Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site harvard.ARPA Path: utzoo!linus!philabs!cmcl2!seismo!harvard!brownell From: brownell@harvard.ARPA (Dave Brownell) Newsgroups: net.micro Subject: Re: Is parity *really* worth it? Message-ID: <6@harvard.ARPA> Date: Mon, 6-Aug-84 03:23:59 EDT Article-I.D.: harvard.6 Posted: Mon Aug 6 03:23:59 1984 Date-Received: Wed, 8-Aug-84 00:18:10 EDT References: <702@sri-arpa.UUCP> Lines: 27 Two points: 1) Designs that only have hardware error detection (parity, ECC, or what-have-you) are SERIOUS COPOUTS. Get that lazy programmer to write some code that invalidates that block of RAM, logs the error, kills the process using it, and then lets the rest of the system continue!!! 2) Apparently not many here are aware, but there are a large number of market projections that say that "fault tolerant" systems are the hottest growth area ($$$) in computers over the next decade. NOT second to micros, note. There are a lot of people with lots of money out there who want their computers to be reliable. I wouldn't mind a single bit error adding $100K to my bank account, but the bank sure would. In short, YES, parity is worth it. But only as part of a whole system design, cut these half-a**ed efforts before I get violent. You have to be able to recover from the errors, not just detect them. Dave Brownell Sequoia Systems Inc. {allegra,floyd,ihnp4,seismo}!harvard!sequoia!brownell