory problems... it's free too.
http://memtest86.com/
I've had a few questions I'd love to pose to the /. community but I knew were unworthy.
Where would you suggest such questions be posed?
Peace & Blessings,
bmac
www.mihr.com
Wow, really!?
How visionary of you to suggest it!
I've found this this to be both useful and FREE. May not have all of the tools you're looking for, but it's an excellent place to start.
o 1 Sig beneath your current threshold
PC diagnostics are really two-part work. Part one is to fix the PC, and part two is to convince the luser that the machine is actually fixed. That's where the diagnostic software comes in handy. Run the software, show the luser the "problem", fix the PC, and show the luser that the problem is "fixed". I've found that a piece of paper in a luser's hand is worth hours and hours of post-fix re-diagnostics because "something" has changed.
Keep a copy of the Dell Diagnostics. This is the prime tool that their techs use to find hardware problems. Other companies have simialr products.
REM Old programmers don't die. They just GOSUB without RETURN.
In my experiance, the best hardware for diagnosing PC hardware problems is another PC that you know works. Quite frankly, the built in diagnostic capabilities of PC hardware is extremely poor, the only reliable way to discover if a part if bad is to replace it with a known good part and see if that fixes the problem. Don't blindly trust new or especially refurbished parts either, they need to be tested and known good. With experiance you will know what parts to try first, but it is still important to verify that replacing the failed component with a new part fixes the problem.
I remember back at school where the tech support guys were ripping their hair out because a lot of the school issued PCs were coming back with random crashing problems. (I had a roommate who's machine would crash everytime the screensaver kicked in). They were replacing parts left and right and it never seemed to fix the problem. My roommate had everything replaced except the case at one part, and it still crashed on a vanilla Win3.1 install. It took them awhile to realize that most of the machines had bad memory, and the vendor supplied replacement memory for the systems was usually bad as well. I eventually loaned my roommate my memory sticks, and when his system didn't crash he went back to the PC guys and told them exactly what the problem was and made them continue swapping in RAM sticks until they finally found one that worked (apparently the RAM was OK in their hardware RAM tester, but failed once it was actually put in PCs. They suspected the same thing was happening at the vendors end. They would get bad memory, test it and not discover a problem, then ship it right back to the school.
I read the internet for the articles.
http://www.uxd.com/phdpci.shtml
echo "the presence of this routine has doubled the number of diagnostic programs available for the mac"
I would check out the 911 rescue CD if you cannot figure out how to use a knoppix CD.
http://www.911cd.net
You will have to download all the tools required seperately and have your own windows CDs to create the boot images on a single disk.
Check it out it's a freeware project.
http://www.sysinternals.com/
I presume you ordered the software over the phone - mail order products are covered by a 30 day money back guarantee by law - unless they changed the laws. Call your credit card company or bank if you charged in on a credit or debit card, and dispute the charges. Although that might not be required if you call them and let them know you'll be disputing the charges if they don't issue a refund.
666-607: 6th floor apartment of the beast
Anyway, certainly he *mentions* memtest86 but he didn't say that he used it - wanting 'something more comprehensive'. I am suggesting that he shouldn't be so dismissive given that experience suggests testing the memory properly is a good place to start.
Why he wants a costly, all-in-one package rather than a comprehensive set of free tools seems peculiar to me (and to other posters).
He didn't mention memtest86+ either.
i use microscope. my business bought it, and its a $600 buy in a believe. comes with a POST card (very handy for troubleshooting non-POSTing mobo's and a bootable diskette that does all kinds of good testing. we also got it on cd for an extra $10. i use it all the time. for testing harddrives, i use seatools from seagate on bootable cd.
We are an IBM shop (By state mandate) so I am a bit biased. You said manufacturer versions are model specific, but I doubt IBM's is, because they use the same PC doctor program for the last 10 years worth of laptops, workstations and x86 based Servers. It comes on a bootable floopy (or on servers a bootable partition just for it). It does full HD, floppy, CD, and memory scans. It will test the standard AT external ports (Parallel, Serial, PS/2) It runs VGA mode scans, and will test some features of the AGP port. Admittably it won't test stuff like sound cards, or many built-ins, but I doubt any Paid program would either.
To find it go to IBM support pages and start looking for Diagnostics, you will eventually find it.
We (me personale and the shop i work in) have been using Quick Tech Pro from Ultra-X. Its a british company, and their stuff is not cheap. They have full blown hardware diagnostic boards, but all i use is the software. It accuratly identifes problems on all PCs ive run it on. Our copy is from when AMD K5 was the fastest processor out there, and it is shtill very relevat and helpull, it preforms a litany of tests and provides very detailed information.
http://www.uxd.com/
If you resist reading what you disagree with, how will you ever acquire deeper insights into your own beliefs?
When I'm troubleshooting problems for my family. I like to just head on over to best buy and buy whatever I think is bad, then I can install it, and test it, if it really is bad, then I can ask them if they want me to order the part cheaper and wait, or use the overpriced crap. If its not bad, then I just take it back to best buy and say it doesn't perform to my expectations, and get a full refund.
For testing hard drives, use the install disk you can get from the manufacturer's web site. For memory, Memtest86. Cards and ram, you should have extras to swap out and test. If the system isn't POSTing, get a POST card. No software needed.
SmashTech - No smashing of tech involved
You can issue a chargeback. Before you do that, e-mail Micro 2000 and tell them that if they don't refund you, you will chargeback. If they still don't refund, take your credit card invoice, go to your bank, and tell them you never authorized this transaction. Since it is an online transaction, you never signed anything, so they don't have any proof of your authorization. It works. I'm a RegNow vendor, and they regulary get chargebacks (and they have no choice but to refund. They even get a penalty for having issued a false transaction).Micro 2000 fucked with you, so fuck with them.
Note that I'm not promoting false chargebacks, but if a company says it has a 30 days guarantee and doesn't honor it... well they deserve that.
perception is reality
meh, boxen, virii, [insert any word here] anyone?
OK, you can kick my ass now.
I recently was looking around for backup solutions. The folks over at ltsp (ltsp) recomended mondo/mindi for a backup solution. Mindi is a linux system duplicator, however they seemed to have made a bootable Mindi CD with memtest86 allong with a few other utilities that seem quite comprehensive. Check it out here. ( mindi.iso) )
A friend will come and bail you out of jail, a true friend will be sitting next to you saying, "damn that was fun!"
That's assuming that Knoppix even has support for the hardware being tested. That's a big "if". That's a pretty poor way to test hardware, if you ask me.
I work at Best Buy part time as a Service Technician. We have been using PC Certify until recently we just quit, as a store. It sucks. Anything over 256 ram it misreports, doesn't notice anything higher than a P3 or lower mhz thunderbird. We use Knoppix, and three other cd's we ordered off of the internet to do any troubleshooting now found out within a few minutes. If you would like copies of the three other cd's we use, I am more than happy to accomodate. Email me at my profile email account.
Alcohol & calculus don't mix. Never drink & derive.
I have found variations of the Hopi rain dance to be effective in solving many PC hardware problems. Tibetan chanting also work well.
an ill wind that blows no good
To be honest I'm not surprised that the guys that sell this software/hardware are con artists. What they sell is Snake Oil, to people who want a magic bullet. If the CPU's BIST (Built-In Self Test) and HIMEM/MEMTEST can't find a problem, some third part app isn't going to find it.
The only way to do this is to systematically change things until you isolate the failing part. The longer you've done it, the better your instincts will be as to where to start.
Isolating the effect is not the same as determining the cause.
Hi, I recommend AIDA as a Sysinfo tool. Free and powerful, can even run in batch mode.
http://www.aida32.hu/aida32.php
Ziad
I definately agree that diagnosing computer problems is something can take years of experience and can become quite instinctual, part of that is having a good long-term memory and being able to put into memory the results of previous diagnostic work.
The other truth I wish to share is that you MUST under ALL circumstances get things a Salesperson says to you in WRITING before agreeing to purchase ANYTHING. I work as a Purchasing Agent primarily and I tell you what... Salespeople are often far worse then mythical Genies, they will twist everything you say and turn your own purchase orders against you if you don't have them worded just right and don't cover all the bases as well...
If you ignore the other uses of a tool, does that make the tool less useful, or you less useful?
At least not at first. Most respectable programs will have a trial version out. And there are plenty of freeware/open source alternatives.
Good programs, I've encountered have been RegSupreme, Norton SystemWorks, AdAware, SpyBot, and numerous others.
The reason you can't find software to do it is because there is enough people out there who know how to fix these buggers a lot quicker. Having replacement parts on hand helps but after you seen a few hundred computers not boot(amoung other problems) you start to get the feel for it and software (espiecially in this context) will never be as good as experience. It helps to get this experience on your own machines. I've been fixing computers for close to seven years now and I've never even looked for this kind of software.
I recently used Ontrack Easy Recovery Pro to recover data from a hard disk in which the file system inforation was completely destroyed by corruption. Booting the disk as a slave in Windows gave me nothing more than a hardware ID in device manager. The disk wouldn't populate or even assign a drive letter. I had to do a raw bit-by-bit recovery which took over 12 hours, but I got every last piece of data off that disk(of course, I couldn't get directory info or original file names, but the data itself was intact).
"People should be allowed to keep midgets as pets."
- Gov. Jesse Ventura
Um, the machine I use at work can't boot to CD. What am I to do now?
Someone hates these cans.
The more complicated the test the more likely that what's causing the errors is the test and not the hardware.
I have had several bootable Linux CDs that truly give a wealth of information on the status, identity, and health of PCs. They are cheap and can often point you in the right direction when you are having some hardware issues. If I was doing this for a living I would always carry one around with me.
TT
www.ultimatebootcd.com
.::Dread
Free and includes loads of software.
Some of you have wondered what do you need with more than a memory tester, and a disk surface scan?
Have you never encountered PC's that have perfectly working hard drives, and memory, but the machine keeps crashing?
I've had a few, among the culprits a microfracture on the motherboard, a PCI slot that was sending the wrong data, corrupt video memory, a corrupt bios etc.
If I could put a disk into the machine and find out a few hours later exactly what the problem is that would be great.
I've been doing this for a while and I have my instincts, 99% of the time they are right, but when it's I figure out its not problem A like I figured it would be, I know its b, c, d, or e; that doesn't save me the 2 days of troubleshooting.
Anywho - finding a good diagnostic tool, software or hardware that could help deduce this stuff without my constant attention would be great.
To be honest I'm not surprised that the guys that sell this software/hardware are con artists. What they sell is Snake Oil, to people who want a magic bullet. If the CPU's BIST (Built-In Self Test) and HIMEM/MEMTEST can't find a problem, some third part app isn't going to find it.
Wrong. These tests are designed to be *fast*, not *comprehensive*. A true memory tester takes a lot longer to run than the POST test, because it's a more thorough check. The POST test in particular is useless for finding most memory errors.
If you're relying on POST to diagnose memory problems then you're nothing more than an ignorant hack.
Yeah, I was hoping for something that would save me time, but suspected this was the case. I've had the dell diags save my bacon a few times when there was strange damage to parallel ports and the like, and was hoping to find a general-case tool. I do all on-site work so I'm on the clock in front of the customer, which means that there's huge time pressure and even a quick way to comprehensively discriminate between driver and hardware issues (especially with video hardware in laptops) would be a boon.
-R
I prefer this, it is easy to carry, gives me full access and has a full suite of tools and applications.
Oh, and its free.
Why all these software suggestions to a hardware problem? You want my advice? Make a dummy load, get a meter and a cheap scope, and look at the power supply alone first.
...what the rubber chicken was invented for?
memtest86 gives you a bootable floppy that will scan *all* RAM in a system, and turns up the most obscure memory errors. Some errors are not consistent, they only appear in transitions from one bit pattern to another, for example. Or adjacent bit cells may bias the bit in question.
That's all it does, but it's good. And it's free. One other point, systems with mismatched parts (designed for different bus speeds or timings), and overclocked systems, may generate memory errors. Since I started using memtest86, I've stopped overclocking, as every single overclocked system I've checked has shown errors under memtest86!
Big Daddy, Johnny, Burp, Aunt Zelda, Scott, Slurp, Big Momma
I use memtest86 quite a lot (well, sometimes we are all asked to "look at a computer", you know...). I think it's one _great_ piece of diag software. But I knew nothing about memtest86+! (I thought memtest86 got frozen). Quite informative for me - gonna try that home tonight.
I'm lead tech at a smallish computer shop. Over the years we've used just about everything to aid us in diagnosing hardware issues. The ones we use most are:
QuickTech Pro - This is great for testing memory, serial ports, video RAM, and just about every other problem that you can experience. In the past we've had so many problems with recieving bad RAM from our vendors that we now run the quick memory test from QuickTech on every PC before it leaves our shop.
OnTrack is simply the best when it comes to data recovery. They aren't cheap, but for a small-medium business their software is well worth the price. We've also purchased some of the MS Office add-ins to help us recover corrupted Word/Excel documents better. This program really works, and if it can't recover something off a failing drive (or something that a user deleted by accident) then Ontrack will almost certainly be able to recover the data at their facilities (for a steep price of course).
I'm not a huge fan of the guy that wrote SpinRite, but if you've got a FAT(16/32) partitioned drive that seems to be failing, this tool is great. It will recover bad sectors off most drives (not seagate), especially the ones that happen when Win9x doesn't get shut down properly due to a power surge or the like. This software is free and takes a very long time to run at its highest level.
Other than these 3 programs and a few other niche utilities we generally diagnose all other problems by having known good hardware and swapping out to see if the problem still exists. It is still, without a doubt, the best way to diagnose a hardware problem other than Technician's intiuition.
Duris MUD - The best pkill MUD. Ever.
Hey,
If they refused to take their software back after agreeing to, I'd simply make an ISO image (or some other easily distributable form) and post it, so that others can see their crud before they get bitten by the same scum tactics.
you might want to drown your lawyer before using this as anything like advice.
These wonderful utilities are versatile, come in many sizes, and assure me that my @!$%@&! PC never, ever gives me an error message again!
Vos teneo officium eram periculosus ut vos recipero is.
Real IT consultants do not troubleshoot hardware. They buy either dell or compaq hardware and use that. Most IT consultants charge between $120 - $170 hour. To pay that for three hours to find out the harddrive is bad is crazy. It is just cheaper to buy a new comptuer. Playing PC tech as an IT consultant is basicly ripping off the customers time and your time. First off they should not be buying white boxes. Second off you should not be selling them white boxes. That means they are buying dell or compaq or hp under a 3 year parts warranty. Just get on the phone tell them they need to ship them another computer. Do not mess around with listening to what ever they have to say. Explain it to them clearly, ship me a new one and i will ship you this one back.
MemTest86 - a VERY GOOD memory tester. Does not need an OS to work. Boots with LILO (and GRUB). Nice and graphical (ncursy-like). Can work without a graphics card, using the serial port as an interface to a terminal. http://www.memtest86.com/
magic.
Seriously. I've tried Knoppix, but I fail to see why everyone is creaming their jeans over it. It was a slow KDE desktop, and I binned it as soon as I realized it had no drivers for my NIC.
I like to smell the the computer first to make sure nothing's blown or burnt out. This is moot if I've seen the part blow up, like the IBM monitor from 1985. Both methods are free and efficient. I also use a laser to diagnose light bulbs that have burned filaments.
I also reply below your current threshold.
AMIDiag from American Megatrends has been around for a long time. It has Windows and DOS versions. The DOS version will run on DRDOS. I used to use it when I was building servers for a former employer.
In adition to the other good advice here, I'd bring up that a benchmarking program like PCMark2002 can sometimes point you in the direction of a problem. (http://www.futuremark.com/)
:)
If your computer's memory score just tanked when compared to your baseline benchmark, you might wanna test the ram first.
-ave
...or maybe not.
That whole string of stuff you listed is almost completely software-based, while the posting asks about hardware. Besides Sandra and memtest86, you've got nothing there that would be of any use... Software problems are generally easier to solve since you can always format the disk and start over anyway.
Besides, is it legal to have a Win98 boot disk without having purchased Win98? I wouldn't think so, and this makes your $20 price tag inaccurate, especially since you're implying that you have other Windows boot disks as well.
Anytime you accept something with the option of returning it, get it in WRITING..
swerving back on topic: perhaps its time for a set of OSS tools for diagnostics.. some parts exist now, such as memtest86.....
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Wow! What's the name of this program?
How did you learn of it? It's so obscure!
You're a dummy lol
I'm surprised that no one has mentioned CheckIt Diagnostics from Smith Micro Software (http://www.smithmicro.com). You will find it on their website listed under the Utilities section. CheckIt Diagnostics only costs $70. I bought my copy at a local computer store a few years ago.
What I like about it is that in the same box you get both a version that boots and runs from a single DOS boot floppy, as well as a Windows version on a CD ROM. I almost never use the Windows version because the DOS version is very comprehensive. The only complaint I have is that I can't find a way in the DOS version to make the diagnostics run "n" number of times. Their memory test is very thorough, but I'd like to leave the whole thing running for a few days. Maybe they've corrected that in newer versions?
They don't have an eval version on their web site, but maybe you can contact their sales department about getting one. Please note that they now have a product called CheckIt86 which has nothing to do with the DOS version (e.g. 8086) but is an ad-blocker.
God knows nobody else has!
...was...well...a long time ago. But at the time AMI Diag was pretty good. It is still available, but I'm not sure how good the current version is.
The heights of genius are only measurable by the depths of stupidity
The Dell Diagnostics are free to download and (last I checked) work on non-Dell PCs as well. They test just about everything you could think of and with a little work you can burn it all onto a bootable CD.
An IBM service tech told me that's they use.
Agreed: Try known good parts.
To prove to yourself that it really is fixed, use a memory tester, the hard disk manufacturer's disk diagnostics, and either a program that reboots an OS 20 seconds after it is loaded (on Windows XP, Wizmo from GRC.com and Sleep.exe from the resource kit) or, even better, some Linux or BSD build process that takes several hours.
The biggest cause of failure in an old PC: Bad contacts. Just move every card and connector 2 millimeters out and in again. The rubbing of metal to metal creates fresh contact surfaces. Renewing the contacts should be the first step in fixing any PC.
The biggest cause of real failure in a new PC: Infant failure. Components are more than 100 times more likely to fail in the first week than they are in the 100 weeks after that.
I use a combination of Memtest and Maxtor's Powerdiag software. Maxtor's software will work on any brand hard drive and has fixed quite a few non bootable hard drives long enough to get them Ghosted over to new drives. As for Micro2000, just last week I had a defective IDE controller that passed Micro2000's diagnostic tests just fine, but killed 2 hard drives. Micro2000's memory tests also miss a lot of errors that Memtest finds.
The reason I'vd found for this is quite simply that a piece of software can't possibly report correctly on a hardware problem, especially an intermittant one ( a klingon!). It's self defeating to expect software to find a problem with hardware. That's NOT to say that software testers don't have their place; they are great for burn-ins and torture tests.
I will most often have found and fixed a problem long before a diagnostic is ready to report. And if it is an extremely hard or intermittant problem, the diagnostics are not going to help anyway! I've found even harware-based diagnostics (you know those units that plug in to an ISA/EISA/PCI/whatever slot), to be ineffective as well; they work great when the hardware is fine, but fall over without a useful result when it's not. Think about it. As some others have said here, nothing beats the old noggin' as the best diagnostic software available (I guess we'd have to call it "wetware" though!).
Microsoft offers a freebie memory tester
Supposedly pretty good, it boots off a floppy or CD so it looks like it will run under Linux. I haven't had a chance to try it myself yet.
I hope that someday we will be able to put away our fears and prejudices and just laugh at people. - Jack Handey
I used to write diagnostic software for computer companies in the early 80s. If the computer was together enough to run my software there was not that much that could be wrong with it and very little I could find.
Keep in mind typical diagnostic sofware back then would test for things like memory not really being there (bad address or data line problem) or interrupts stuck on or not happening when they should or can't talk to the disk drive.
None of this crap really helps is you have a bad scsi cable (ouch, that was a long drawn out pig) or a bad cable or the wrong cache controller chip (ouch) or a bad power supply or wrong speed RAM any of which will cause a system to beheva erratically and in a - and this is the bad part - non repeatable way.
Back then almost every part was $8000, these days the answer to "how do I fix a flakey computer" is "buy a new one".
Need Mercedes parts ?
MemTestx86 (as you have found): Allow me one point further int he favor of it, major memory makers will accept their RAM bad, no questions asked (in my experience) if you tell them it was checked and found bad, via MemTextx86.
i'd like to second this. i had some crucial ram giving me trouble so i called their tech support folks, told them memtest86 failed, and they were quite satisfied. it turns out that our motherboard came with two different chipsets. the chipset we had was incompatable with the memory they sent and they crossshiped the replacement.
-- john
Anyone know of a good auto backup program? One that would say, let me pick which folders get backed-up, pick where they get backed up to, and how often this backup happens? One that runs in Windows possibly?
I agree as well. I used to do support for the USDA-FSIS. It is much more time and cost effective for a large support shop (>3000 end users to support when I was ther) to have a few spares lying around to just do a quick swap. Why run diagnostics for hours/days when you can put a new modem or NIC in there in 5 minutes and be done?
Now, if you are trying to run a small PC repair place and can't have the overhead of equivalent parts lying around the software MIGHT be useful. Even then, there are other diagnostics you can do with the proper knowledge and background. However, this still takes lots of time. With hardware so cheap, if you burn up 4-8 hours of time at $50/hour the customer should be pissed.
Do really dense people warp space more than others?
Any thoughts on diagnostic software for Mac OSX?
McAffe? DiskWarrior? Norton?
Human genome = 3 billion base pairs = 6 GBit. Windows + Office = 20 Gbit. Which is more impressive?
Sandra has some uses, but it, like a lot of other "hardware diagnostics" software, has a HUGE disadvantage.... It expects your operating system to be in good working order. It also expects that you have current (and appropriate) drivers installed for all your hardware. Any good technician already knows the tenet "Divide and conquer". When troubleshooting, you want to know if the problem is caused by the hardware or the software. If your software is screwed up, how can you trust the diagnostics to properly report that the HARDWARE is good?
Likewise, anyone can write a driver bad enough to make the video tests fail, but that doesn't mean the video card is actually defective.
Years ago, I worked at a PC manufacturer and we used QAPLUS FE. It was small enough to fit on a floppy disk, and had modules for all the independant subsystems: CPU, RAM, VIDEO, IO Ports, Timer channels, interrupts, Hard disk... You could select all the tests and let it run all night. If it failed on something, it actually gave you an idea on what might be the problem.
I would recommend QAPLUS if they had an up-to-date version that booted from a CD and had it's own KNOWN GOOD drivers for hardware. A Plus would be some sort of modular technology that would allow you to add drivers for more hardware in the future.
Well, I'll try doing what I can, but I agree with the summary re: intermittent problems. I can buy a used 4150 for less than quoted repair costs, but I don't have the moolah either way. I'll check for a power regulator, and I'll do the Knoppix check too. It's been a handy machine, I'll try to keep it working. Thanks for the suggestions and comments !
I it was Antec that recently put out a power supply tester. It basically an LED and a few resistors with a harness for like $15 or $25 (I forget). You still need a multimeter to test it but if you get you +/-12V and +/-5V while underload you should have a good power supply. I haven't personally used it yet but I plan to pick one up at some point.
If you come to a computer that needs work and you boot into a Knoppix CD you get...a desktop. On the other hand if you boot on to something like the ultimate boot cd you get a nice menu broken down by category of things like "File system utilities", "Memory Tests", and "Hard drive cloning". I just don't see how Knoppix can compare to that. I'm willing to listen though, if you care to explain what makes it so great for this.
SCO.com uses Linux
I was a tech support person for years, and had the same trouble trying to find a diag. product that was really useful. One thing that I ran across (but never had a chance to test) that may be worth it for you if you do this full time was a product that was a PCI card that would test the various bits of hardware, and report a 2-digit code that would tell what the problem was, and where.
Unfortunately, it was a few years ago, and I couldn't afford it personally (it was like $500 US at the time?), so I don't know how well it really works - but the theory is sound. I think it was something along the lines of this product:
Worrying works!! 99% of all the stuff I worry about never happens
I know this doesn't fit with your situation exactly, but I would like to take this opportunity to say that Microsoft Operations Manager is actually a VERY kewl product. I ran it up in a test environment in my house to test its abilities, and found it to be the most comprehensive event tracking, databasing, solving, and tag collector for large and small industry alike. So if you ever need these diagnositic abilities outside of small/individual PC work, then try MOM out.
This is very nice software, we use it at work, runs off of a floppy which you can burn to iso, it will test every component piece by piece, it has found bad hard drives, ram, and video cards many times. Also from the same company you can get a POST card, great for when you can't tell what part of the motherboard failed. oh their url is http://www.uxd.com/qtpro.shtml
press ctrl-alt-F1 after booting to Knoppix and type lspci. It will give a list of everything sitting on the pci bus whether Knoppix configured it or not. /proc also has a wealth of information especially if you look at the files in /proc/bus. For instance:
/proc/bus/usb/devices will spit out a handy list of everything on the pci bus.
cat
Hey folks,
It may seem too obvious to mention, but for ANY had drive issues, one of the first thigs I do is just use a bootable floppy with the manufacturer's diagnostic tools. Fujitsu, WD, Maxtor, they all have them and they have helped before. If the drive is failing, but still holding on, any bootable linux CD then goes in (Knoppix or Cool-Linux, ususally) and I copy the contents of the dying drive to a fresh one. Then the old one can continue its innevitable tranformation in to a paper weight.
Mr_Wood
If the diagnostic tool takes a few minutes to run, it generally is not as effective as my eyeball diagnostics of banging on the keyboard and testing out normal programs.
If the diagnostic tool is focused on specific tasks -- say memory or hard drive -- and it performs an exhaustive test, it will catch things I can't.
Case in point: I've found that 1/2 of my computers have had RAM defects; some right out of the box, and some toward the end of life.
Sometimes, I suspect that a specific problem exists and the tool verifies it. Other times, I test just to make sure the systems are OK, and get a surprise.
In either case, the tests should take hours. In one situation, I ran a burn-in test for over a day before any problems were detected.
A firewall can not protect you from yourself. Turn off what you do not need. Do not use the firewall to do your work.
There was a discussion on this topic over on the Games page a week or two ago RE: recurring charges for an X-Box Live subscription. The consensus seemed to be that Chargebacks should only be granted in cases where the merchandise wasn't delivered in the first place (amongst other criteria). Whether some over-worked/under-interested customer service person will give you one anyway (and whether the company then disputes your chargeback) is a separate question.
:(
I think that small claims court is probably the most likely to provide relief for this type of problem. I *believe* that you can sue mail-order companies in your jurisdiction and they'll lose by default if they don't show to contest - quite possibly not worth their time. What exactly the court usually does in a case like this where the company has carefully not kept any record of their promise of a refund (i.e. it's a strictly he said/they said) if it goes to trial, I'm not sure.
IMO, network problems (thick, thin, 10T, and 100T ethernet, GigE, Hyperchannel, token ring, 802.11a/b/g, ...) are best diagnosed with the aid of a rubber chicken.
YRSMV. (Your Ritual Sacrifices May Vary.)
Prime95 is an invaluable tool for stressing the CPU and Memory of a system. I have found that a system may pass Memtest86, but will crash under Prime. Specifically the new version lets you stress the CPU, RAM, or a mix of both. Alongside that I also find Motherboard Monitor a great asset to any PC diagnostic kit. The ability to monitor temperatures and voltage levels is extrememly important. A weak +12v rail on a newer P4, Athlon XP system is indicative of system instability and most likely the cause of many problems. Also keep in mind heat is electronics worse enemy. I cannot tell you how many times I have found dust caked in the CPU heatsink and fan causing overheating, leading to system crashes or a dead Proc. Not the end all be all of diagnostic software, but a good start. I find the free alternatives better than any packaged software you can buy.
Try TuffTest Pro (I think it can be found for $20 with a quick google) with the $20 plug set, and get a POST Probe from cwlinux.com, and codes from bioscentral.com. Voila, all you need for MUCH cheaper than MicroScope WITH their POST probe, and works better.
Hey i recently had took look for just such a software. What I found is that no software company makes an all encompassing program to diagnose hardware. I think you may have to buy seperate software for different jobs. I have been trying out many different software companies and I had the most luck with Ontrack and R-Studio. Both are used for hardware diagnostics only though. So I think you may have to find a seperate piece of software to diagnose each piece of hardware, if you want it done correctly. Good Luck
using memtest and other nifty linux based utils on a bootable CDROM distributions like Knoppix and LNX-BBC has saved me many hours of torment and toil.
Strongly suggested.
Up to 5 pounds it's a "hammer."
Between 5 and 8 pounds it's a "maul."
Anything bigger is a "sledge."
Of course, this is the Information Age, and the young probably don't get exposed to the correct vocabulary for many physical objects. Perhaps not even to manual labor.
sincerely,
Old Coot
Did PC diagnostics ever do anything worthwhile? I've been around PCs and Macs on a support/troubleshooting/technical basis for 15 years and I've never found a diagnostics program other than MEMTEST86 find a damn thing wrong with a PC or indicate if there was a problem. I'm excluding FDISK/fsck from this as corrupted disks are more of a database/software problem than a hardware problem.
Nobody uses them because they don't do anything. Whining only slightly louder than the ventilation system will get you a motherboard swap from most vendors at the IT dept. level, at the consumer level you're stuck with at least one "vendor default image".
It's too easy and cheap to swap out systems entirely, wipe your hands and walk away in 30 minutes than it is to BS around with diagnostics which might tell me that a nonreplacable surface mount component is bad.
There are no good diagnostics because nobody cares about $75 motherboards and $100 CPUs.
Seriously, most of the time you can diagnose a problem with simple methodical logical thinking. Somethings not working? What are the possible causes. Isolate and eliminate.
Now you said diagnostic tools, so I wont tell you adaware/spybot, av, a knoppix disc and so on. Besides you have enough people listing enough good ideas.
The simple truth is, if you replace the memory and the system starts booting, why do you need to know what's wrong with the memory? It's no working and you can not fix it. If you/the customer is lucky you can send it back on a warranty and get it replaced.
Nope screw the diag software. The best thing you can do is buy and or acucmulate lots of spare parts like some people have suggested. Think it might be this? Replace it or put that in another system and (try to) prove it conclusively one way or another.
I know in rare cases you get really F'ed up behaviour and just CANNOT figure out what it is even after replacing everything (two recent events in my experience come to mind...); but I seriously doubt any piece of software is going to tell me what was causing those problems. If they did it would be a first and I would definately recommend them...
If you get a signal 11, start diasgnosing at lower level !
[Pruneau
#1 HIMEM and MEMTEST are not part of the POST. If either fail you've already isolated a symtom.
/cpu/etc is the proven cause, why would you need more validation, you've either diagnosed the problem or you haven't? Creating a test case that accurately tests one specific failure mode, will like miss an infinite number of other subtle problems which are next to impossible to replicate or simulate, especially if you take them out of there operating environment. Far cheaper I suspect to throw away a bad memory stick, whether its a bad memory cell, or capacitive loading or reflection issue that's unique to your board. See also transmission line theory.
#2 BIST should determine fatal flaws in the processor, much anything else is looking for corner conditions, that might prove very difficult to replicate. See also processor errata and validation. Processors a full of subtle flaws, they have departments working on finding them. I doubt a guy in his garage can slap together a solution that is close to a holy grail. Someone who sells Snake Oil will always find a mark.
#3 Testing using synthentic tools, will likely completely miss anything but gross and fatal flaws. If they do pinpoint a flaw that's great. If applications are failing, and the memory
The primary point is that a good technician can resolve a problem if the symptoms are present, without recourse to hand holding tools, which basically extend their billable hours and cost structure. I suspect most customers would be far happier paying for the 30 minute fix, than pay to have someone dick around for 4 hours.
Google for memtest86.
Visit http://ringbreak.dnd.utwente.nl/~mrjb/growingbettersoftware to download your free copy of the book
In my experience, diagnostic software has never been better than my intuition and experience.
Don't waste your money on software packages - spend the money you save on bettering your education and experience through training and reading. It'll pay you back, where as the software is liek throwing your money away.
I suggest you make a Knoppix CD with LTP installed. With a little configuration, that will take care of all of all your tests for the memory, disk, IO, and CPU. You might want to install America's Army or something to test the video subsystem.
If you put a little effort into it, you'll have a test suite as good as, and likely better than, anything you could pay money for. If you want to buy something, you can make a donation to the LTP and Knoppix projects.
There are also simpler tools, like Memtest86. I find this tool to be invaluable when I try to salvage old hardwar. I can't begin to tell you how much time it's saved me that I would have spent aimlessly swapping components around.
In spite of the suggestions and all the tests that I have made, I have not cavato a spider from the hole.
If you can still find it, AMIDIAG (from American Megatrends) was my favorite from back in the day. It booted off a single floppy, and ran an intensive gamut of memory and other sorts of tests. It might be a bit dated by today's standards, but as far as the nitty gritty I think giving it a shot might indeed prove worthwhile.
"[T]he single essential element on which all discoveries will be dependent is human freedom." -- Barry Goldwater
it cannot be duplicated by any means I could discover, even for backups. "Not that there's anything wrong with that!
You should try dd under linux.
Something like dd if=/dev/fd0 of=~/image (sorry I don't have the manual handy, but it's something like this)
BIST? How 'come BIST has never found any of the L1/L2 flaws that I *know* are on some of the motherboards I've tossed? Turn off the cache, everything works.
HIMEM? You mean that POS memory test that MS included as a part of DOS? You actually trust that thing?
"Synthetic tools"? WTF?
"Replace stuff until it works". LOL! You'd make a good automobile mechanic. I'd love to see you explain to a customer why you replaced the battery, battery cable, solenoid, ignition key, etc. because a headlight went out.
Just... listen...... to the screams......
You are looking for 1 package to diagnose a giant set of hardware components. That seems like quite a challange. Maybe you should look at it from the standpoint of components such as a memory test, hard drive test, mainboard test, proc test, etc.
This will obviously require you to lug someones hard-drive home to your "test" machine, but it may be easier looking for those kinds of software packages.
Good luck
-- A cat is no trade for integrity!
To test the video, just run soem 3D game demo. It's free, and it will flex the GPU muscles on the card. My girlfriend's fan died on her Geforce 256 and that is how I realized it was the video card locking up the whole computer. The fan was still working, but it was running at a low enough RPM that it wasn't clearing the heat out, so it would eventualy overheat enough.
For testing USB, nothing beats a cheap little USB flash drive. Works in most OSes with no drivers, with the exception of win98.
For Serial testing, just plug in an old serial modem. Doesn't matter what speed as long as it is tested good. I bought a 14.4 external at a thrift store for a few bucks. Works fine in a pinch.
For parallel, who knows. There isn't much you can put in a parallel port that won't require drivers. A zip drive can be found for cheap.
I dont' have one, but a POST card will check dead machines that don't come up.
Always keep a spare ISA, PCI and AGP video card around. I bought a P2 motherboard for $7 once, and the AGP was fried. Everything else worked fine.
Sound. Got headphones?
You don't need expensive dongles and software packages to test all this stuff. Knoppix and with a boot floppy for older PC's is all you need.
-- Having a Creationist Museum is like having an Atheist place of worship
There was this little mom and pop computer shop, where I bought some stuff, and my buddy bought a whole computer, circa 1993-94. My buddy paid $800 for 16 megs of RAM. And he paid $250 for a honking big tower case, with wheels, and hinged panels, and almost a dozen external bays.
That honking big case was a honking big mistake. He never populated those bays, and it was too bulky to carry on public transit. Well, I had a car, and he didn't. So, when he had hardware problems he would beg me for a lift.
I can't remember how many trips we made to this store. A bunch of them concerned his flaky hard drives. The fellow replaced the drive, at least once.
Well, one time my buddy asked me to take his computer to this store for him. And this time I watched the owner's diagnostic technique. The first thing he did was take the drive out of the big honking case, and put it in his test rig. He also confessed to me that he wasn't replacing the drives any more, he would just test it, and if it was okay he was telling my buddy he had replaced it.
When I got the computer back to my buddy's place, I opened it up myself. I found that one of the pins on one of the power connectors had come loose. So it was only making intermittent connection. And this was causing intermittent problems.
Diagnosis through swapping out components failed here.
Hey, Windows users, there is no such thing as "forward" slash, there is only slash and backslash.
If you want to try it IBM uses a limited version as it's diagnostic software. You can download the diags from IBM and run them on an IBM computer. The only difference I saw when I compared the IBM download to a normal PC Doctor was that the IBM version checked to see if it was an IBM computer.
Turn it on and see if it SMOKES. If it does its a hardware problem.
BCM Diags is a Windows 95/98 diagnostics program that you can download for free (freeware). Of course who runs Windows 95/98? However once installed you will find a subdirectory in it's program directory called DOSdiags. Format a floppy with format a: /s and copy the contents on the DOSdiags subfolder onto the floppy and voila bootable DOS hardware diag disk for free. And it works as well or better than the ones that cost bucks. Check it out for yourself at the url below. I keep one around for basic hardware tests. I also got suckered into buying tufftest pro (which is at least affordable) but BCM diags works better in my expereince and it is gratis. Thank you very much to whomever wrote the thing and decided to give it away.
s ti cs/bcm-diagnostics.html
http://www.5star-shareware.com/Utilities/Diagno
...Uniformity of hardware is key to maintaining a sane corporate IT infrastructure. If every department has their own standard, it's impossible to troubleshoot Gateways, IBMs, Dells, HPs, and frankenbeasts in an 8-hour day. x86 legacy aside, there are too many variations in quality and configuration even across "compatible" systems to reliably troubleshoot issues on a daily basis.
I especially like Dell and IBM's basic troubleshooting kits. They seem to be pretty decent at working on a variety of their own machines, so one disk will support the Dimensions, Optiplexes, and Latitudes I see on a daily basis.
For more in-depth toubleshooting, a good DOS boot disk with Partition Magic is a good first step. For Win2k machines, the System Rescue CD is vital. Especially when you need to bood from a CD (no floppy workstations), mount the NTFS partition, try to fix it, and if you fail you can mount a samba drive and backup your data all without multiple reboots.
Yeah, read the post.
There's a great free service at belarc.com which is not diagnostic but it gives a complete listing of the PC's hardware and software in a handy and readable HTML format. It includes M$ hotfixes and updates as well as software licenses where applicable. Very useful if problems necessitate reconstruction of the system.
John
I've worked as a technician for about five years, both on-site and in-house, and I really haven't found any good all-around utilities. Most of the diganostic programs mentioned here tend to test things that hardly ever test bad in reality, such as serial and parallel ports, timer chips, address lines, etc. The best thing to have around in case of a rather obvious failure (failure to power on, blank screen, beeping) is a collection of known good parts that can be swapped in to isolate the problem. They can also be useful in cases involving more subtle or intermittent problems, such as a CD burner that fails half the time or a computer that locks up after a few hours. Heat problems can be subtle -- I remember a friend telling me that the computer he shop didn't have heat for a while during the winter because of a bad relay, so there was a case where a computer with a slow fan worked at the shop, but didn't work when the customer took it back to their warm home. Sometimes a USB device a customer installed won't work because they plugged it in before installing drivers, and now it needs to be removed from the registry and installed again. In Windows, sometimes certain programs don't play well together, and experience will tell you what programs to avoid, and which processes in your task list don't belong. The point is, certain utilities may have their place, but no utility can replace the ability to diagnose a problem through experience and process of elimination. A memory test utility may show that you have bad memory, but experience may tell you that it's bad anyway, even when the program says it's okay. The good news is that I believe quality is improving again, after hitting a low in the K6-2 era, when cheap motherboard production proliferated, and the problem was compounded by the large increase in cooling needed for those chips (I'll never forget PC100 mainboards (yes, that was the company name, not the memory speed)). It's also pretty cheap nowadays to have spare parts on hand for quick checks.
"No one likes working in a hamster wheel, and your shop smells of cedar shavings from here." - TaleSpinner
ok> setenv diag-switch true
:-(
ok> reset
Oh, you're talking about a Wintel box, not a SPARC;
Well, you get what you pay for.
Found this site with diagnostic tools for a bunch of different hard drive mnufacturers.
When i was in high school i took a GOOD PC (A+)repair class... I learned what IRQ, DMA, Mpu and all that good stuff was really about... not just ok... place this card here... or make sure the IRQ is free.... Most importantly we learned about the OS...
Computers are not like they used to be... your best bet is to know your OS... hardware is easy to replace... easy to trouble shoot...
You really need to understand the OS... and then you will see that you don't need that expensive software... save your money... and take a good class...
Several years ago, I bought this package because it said it would detect bad ram. Well, it didn't. After contacting the company, they did not want to refund my money. I ended up calling the credit card company I was using and explained the situation. They told me to box it up, send it back, and they refunded my money.
boycott slashdot February 10th - 17th check out: altSlashdot.org
Check the power supply first. Don't put your "known good" parts in a machine until you verify that the power supply is working correctly. Power supplies fail often, sometimes subtly. Applying 12VDC where 5VDC goes can kill your "known good" cards. Ask me how I know.
Anyone know of a good diagnostic tool for an Asus A7A266? Asus' website blows and I have never been able to find _ANYTHING_ along the lines of a diagnostic utlitiy from them. :(
My shop is Xserves and Macintoshes, so I've grown lazy and most nothing breaks (no flames please). I learned at school (where even the teacher-a master-couldn't control the beast which is MS Server) on Windows and if it weren't for these guys nothing would have got done. WARNING: these tools work and cost money. Pay the man. http://www.winternals.com/products/repairandrecove ry/index.asp
http://www.sysinternals.com/
~hylas
I can't agree more.
If you have a gentoo install/livecd, an undocumented feature is to type memtest (or was it memtest86) at the boot: prompt and boom you're in.
Alternatively you can stick it on a floppy.
I have never found bad ram with it, though I know others who have.
Prerequisites:
(1) GHOST'ed hard drive with Windows 2000 installed, and the Sysprep utility enabled on it
(4) Processors: a Socket 7, a Slot A, a Socket A, and a Socket 478
(4*2) RAM modules: a couple of 72 pin SIMM's, a couple of PC-66 SDRAM's, a couple of PC-133's, and a couple of DDR's
(3) Power supplies, an AT, an ATX, and one of those new ATX'es
(2) Motherboards, 1 AT, 1 ATX
(2) video cards, 1 PCI and 1 AGP
Step 1:
Replace user's HD with your SYSprep'd one. Boot. If you can boot, Win2K will do it's hardware detection routine. If it finishes, and boots to a 2K desktop, your problem is probably software and you have to narrow down from there. If it's using Windows, boot with user's hard drive in safe mode. If problem does not occur, disable taskbar lint under HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE/Software/Microsoft/Windows/Cur
Step 2:
If the user's machine did not go past the Win2K hardware detection routine, then the problem is hardware. Go into the PC's CMOS and reset to Setup Defaults. If that doesn't work, CMOS is OK, it's a hardware component. The list of problematic components in a typical PC, listed in desending order of probability is:
Go into the CMOS, disable L2 cache on the motherboard (common problem and you don't have to swap out anything). Try Win2K detection routine. If it works, motherboard L2 cache is the problem. If it doesn't, swap the ram. If it works, it's RAM. If it doesn't, swap the processor. If it works, it's chip. If it doesn't, swap the PSU. If it works, it's PSU. If it doesn't, take out all add-on cards and swap the video cards. If it works, swap back each add-on card one by one until the problem re-occurs. When it re-occurs, the last card you swapped back in was the problem. Replace it, and you are good to go.
Using this technique, I can troubleshoot 90% of PC's in 15 minutes or less, 90% of the time. HTH.
From the times of the Atari ST I still have the '10 cm test' in my repertoire.
The Atari had lots of socketed chips inside, and whenever the PC acted a bit weird, I used to lift the thing 10 cm and just let it drop. That was ususally enough to settle the chips a bit better in their sockets and have it work some better afterwards.
Yeah, I know.... It's just dealing with people who can't go off script that's annoying.
Thanks for the encouragement.
-- red floyd
The only reason we have the rights we have is that people just like us died to gain those rights. -- Cheerio Boy
When it comes to detailed hardware diagnostics:
Third-party diagnostic software is usually insufficient because many hardware details are kept proprietary by the manufacturer.
Manufacturers' diagnostic software is always suspect. When there is a somewhat obscure design bug, manufacturers have been known to remove a test which points out the bug. (Then they can point the finger at the user's software as the culprit rather than their hardware).
I wonder if that would help my laptop stop crashing... ;)
Right between your ears. Seriously, in the last 20+ years in this industry, there's one thing I've learned: if a diag detects a problem, you've got a problem, if it doesn't, you still might. Reason being, most hardware problems are intermittent. If the hardware doesn't work at all, then you know what the problem is and diags aren't going to tell you anything new (except for some arcane proprietary result code you need to tell the tech on the line when trying to get a replacement). If it's intermittent, it's tough to narrow it down, and diags might not catch it. If it's flaky, then the moment you run the diags is the time it doesn't act flaky.
:)
The best thing you can do is stop relying on useless diags. As you've learned, most are. Bone up on your troubleshooting skills, learn more about the hardware...
Do you know BIOS beep codes by heart? Do you know what they are? I've met very few people over the last few years who do. You don't need a POST card if you learn 'em.
Do you know how to write scripts? Batch files? A simple batch file that formats a drive, and fills it with data, over and over again will more often give you a good indicator as to its health than some diag.
These things are all based on "the basics" that every tech should know. Buy a copy of "Upgrading and Repairing PCs" and memorize it. There's a TON of good information on how these boxen work. If you fill your head with skills, you can always be sure to have the diags and information you need. If you need to rely too heavily on tools and such, you might not be in the right field.
Which is more painful? Going to work or gouging your eye out with a spoon? Find out!
http://www.workorspoon.com
http://www.uxd.com/qtpro.shtml
Our company swears by it... every machine before it goes on the bench and after it leaves goes through fully automated and comprehensive "Burn-In" process. I'm not sure how much it costs, but its definitely up there around $400 maybe? and comes with bunch of loopback interfaces.
it's pretty up to date too, last version we have has serial ATA, athlon 64 etc support
I can't even count how much time we saved when after initial burn-in we realized that the memory was set to CAS 2.5 instead of 3 causing timer problems and subsequent weird application crashes.
A tool like this is very important if you have many crap machines coming from the street and you dont know who worked on them before (Joe Sixpack thought that lower CAS will make his computer go faster, but his el cheapo memory modules just wont take it)
I've just built a machine for my wife and it was hell. Could not get it stable.
Testing from the start.
Starting right down with a PS tester. All green, no regulator problems? Check.
MB and RAM in. Six passes of the 3 256s with memtest-86 in a CD boot. Zero errors. (And on and on for other parts and swaps.)
Called the motherboard tech support.
THEM: Try it with only DIMM slot 0
ME: But I got zero errors with six passes of memtest-86!
THEM: Try it with only DIMM slot 0
Tried it with only DIMM slot 0. Stable. Took that stick out. Put the other two in. Still stable.
Moral? Like the guy who puts out memtest-86 writes: Buy RAM one speed grade above spec for Athlons and you will save yourself a lot of trouble. Quality is important from the start.
Moral Two: Testing doesn't replace experience.
I build several hundred servers a year and use AMIdiag to burn them in and test them. I actually ship a legal copy of the product with every server I ship.
As others have said, there are 2 versions, one runs under Windows. One under DOS. I use the floppy or CD loading version. It does a fairly comprehensive test of the hardware and devices.
I have found Burn In Test to do a pretty good job of testing new components for hardware failure. It doesn't have a lot of diagnostics, but if your testing new hardware then all the need to know is a problem exists. After that your just an RMA away from a working component.
The purpose of language is communication, If the idea is clear the grammar ain't important
Sorry but it will cost more than 10s of billions to wire every house in the United Stated with fiber. That is just an unheard of and extremely expensive prospet.
"Help me Obi-/.-Kenobi,your my only hope!" -$
This is more "lightweight" than Knoppix, and will run fine on less powerful hardware. Only thing is, the version I had is kind of allergic to some Intel P4 motherboards. You have about 60 seconds to type # rmmod i810-tco before it resets itself. Of course, some people would say that an Intel processor is a fault .....
.....
For testing RAM, a kernel compile is about the best you can do. Unfortunately, you might have trouble fitting the necessary stuff {full GCC inc. dependencies and kernel sources} on a CD. You could swap out the RAM into a board with a big HDD though
You can check out serial and parallel ports with a voltmeter, a portable oscilloscope, or some homemade gadget with LEDs and resistors. In the dot-matrix days {when printers took ASCII codes} it was easy to tell which bits weren't working by seeing which characters printed wrongly.
I have to agree with the other posters though, that there is no substitute for experience - and a set of known good parts you can swap. There really is no single tool that will do the job. If PC repairs were simple, they wouldn't need a human being to do them!
Je fume. Tu fumes. Nous fûmes!
A word of advice for do-it-yourself-ers: You get what you pay for. If you want a stable system, shell out the cash for a good quality power supply (Antec makes some nice upper-end quality power supplies in the range of a budget, check out tomshardware.com).
"The most common problems I encounter with PCs are memory related."
Hah. The most common problems *I* encounter with PCs are user related.
And if its a sysadmin user, its almost always a typo.
In the free world the media isn't government run; the government is media run.
http://www.zhangduo.com/udi.html
unknown device identifier, it will give you the PnP info on your hardware, so youll know what sound card is in there *without* having to pop the case.
& its only 800k, so you can send it to someone & have them run it
I have Norton Utilities, the only program on the cd worth using is WinDoc. I find that it fixes most Windows issues. Especially erronious registry entries. The program does seem to solve 80% of my Windows problems, the other 20% I am usually able to muddle through without help.
I am Bennett Haselton! I am Bennett Haselton!
[memtest86] Let me send you my IProc PC-100 SDRAM DIMM... the idiots put the wrong timing values in it's SPD. I've only found one machine, ever, to work properly with that damn thing. Tyan MB's tend to lock as soon as the POST is complete. Memtest86 ran for 7 days and could not find a problem with the DIMM.
Heheh... I've had similar problems with RAM speeds. A couple of years ago, a bunch of SiS shared video/system memory motherboards on FIDS (flight information display systems) that I was administering would cease to work when the displays were pushed to any resolution greater than 640x480.
The symptoms were random garbage and slow refresh of the screen - ie, close a window and artifacts remain. Kick to a shell and they all disappear as the resolution is cut to 640x480.
Took a look at the RAM itself. "PC100" stickers all over the place and 10ns speed ratings on the ICs. "Okay, f = 1/t and t=10ns, so this is 100 MHz rated RAM..."
Tried swapping in another DIMM. Same problem. Tried swapping in another DIMM of another brand - no more problem.
Did a little research when I noticed that the good DIMM had 7ns labels on all the ICs...
Turned out that the PC100 specification requires all the RAM chips to have 7ns or better response speeds... and apparently, the DIMMs which didn't work came from some third-world country where the definition of a nanosecond is somewhat different than ours. (Almost like how a "watt" in computer speakers and car stereos has absolutely nothing to do with the scientific definition. Rule of thumb: amplifiers rated in real watts will tend to weigh 1/4lb per watt. Haven't yet found a similar rule for memory speeds.)
Fire and Meat. Yummy.
>>
And last, but not least, a good Google search. Another thing that has saved my skin time and again is to input exact error messages and see what Google turns up.
>>
A friend's computer refused to boot and displayed: error 1506
Google search: Your ps/2 mouse and ps/2 keyboard plugs are reversed.
1000 SlashDot sigs
I work as a the production mananger for a midsized PC manaufacturer who also does a fair amount of refurbishing of other manufacturers sytems (30k plus units shipped in 2003) We have a need to inexpesively test hundreds of parts and units on a regular basis. The following are tools I can have any of my tech without.
0 &SiteID=simtel.net
The First is EBCD Emergency Boot CD
http://www.ebcd.i-am.ru/
Mirror of download http://www.simtel.net/product.php?id=61113&sekid=
This is a program that builds an ISO out of FD images and XML based build program so you can add all your floppy based boot tools to it or use the multitude of built in tools including Memtest HD fitness utility and AIDA 16
Another excellent choice is to use Ultimate Boot Cd available at http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/ all make use of freeware and shareware.
also as mentioned yesterday a WinPE disk made using Bart's PE builder is excellent for windows testing.
No, seriously, the best non-synthetic test of a system's datapath IMHO is to build the Linux kernel repeatedly. GCC is quite RAM and disk intensive, and so stresses the most flakiness-prone parts of a machine. Plus it gets the CPU pretty hot. This, in my experience, will make a machine with marginal memory, clock settings, or even heat dissipation fall over.
Most of these programs are little help in diagnosing problems with a motherboard these days. I am an A+ professional with over 3 years experience and I have yet to extensively use or see another PC Tech rely on these expensive diagnostic programs with the exception of free, downloadable tools that test your hard drive or RAM. Check out Hitachi's Drive Fitness Test, a free download, works on most brands of IDE hard drives. (www.hitachi.com) For RAM, memtestX86 ver. 3.0 is good, as well as the Windows Memory Tester (note: does not run in Windows!), which is provided by Microsoft I believe.
Beyond that, many hardware problems are simply not catchable by the programs you mentioned.
If you are having problems posting a motherboard, a PCI POST error card can be handy, as it will tell you the codes that are being written to port 80h.
Also, I'd say that most motherboard problems fall into the category of no POST or stability issues, both of which diagnostic programs will not help much. (Can't run software on a no-POST!!)
As far as Windows based "doctor" prgrams that try to find problems in Windows, they are pretty much useless. Anything that screws with the registry is dangerous as well, could possibly render your programs or Windows inoperable!
LinuxDefender
p hp ?menu_id=25&n_id=58
e fe nder/
n ux /free/LinuxDefender/
http://www.bitdefender.com/bd/site/presscenter.
ftp://ftp.bitdefender.com/pub/linux/free/LinuxD
ftp://ftp.bitdefender.ro/pub/produse/release/li
Maybe your clients need to shave? Or at least wear long pants and shirtsleeves.
--
"Outlook not so good." That magic 8-ball knows everything! I'll ask about Exchange Server next.
Seriously... you dont realy need the software, all you need is some troubleshooting skills.
.02
The only software packages that i use when on site are ones such as partition magic, or R-studio (a verry good data recovery tool). If it looks like a hardware problem i just use the process of elimination, and can usualy find the cause in a few minutes. Invest your money in some known good hardware ( i.e. extra ram, video cards, hard disks, NIC's, and cables) and the process goes pretty fast. having the replacement hardware with you generaly impresses you clients as well becasue they get there issue resolved on your first trip out, and they tend not to mind if you charge a little extra for it.
just my
Have you tried ToolhouseUSA.com? Also look into computerrepair.com. They have forums that techs specifically discuss these issues.
This was moded as Insightful and is now Flamebait! cat /proc is going to tell you everything you need to know and more. Oh, wait, there is no proc on your win95
I think it stucks a bit that the microscope guys didn't really get a chance to defend themselves in this article.
It's why I don't support end-users anymore. $349 gets you a brand new Dell. Fixing PC's is becoming pointless. I haven't fixed anything except a dead hard drive in years. SO have them spend $349 and charge them $75 to add their old HD as a slave and reinstall their software and recustomize. You'll make more money with less work. I promise.
Vote Quimby!
Try Ultimate Boot CD.
Really, a great tool, includes a _load_ of hardware testing tools (like vendor tools for harddisks, memtest, etc.).
I have had success with Checkit Utilities from Smith Micro. Note that I just use it when I have problems with my own machines so I cannot claim to be a power user and so cannot speak for how complete the testing suite is. They will boot from a floppy, which is essential for doing hardware diagnostics - you cannot do that from inside Windows.
Squirrel!
It is a shame that most PC technicians don't actually diagnose problems. Instead, they guess and swap, until the system happens to work, again. They don't really know what was wrong (though they probably will claim otherwise), and they certainly don't know if they fixed the problem.
I've met several technicians who claim that modern microchips are less-sensitive to electrostatic discharge than obsolete microchips were, but the microchip industry says exactly the opposite. Most PC technicians take very little, if any, precaution against electrostatic discharge. They assume that if the component works, it isn't damaged, and they lack the skills and tools to find any real damage. Instead, they simply swap out parts if something stops working.
I can't entirely fault the PC troubleshooting industry, though. Electronics are too cheap, most of the time, for technicians to spend very much time troubleshooting them. Speed is the most important asset in the PC industry. It is better to be fast than correct, whether troubleshooting systems or writing software code or technical manuals.
That might be reasonable for PC technicians, but one could find the same attitude in other troubleshooting industries. I just took my car in for repairs, because I often had to push-start it. This after a week of repairs for various problems. In that week, the mechanics never found anything wrong with my car starting, and this last trip dedicated to that problem was no different... until the mechanics got ready to return my vehicle to me. When they tried to drive back to the parking lot, my vehicle would not start. A new starter appears to have taken care of that problem.
Doctors are the same way. It costs far too much to find the real problem, I suppose, so doctors rely on rules-of-thumb and shotgun approaches. Many diagnosis are through the process of elimination; one treatment didn't work, so they try another. Doctors probably never know exactly what is wrong with the patient, but they often get close enough for the body to heal itself, to some degree.
Taking stuff apart since 1969 (TM)
BTW, I also installed SuSE Linux 9 to the same SATA hard drive (again, from a bootable Linux CD). Linux 9 found the SATA drive without the need for externally-supplied drivers. V Communication's Partition Commander also did not need external drivers to find the SATA drive.
Taking stuff apart since 1969 (TM)
He wasn't modded. Some of us on Slashdot post at Karma: 2. I am one of those. I don't remember exactly how, but it had to do with the default settings ("Post at") level in my profile.
Taking stuff apart since 1969 (TM)
Yeah, anybody who uses tools to do their job is incompetent.
I need to remember not to let you try to fix anything I own, ever.
Why yes, I AM a rocket scientist!
www.simmtester.com has a program called Doc Memory that creates a bootable floppy disk with a memory testing utility on it that turned up a very intermittant bit error.
I started having some very strange problems with a PC that gradually increased in frequency over several months. At its highest rate, I'd get some bizarre lockup maybe once every couple days. The big clue finally came when I copied a large file from one drive to another and the MD5 hashes didn't match (I thought I had a virus or a poltergeist or something at that point) and a file compare revealed a single bit difference. I tried several RAM testing utilities, and the simmtester one was the only one I found that could duplicate the bit error in one of my simms. I had to convince myself by moving the simm (256M PC133) to another machine and testing again, and sure enough, that was it.
It was tough to make the bad bit misbehave: required zeroing the bad bit, then writing 1s into totally different but very specific locations elsewhere in the simm before the 0 would flip to 1.
Six months of very intermittant single bit flipping in ram being used to cache disk reads or writes super-mega sucks the big one, by the way. I have this simm in a container with a biohazard symbol on it.
cat /proc/bus/usb/devices will spit out a handy list of everything on the pci bus.
That command will actually spit out a handy list of everything on the USB bus. Ooops......
www.ultimatebootcd.com
all free, I make my feild techs bring it to ALL jobs
enjoy
I would send them the software along with a letter requesting your money back. Send it certified so you have proof they got it. The last thing you want to do is let them stall you until the 30 days is up.
If you have to take it to court, you can probably file in your local small claims and show proof that you returned it. Of course, it would be even nicer if you could use a different e-mail address and get them to send you an e-mail promissing the refund.
-IANAL, but I play one on /. Take my advice at your own risk.
Nothing like two instances of gmake -j5 to give your memory and CPU a nice workout. :)
Wow, that is a name I have not heard in a long time. I unfortunately dealt with these rats about 13 years ago. When I dealt with them, their sales vermin acted just as bad as you described. I really thought that a company with practices this bad would have been long gone by now. Well, I guess like the saying goes, after a nuclear war all that will be left is cockroaches and the sales swine from Micro2000.
MS Has a bunch of free tools. Here's a link to mem tester, other tools are also on line. http://oca.microsoft.com/en/windiag.asp
I'm surprised that no one mentioned this little gem. Well, okay - it's usefulness was somewhat limited... :^)
t m
http://www.computerhope.com/jargon/m/micrdiag.h
Plus, I'm sure you can pickup MSDOS 5 or 6 floppies these days for pretty much free...
There's always a good reason and your job is to find it.
If you run your #1 tool, Knoppix, and it does not experience those indeterminant faults, the fault is clearly software related. Just boot it and leave it running some silly task, like computing random numbers. When you get back, use uptime to see if the machine failed while you were gone.
The only problem Knoppix has is the inability to recognize worthless hardware like winmodems. Ripping junk like that out fixes lots of problems, even in the windoze world.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
Google on "Apple III drop fix". This was an officially recommended procedure at one time.
Share and Enjoy: 09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0
check it out.
...can be made by booting Linux and looking at kernel messages. You can spare your bucks of course.
This way, I already detected a memory chip failure which brought my friend's Windows to knees after 30 minutes of running.
"If it can't boot linux, it's broken." is may favorite saying.
There you are, staring at me again.
"Most technicians do it by instinct and years of experience. "
No need for years of, or some "guessmatic instinct"
Rules of thumb
Follow these and a lot of problems will fall by the wayside.
I have been in this business for years, and I have seen many tools come and go. Most of them go, or should. Honestly, they best tool is your brain. With experience comes the ability to quickly (99.9% of the time) diagnose and solve problems.
For pesky Windows problems, I use WinDoctor on the Norton Utilities CD. You dont even have to install it, this app runs right from the cd, and it really does a good job. You can even delete a program directory and uninstall it with WinDoctor, although I do not recommend this on your customers machines!
For partitioning, I use Ranish, which seems to be much quicker than fdisk.
Hope this helps.
DISCLAIMER:
I don't believe what I write, and neither should you.
" Learn how the hardware works, and it's easier than you think."
In the age of schematics and hardware-level documentation, this was possible. No longer except in the most high-level way. This is true not only of computers but other hardware as well i.e. cars, etc.
"And the Gentoo LiveCDs all ..."
Gentoo zealots seem to have enrolled in a worldwide campaign to hype this distro in every possible forum on the planet.
Any body who has one through the pain of a Gentoo install / compile will know how bogus the claims of SPEED!! really are.
Slight brainstorm.
Is there a diagnostic Linux kernel that detects "trends" that are a precursor to failure?
Isn't it likely that Maxtor's very own drive testing tool would bypass or disable that particular feature (auto sector relocation) during drive testing? Wouldn't it be a really stupid test if it couldn't?
The original poster has already posted in reply to your post confirming my theory.
Oh, and, messianically speaking, Steve Gibson ain't all he's cracked up to be.- doomed! attitude is a little over the top.
Don't get me wrong--his programs are cool, and he's a smart guy--I'm just sayin' his I've-gotta-save-the-world-by-telling-them-they're
Furry cows moo and decompress.
"The biggest cause of failure in an old PC: Bad contacts. Just move every card and connector 2 millimeters out and in again. The rubbing of metal to metal creates fresh contact surfaces. Renewing the contacts should be the first step in fixing any PC. "
The biggest cause of failure in an old marriage: Bad contacts. Just move your "connector" 2 millimeters out and in again. The rubbing of flesh to flesh creates "happy" contact surfaces. Renewing the "contacts" should be the first step to fixing any old marriage.
You are just a real common fucken criminal. A big fucken thief aren't you!!!! It is people like you that make these companies the way they are. No wonder all the prices are high on their tools!!!! Fucker!!!!
I am surprised no one mentioned this one, cpuburn. It is a good CPU stress tester in Windows and Linux. Be sure to reading the warning because it can damage if your system doesn't have proper cooling.
Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
Try FIRE. I've only used it once, but it seems to have a lot of interesting stuff (though it has a bit of a different, more security oriented focus). A look at the "Tools Available" list is educational all by itself.
Can you count how many parts of the machine not being tested by your method?
Yeah, but it doesn't do any diagnosis, which is what the poster was wondering about. Sure, we can all break computers, but the OP wanted to fix them!
I, too, have tried a bunch. The latest one I have uses is QuickTech Pro from Ultra-X. Seems to work reasonably well for burning in systems, but it can be spendy to keep up to date. You can test individual components or run a batch running a "burn-in." It's time to renew it, but I don't know if I want to put out the bucks. I'd rate it reasonably good, but as in other programs, the explanation of the error messages leaves something to be desired.
"Those who dream by day are cognizant of many things that escape those who dream only at night."
IAAEITA (I Am An Expert In This Area) -- Credentials available on request.
Modern desktop systems have so few physical components that you can solve problems by
swapping out parts in less time than any diagnostic software will take.
With experience you can pick up the more obvious hardware problems without doing that.
On Servers with lots of complex subsystems the diagnostic software is shipped with the system
or available for download. I.e. On a Dell PowerEdge 2650 You need to run the 32 bit diags to
discover which fan is misbehaving if one is performing below spec.
PS: Don't buy complex server hardware without accompanying diagnostics, online and phone
support accompanied by a solid and reliable warranty.
--= Isn't it surprising how badly I spell ?
Boom. Windows product activation came up. I had to get on the phone and fight for a new license number.
Anyone else worry about what Windows product activation will do to the "swap it and see" technician?
He put his boots up on the table and made a face. "The sig," he smirked. "You can waste your life in search of the sig."
While I have yet to find *any* device that can test everything, this spiffy little gizmo from Elston Systems has saved my bacon once or twice when I thought I had a dead motherboard. It doesn't catch all the stuff all the time, but I've found it to be pretty useful. Plus, *grins* as a geek it's fun to leave it in my case and have the hex display shining mysterious stuff through my window.
In Soviet Russia jokes are formulaic and decidedly non-humorous.
Seriously.
A real techinician doesn't need generic "diagnostic software".
Leave Norton Utilities for the USERS (idiots)
this is a me too on the power supply causing MANY headaches, and a lot of techs tend to miss it cause its not really expected (as long as the machine boots)...
and ram tends to suck in general, lots and lots of bad sticks... i've had the best luck with kingston and crucial as far as fail rates...
these are definately the two most common hardwire problems i've run into, with the 3rd being hard drive problems (magnets, people dropping them etc).
I purchased Quick Tech Pro from Ultra-X two years ago after a situation where memtest86 wasn't adequate to diagnose a memory problem.
memtest86 is a great utility, but Quick Tech Pro's has a better interface, more tests and more comprehensive test. I'm a complete Open Source supporter, but this is one instance where a $300 commercial product is worth investing in.
Find coupons in Greeley
criminals , had the cheapest price on some ram on pricewatch but will not sell you the memory they list. Just trying to get you to call to charge you more. criminal bastards!
Electronics tech 30 years. PC tech for the last 15 or so. There is no software worth the effort anymore and that's presuming there ever was at anytime past. I used to use Checkit from Touchstone for burn-in mostly but that has fallen by the wayside as well. Nothing is more time and money efficient than subbing in known good parts. Even at that though, you quickly run up against the cost/time/value problem. If you spend two hours troubleshooting down to a mainboard, once replaced and all hours accounted for, the bill will be near the cost of a new box. On the other hand the cost of a new box once all data, programs and the general setup is transferred over is not exactly the advertised price either so there is still value to be had in the doing, but the edge has become quite a bit finer and the age of a system plays into the equation substantially (and earlier than most people expect).
There have been times when I wished for a good memory tester but those aren't cheap, not as cheap as keeping a supply of known good memory around which fills the same purpose for less money and at the end of the life cycle you can push the used memory out the door.
A POST card. Would like to have one of those too but would be helpful infrequently and really only good for telling the customer what the problem is with greater precision. Instead of a general fault on the mainboard you might be able to say the problem is in the interrupt controller. Mainboard shot either way but you have additional assurance on your diagnosis.
On the upside most problems I see are software related and not hardware. On the hardware side most of those can be diagnosed accurately within minutes with simple tests, visual inspection, substitution and smell. You can smell burnt. Follow your nose. Like you can see a swollen capacitor, hear a bad fan and feel an overtemp processor or other hot component.
To make money you cannot piss around and that cannot be overstated.Luckily the number of hardware problems that will eat your lunch are comparatively few and can be written off for the exercise in futility that they are.
Of greater concern however, is the coming issue of premature component failure due to an inferior materials change in the manufacture of some semiconductors which could far outshadow the bad capacitor problem recently endured. A rash of these problems on mainboards could be troublesome at the repair center/shop for the amount of diag time involved and the inability to absorb the loss of productivity economically. If you fix computers for a living this is a bottom line.
To wrap this up, I have not found any good software for explicitly detecting hardware problems accurately. There is no magic bullet. As mentioned in previous posts, there is software that is very helpful. I keep a copy of Knoppix around for example of repurposing software into a diagnostic aid. I once uncovered a timing problem in a North bridge using PKZip on a large file that would fail on verify in discovery of the root cause of intermittent blue screens being hardware. Sometimes you just have to know what your looking at.
debug
> g=c800:5
anyone else remember that?
...is already on it's way (and has been for several months now[1]).
Look for it in the [VERY] near future.
--
"Fish" (David B. Trout)
[1] Ref: news.grc.com, group: grc.spinrite.dev.
"Fish" (David B. Trout)
Fight Spam! Join CAUCE!
http://www.c
Sounds like using the internet to download the modem drivers you need to connect to the internet...
Memtest will indeed fail to detect some failures on some memory chips as it requires a high degree of knowledge regarding the bit/cell alignments within the silicon. ie. write to a bit, write to a adjacent(sic) bits and then check the original bit has not been corrupted by the adjacent writes. To do this memtest has to guess (or try a range of algorithms?) that will hopefully find MOST flaws.
Q.
Insert Signature Here
>with an intermediate fault= Diction ary&va=intermittent&x=0&y=0
http://www.m-w.com/cgi-bin/dictionary?book
1. Capitalization.
2. Punctuation.
3. Grammar.
Check out Micro 2000:
http://www.micro2000.com/
Where did you get your POST code card? I haven't been able to find an inexpensive one
This is in response to Reborn Data. Although MicroScope has probably the highest customer satisfaction rate in the industry among professional technicians, we admit that it's not possible to please everyone. However, in this case we believe something else is going on.
By his own admission 'Reborn' was getting free demos of every diagnostic he could, and when we didn't offer one he bought the package anyway with the apparent intention of returning it when his evaluation was over. In doing so he chose to ignore both our license agreement printed on the software envelope and the seal he had to break to open the package. Unfortunately no reputable diagnostic provider can give an unconditional 30-day trial of the type he claims he was offered, because too many dishonest people will order the product just to fix their problem of the day and then ask for a refund. We do however bend over backwards to solve any technical problems a customer may encounter, and in the rare case where that fails we will usually give a refund anyway. In fact, Reborn's first contact with our technical support staff only two weeks ago was to request a refund, and only when that was denied did he come up with some technical issues with which to justify his request. Most of these are resolvable with a little guidance, but for two instances where Micro-Scope may have fallen short, our engineering department has created a patch. We have been unable to contact Reborn for the last several days, but the patch is in the mail to him and is also being posted on our website in case anyone else encounters these same problems.
i wish i could mod your ignorance spewing post down.
;-p
the install is not the most friendly in the world, nor speedy. but the performance increase i see when i do it right is very real.
and that's not all that is good about gentoo.
use whatever distro you want and keep your ignorance away from mine. more for me.
I have not had that experience.
The Install is non existant - unless you count Linux From Scratch as an 'install'.
The endless compiling is tiresome.
The package management is just another package manager & is buggy anyway.
The claimed speed increase is something like when you sit & hit your thumb with a hammer for hours & then stop...it feels good.
Gentoo is only one of many Source Based Distro's, it's not unique and it does not live up to the hype.
Reformat, reinstall, and if that fails...replace!
It's just too hard to find software that can diagnose hardware - given the variety of the sources to hardware faults and the many many interaction effects of different chipsets, cpus, RAM modules, power supplies, etc. Not to mention the os.
Dictionaries are for loosers.
Personally I'd look at these sites Barts PE CD and 911CD They asist you in creating a recovery/util cd for win based systems, dos based utils and even small linux distro (Tomsrtbt). For just finding a good prog for testing hardware sisoft and aida are nice but search tucows nonags etc and you will find freeware progs that have tons of functionality and are not as bloated/intrusive as large name companies software (i.e Norton). Pisnaz
I work for a computer motherboard manufacturer and have been using AMIDiag 6.20(http://amidiag.com/) for about 6 years now. The software does a good job in finding hardware problems. Draw backs to the software is that it runs in DOS mode (FAT16 or FAT32). It requires about 2M of harddrive space. The DOS version comes with the Suite 2.0 Windows version CD. The Windows version is poor. I have found countless number of errors with the DOS version. Even the memory test proved to be better than a dedicated memory module test equipment. Obviously this will not fix any Windows operating system compatability problems. The only error from AMIDiag that seems to be not correct is an occasional NVRAM failure run in batch mode. For NTFS systems, it would not be too hard to set this software up to run from a CDROM. Just can't log.