Longer ECC boot

XFs · 05-25-2006, 03:44 AM

I heard somewhere that ECC motherboards have to prepare/check the ECC RAM on every boot.

Could this be as long as 5-10 seconds?

PC eye · 05-25-2006, 05:51 AM

What ECC means is error correction where some manufacturers claim their boards will support the ECC type of memory when they apparently don't. http://cr.yp.to/hardware/ecc.html
At boot time the bios conducts a series of hardware tests according the programming stored on the EProm chips(non volitile memory or NVRam). What ECC memory does is check the accuracy of data as it goes into and out of memory. That perhaps takes only very small fractions of one second. The time spent on initial bootup of any system primary consists of the bios tests.

34erd · 05-25-2006, 06:54 AM

Keep in mind that ECC RAM is slower in general.

PC eye · 05-25-2006, 07:40 AM

Ecc has nine chips compared to eight seen on non-ecc memory. But the process of error correction is what gets involved. For a better understanding about how involved it can get look over the page here at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Error_detection

gamerman4 · 05-25-2006, 02:38 PM

I am using a Compaq workstation at school that uses ECC RAM and it boots comparable to the other comps (non ECC Dells) which have the same amount of RAM and I dont notice a difference but of course that could be because this one is an old P4(1.8Ghz) while they are P3s. But it isnt too much slower than the newer Dells (using P4 3Ghz) so i doubt ECC RAM will make a 5-10 second difference in boot time. ECC RAM is usually for workstations that rely on not crashing and full stability.

PC eye · 05-25-2006, 07:53 PM

You are not going to see a drag down of the system at post due to the nature of ECC being there to error check data from a running OS as well as any program you are running. At post time the only data is the bios programming going into effect to perform the initial hardware tests followed by the search for the boot device.

If you ran an ECC DDR400 512mb dimm on a system you just ran a non ECC 512 on you wouldn't even see a lag. When you started running apps in the Windows environment then you would notice a change at that time due to the error checking taking place. That link has a good article on how companies could have easily made error checking active on most boards.

05-25-2006, 03:44 AM	#1 (permalink)
XFs Silver Member Join Date: May 2006 Posts: 152	Longer ECC boot I heard somewhere that ECC motherboards have to prepare/check the ECC RAM on every boot. Could this be as long as 5-10 seconds?

05-25-2006, 06:54 AM	#3 (permalink)
34erd Diamond Member Join Date: Jul 2005 Age: 15 Posts: 2,842	Keep in mind that ECC RAM is slower in general. __________________ DFI Lanparty UT nF4 SLI DR Athlon 64 3500+ Venice 1 Gig OCZ VX DDR500 DDR BFG GeForce 7800GT 160 Gig SATA HDD CD-RW DVD-ROM Antec NeoPower 480 Thermaltake Tsunami

05-25-2006, 02:38 PM	#5 (permalink)
gamerman4 Platinum Member Join Date: Aug 2005 Location: Arkansas Age: 18 Posts: 992	I am using a Compaq workstation at school that uses ECC RAM and it boots comparable to the other comps (non ECC Dells) which have the same amount of RAM and I dont notice a difference but of course that could be because this one is an old P4(1.8Ghz) while they are P3s. But it isnt too much slower than the newer Dells (using P4 3Ghz) so i doubt ECC RAM will make a 5-10 second difference in boot time. ECC RAM is usually for workstations that rely on not crashing and full stability. __________________ My Gaming PC: NZXT Nemesis Elite Black Case Intel Q6600 @ 3.20 Ghz COOLER MASTER RL-EUL-GBU1-GP Watercooling Gigabyte DS3R 2 x 80GB HDD 1 x 250GB 1 x 500GB 2 x 1GB Patriot Extreme Perf. DDR2 nVidia 8800GT 512MB Antec Smartpower 2.0 400 Watt

Thread Tools
Show Printable Version Email this Page
Display Modes
Linear Mode Switch to Hybrid Mode Switch to Threaded Mode

05-25-2006, 05:51 AM	#2 (permalink)
PC eye Diamond Member Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Inside a pc Posts: 18,998	What ECC means is error correction where some manufacturers claim their boards will support the ECC type of memory when they apparently don't. http://cr.yp.to/hardware/ecc.html At boot time the bios conducts a series of hardware tests according the programming stored on the EProm chips(non volitile memory or NVRam). What ECC memory does is check the accuracy of data as it goes into and out of memory. That perhaps takes only very small fractions of one second. The time spent on initial bootup of any system primary consists of the bios tests.

05-25-2006, 07:40 AM	#4 (permalink)
PC eye Diamond Member Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Inside a pc Posts: 18,998	Ecc has nine chips compared to eight seen on non-ecc memory. But the process of error correction is what gets involved. For a better understanding about how involved it can get look over the page here at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Error_detection

05-25-2006, 07:53 PM	#6 (permalink)
PC eye Diamond Member Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Inside a pc Posts: 18,998	You are not going to see a drag down of the system at post due to the nature of ECC being there to error check data from a running OS as well as any program you are running. At post time the only data is the bios programming going into effect to perform the initial hardware tests followed by the search for the boot device. If you ran an ECC DDR400 512mb dimm on a system you just ran a non ECC 512 on you wouldn't even see a lag. When you started running apps in the Windows environment then you would notice a change at that time due to the error checking taking place. That link has a good article on how companies could have easily made error checking active on most boards.