Memtest86+

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memtest86+ is memory test software based on the commercially available (from Passmark) memtest86 program.

There are multiple versions of memtest with similar names. Gentoo provides access to three in its main Portage repository.

There is also a different commercial binary sys-apps/memtest86-bin (memtest86-bin v9.3+) masked behind a LICENSE=Passmark-EULA. See package.license for more information on unmasking a EULA license for a specific package.

Installation

USE flags

USE flags for sys-apps/memtest86+ Memory tester based on PCMemTest

+boot Install to /boot in addition to /usr/share/memtest86+/
bios32 Compile a BIOS-bootable 32bit memtest image
bios64 Compile a BIOS-bootable 64bit memtest image
iso32 Compile a 32bit ISO image
iso64 Compile a 64bit ISO image
secureboot Automatically sign efi executables using user specified key
uefi32 Compile a EFI32-bootable 32bit memtest image
uefi64 Compile a UEFI-bootable 64bit memtest image

Prerequisites

Be sure /boot (where the GRUB files are typically installed) is available before installing memtest86+! If /boot is on a separate partition (which it WILL BE if the partitioning scheme in the Gentoo handbook was used for this Gentoo install), then be sure the mount command is run before the emerge section below:

root #mount /boot

If no errors are return then boot should be successfully mounted. Check by running the mount command without any arguments and parsing the output with grep:

user $mount | grep boot
boot

Emerge

Install it through Portage with emerge:

root #emerge --ask sys-apps/memtest86+

Configuration (bootloader)

GRUB2

For GRUB2 just run grub-mkconfig. As long as the package has been emerged, a configuration file has already been installed to /etc/grub.d/39_memtest86+:

root #grub-mkconfig -o /boot/grub/grub.cfg

GRUB legacy

Replace the ? (question marks) in the file below with correct numbers for the system's boot partition:

FILE /boot/grub/grub.conf
title=memtest86+
root (hd?,?)
kernel /boot/memtest86plus/memtest

LILO

For LILO, add this to the lilo.conf configuration file:

FILE /etc/lilo.conf
image  = /boot/memtest86plus/memtest
label  = memtest86+

Then rebuild LILO's MBR entry:

root #lilo

Syslinux

Add this to the configuration file (change .efi64 by .bios depending in your harware):

FILE /boot/extlinux/extlinux.conf
LABEL memtest86+
	MENU LABEL memtest86+
	LINUX /boot/memtest86plus/memtest.efi64

Systemd-boot

FILE /boot/loader/entries/memtest.conf
title     Memory Tester (memtest86+)
efi       /memtest86plus/memtest.efi64

Usage

To use memtest86+ the system needs to be rebooted using the newly added boot item.

Removal

Unmerge

root #emerge --ask --depclean --verbose sys-apps/memtest86+

See also

External resources

References