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What good (free) hardware tests are there for Windows 7 at the moment?

The other day there was a power outage and I am worried that there may have been a power surge that could have damaged parts on my new rig. It runs fine at the moment, but would like to test.

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I found this sweet site that has a bunch of free testing programs: check it out. It has programs to test your CPU, GPU, memory, and hard drive! Then, there's the UBCD. If your rig runs fine however, why would you suspect anything's wrong? I'm pretty sure you would know if it was damaged by a power surge... – cp2141 Jun 5 '12 at 13:36
clearly i tried google and found nothing that was satisfactory, hence i this asked the question to find out what are the best tools for this. I just want to be sure the systems fine as there are many people who claim that power surges can damage the system unnoticeably at first and get worse over time. – Lachlan Jun 5 '12 at 13:47
Read this article hope it will help you. And BTW you have download different tools to check different parts of hardware I still have no knowledge if ther is any bundled software for this. – avirk Jun 5 '12 at 14:17

closed as not constructive by techie007, slhck♦, random♦ Jun 8 '12 at 1:52

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2 Answers

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First and foremost, if you haven't already, use a surge protector. So many people pay good money for their computer, monitor and peripherals but will not spend the few extra dollars to protect it. If you already have one, your PC should be OK.

ESD, short for electrostatic discharge, can cause all kinds of damage/problems. You are correct, these problems are not always readily evident. Worse, there are not always tools to test for them as the equipment is working now. This means you can run all kinds of tests which may not show evidence of damage.

However, for peace of mind, run CHKDSK /R on your drives to ensure your data and programs are OK. You can run MEMTEST86 to check your memory. Also, look at Everest as a tool for checking other hardware. As far as more specific diagnostics, you may need to research those tools from the manufacturer of your PC.

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I wasn't aware the original memtest86 was still being updated. Pretty useful to know if i get asked about it. I tend to use memtestx86+ instead. – Journeyman Geek Jun 5 '12 at 14:40
when i have tried to run chkdsk /r in the past and need to be at root level, im not really sure what the command is to allow this. is it the similar to unix or completely different? – Lachlan Jun 6 '12 at 0:32
Typically you can use your install CD to boot to a command prompt or you can use an Ultimate Boot Disk as cp2141 has suggested. – CharlieRB Jun 6 '12 at 0:44
up vote 2 down vote

Windows 7 has a memory tester in the boot menu, though i favour memtestx86+. I also regularly do smart tests on drives with gsmartcontrol - its a repackaging of smartmontools with a nice GUI.

You might also want to consider doing an overclocker style 'burn in' for your CPU with a suitable tool, and a video card stress test with something like furmark as well to see if there's any issues with that.

I'd also do a physical inspection with a torchlight, to look for obviously burnt out looking caps and chips.

In my experience though, very often the PSU takes the brunt of most wierdness) - i've lost one to.. something to do with magnets, had another one taken out by a internal dust explosion and so on, so if things start acting up, see if replacing it helps.

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