Reasonable Number of Errors?

[ndimmick]

Greetings, I just bought two new sticks of RAM, put them in my 09 Macbook Pro and ran MemmTest86 for almost 8 hours. I received the following information. I've attached a photo of the screen for the rest of the info. I'm wondering if this is reasonable for new RAM. Should I return it?
Thanks,
Nick

3 Passes
Error Confidence Value: 154
Test 1: 2 Errors
Test 2: 2 Errors
Test 3: 11 Errors

[cbrady]

This looks like a legitimate memory failure and the memory should be replaced.

The program combines a number of details about the error to compute an error confidence value. Values greater than 100 are a very stong indication that the error is valid, and not some sort of testing artifact.

[ndimmick]

Thanks, cbrady. I've run tests on both sticks seperately, and I can't get errors consistently. No matter how many times I let it cycle through passes, it tells me there are no errors. HOWEVER, if I hit the ESC key and wait for the current test to complete, then it will display all the details and list errors. These errors are not consistent accross multiple tests. Also, I ALWAYS get errors reported in whatever test the machine was running when I pressed ESC. This coupled with the fact that the other keyboard commands don't work, suggests that maybe this is a compatibility issue with the keyboard of my Macbook Pro. When I run V4.2, I can't even use the ESC key. It looks like I need to find another memory testing program.

[David (PassMark)]

Also, I ALWAYS get errors reported in whatever test the machine was running when I pressed ESC

This issue was fixed in V4.2. See this post for details. Keypresses changed values in RAM resulting in the appearance of an error.

So ignore all errors that appear after pressing ESC in V4.1.

When I run V4.2, I can't even use the ESC key.

This isn't a known issue. But we can look into it.

Except for the problem of the ESC key did V4.2 report any errors?

[ndimmick]

Thanks for the reply. As stated earlier, no key presses work for me in 4.2.0. I'm running a 2009 Macbook Pro (15" - 5,4). There are no errors being reported with 4.2.0. I only saw errors in 4.1 after I hit the ESC key. I will let it run all night to see what happens.

[David (PassMark)]

So if you don't see any errors in V4.2, I think your RAM is good in this case.

Again, ignore all errors that appear after pressing ESC in V4.1.

We don't have the exact model Macbook to test with here. But we do some more testing on a Mac Mini next week to see if we get the same non responsive keyboard behavior.

[ndimmick]

I ran V4.2 all night with 0 errors. Thanks for all your help, David. Now, I wonder if I wasted my money on new RAM I'll have to switch them back and test the old RAM with V4.2.

[David (PassMark)]

We reproduced the problem of the keyboard not working on a Mac & wrote a separate post on the issue, to make it easier for others to find later.