Diagnostic Software Is Handy! MemTest86+ And AIDA64 Updated

A New Look For An Old Friend, And AIDA64 Meets Our New CPUs

AIDA64 just released the update we have been expecting after the launches of the Raptor Lake and Raphael families of chips.  The new silicon from AMD and Intel have support for new features like DDR5 and PCIe 5.0 which means that the software you use to monitor what is going on inside that box need to learn new tricks.  There have also been changes on the software side, with Win10 22H2 arriving along with updates for Windows 11 and Server 2022 that AIDA64 needs to cope with as well.  

The update includes a major rework of the built in benchmarks as well as the stress test, which will make Finalwire’s tool more useful for those who have just upgraded to the new chips.  It’s not just an update for your CPU either, it includes your coolers and peripherals as well.  AIDA v6.80 includes support for things like the Asus ROG Ryujin II EVA LCD,  SteelSeries Apex and Rival OLEDs, Corsair’s AiO liquid coolers and even Elgato’s Stream Deck.  Update if you got it, try the demo if you haven’t.

The other diagnostic tool which has something to brag about.  If you are old enough to occasionally question your memory then you probably remember a time when you used MemTest86 to test your computer’s memory.  The screen presented when you booted up into the tool wasn’t very exciting, but the ability to pin down those intermittent reboots to a single dodgy DIMM certainly was!  Then came the dark days, when Chris Brady’s MemTest86 remained at version 3.0 for years and Samuel Demeulemeester created the Memtest86+.

Open source software is only as good as those that support it, and when you aren’t making much money from your efforts it can be hard to continue to split your efforts between what you would like to work on and what you make your livelihood from.  There is more to that story of course, but that is not the news today.  The news is that Memtest86+ 6.0 has just been released!

This new version includes updated code to support 32 and 64 bit UEFIs, DDR5 support, recognition of not just the new Intel and AMD CPUs but also for the many that have been released over the past decade.  You can grab an image for either Windows or Linux to let you create a bootable USB and finally determine if it is your RAM that is causing those occasional BSoDs or if it is something else which is at fault.