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Reliability of Computer Memory?

olddoc writes "In the days of 512MB systems, I remember reading about cosmic rays causing memory errors and how errors become more frequent with more RAM. Now, home PCs are stuffed with 6GB or 8GB and no one uses ECC memory in them. Recently I had consistent BSODs with Vista64 on a PC with 4GB; I tried memtest86 and it always failed within hours. Yet when I ran 64-bit Ubuntu at 100% load and using all memory, it ran fine for days. I have two questions: 1) Do people trust a memtest86 error to mean a bad memory module or motherboard or CPU? 2) When I check my email on my desktop 16GB PC next year, should I be running ECC memory?"

4 of 724 comments (clear)

  1. yeah by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    um, sure? . wtf, it said this is ascii art .

  2. It is a bit tricky by MatchMate · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    I am not sure why I keep getting free computer offer from dell? any one else getting such an offer?

  3. Hackers. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    Was the best movie of all time.

  4. Re:Surprise? by pdusen · · Score: 0, Offtopic

    Sorry, rent-a-tech, better luck next time.