[rescue] ECC [was: Re: WOT: Ebay changes to IBM from Sun E10Kservers?]

[Dave McGuire]

On Thursday, July 10, 2003, at 04:35 AM, Frank Van Damme wrote:
>> Well yes. The difference is that you have a clue.
>> Most others don't
>
> The difference is most people don't need ecc ram. A ram chip breaks 
> usually
> only after years and years of intensive use, if it does at all. 
> Therefor it's
> cheaper for people to run the risk to break the ram after 5 years (by 
> that
> time the increased bloat in Windows will hae forced them to upgrade 
> their
> hardware so that's not problem either </sarcasm>).
>
> If people had a clue, they'd check their ram for faulty bits every now 
> and
> then. Few people do this - there must be millions of people who have 
> windows
> reonstalled by their (equally clueless) computer dealer because of
> instability which can be caused by bad ram.

   I think the real difference is that most PC users tolerate hardware 
failures.

   Properly-implemented ECC is the right thing to do.  Yes, it's more 
expensive, but it's the right thing to do.  A memory error that would 
otherwise bring a system to its knees will simply cause an entry into 
an error log with ECC...turning unexpected downtime into scheduled 
downtime.

   With this "I like my stuff to work all the time" attitude, am I just 
being too intolerant?

         -Dave

--
Dave McGuire             "I've grown hair again, just
St. Petersburg, FL           for the occasion."       -Doc Shipley