dustybyrd said:
oh, i see.
i noticed that you said you have registered ram, but don't use the ECC...why get it then?
what are the chances of making an error that crashes the system or program with/without ECC?
if you get really fast RAM and run it at slower speeds is it more likely to make fewer errors even without ECC?
i am not using ECC in my duallie and i'm not sure if it has mattered yet at all...the only problems i had were when i overclocked the PCI over 154 mhz the hard drives had errors...
Registered Memory is required for AMD duallies, if you ever want to upgrade to more than two sticks of RAM. (99% of Registered memory is also ECC. I don't use ECC, because I don't really need it and it slows down the system a little bit.) It is supposed to be more stable, too, although I haven't seen in personal experience that it is more or less stable than unbuffered memory. My main reason for getting it is twofold. First, if you ever want to upgrade to more than two sticks on an AMD 760MPX chipset, then you have to use ALL Registered memory. Secondly, the Hammer chipsets that support dual DDR, REQUIRE Registered memory. That's different from today's chipset. Today's chipset will run up to two sticks of unbuffered. The Hammer chipset (from what I have seen) will REQUIRE ONLY Registered memory.
It may be a year or two before I get a Hammer system (if I ever get one), but I figured that if I was going to shell out a lot of money for memory, I would try to make it last a long time. If I could re-use it in my next system, that would be great.
There is a difference between "Registered" and "ECC". In a nutshell, Registered just means that the memory is buffered. Buffered, as opposed to unbuffered. This buffer helps increase stability (at a slight performance cost.) It is suggested for all AMD dual boards and quite a few Intel duallies, too. ECC means "Error Checking and Correction" or something similar to that (I may not have the exact names right, but that is the gist of it.) ECC is important for file servers and such, where there are tons and tons of files going through the memory all day long, from different places, sometimes coming from or going to other systems. The ECC can detect and correct small error in data (parity errors and such.) It can't fix BIG problems, but it can fix little ones. There is a performance hit to this process, too. It is suggested, by most, that you only need to enable ECC if you are running a critical file server or similar. My duals at home both run with ECC off (one is running Registered ECC PC2700, the other runs cheaper Unbuffered PC2700.) My AMD dually file server at work has ECC turned on. For that machine, local performance is not as important as the integrity of the files coming in and out on the network. (I don't think ECC affects my network traffic that much since the bandwidth isn't that high, but it does affect local performance of the computer, ie. tasks that I run on it, like opening apps, etc.)
Anyway, if you are still interested in what Registered and ECC is all about, I'm sure that there are numerous very good, and more technically-complete, descriptions than what I have just given.
There is my two cents... (a very, very, long two cents...)
