Can I mix ECC and non ECC memory?

[Tim_K]

Can I use Error Correction memory on my BP6? Can I mix in a stick or 2 of Error Correction (ECC) with non ECC memory? Or does it all have to be non ECC memory?

[Dave Rave]

for the price of cheap second hand pc100-133 sdram, I doubt there'd be a need to be trying to find out....

but, if you plugged it in, and tried it, i think you'd find out.
i doubt it would get fried in anyway

[BCN]

well, it says it accepts ECC in the manual as I remember, but I have never tried ECC and nonECC together...

[Wolfram]

AFAIK you can mix ECC and non-ECC RAM. The ECC sticks will just not use their ECC capabilities. You can't mix registered and unregistered memory. This is a general rule of thumb, I've no experience with that on the BP6.

[Atropos]

hi there,

there's nor problem with mixing ECC and non-ECC RAM. All that happens
it that bios detects (at least one) non-ECC module and turns off ECC for
the whole RAM. Sad for those modules which would support ECC.

It's not too bad for desktop machines not to have ECC. Modern OS
(yes, even the M$ ones) can correct 1bit RAM I/O errors. It's way slower
than the ECC hardware version. I've read an article which tested ECC
and non-ECC desktop setups. The conclusion was that there's no need for
ECC in desktops unless you're running high load server services.

Just to add something

Atropos

[purrkur]

It's not too bad for desktop machines not to have ECC. Modern OS (yes, even the M$ ones) can correct 1bit RAM I/O errors. It's way slower than the ECC hardware version. I've read an article which tested ECC
and non-ECC desktop setups. The conclusion was that there's no need for
ECC in desktops unless you're running high load server services.

I agree. ECC belongs in the server park where apps are crucial. There is actually a certain overhead of using ECC so it isn't just good news.