# ECC Question



## dndlnx (Feb 24, 2013)

This may not be the best section (if not please move). But I think the fine folks at the FreeBSD forums might have an opinion? I'm "mostly" sure I want to switch my personal server to ECC.  I think...

My question pertains more to the server-client interaction between this fileserver, and the primary desktop (workstation) working with said files.

Should that computer also preferably have ECC, so as not to present a "weak link" in the chain? Paranoid mode: Max.


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## _martin (Feb 24, 2013)

Do you use ZFS ? My answer is: YES, go with ECC.

You can find a lot of discussions regarding this subject on forums, mailing lists, etc. If your budget is not that tight, there's really no reason why not to use ECC RAMs. Anyway, price is not that horribly high for standard ECC RAM (compared quality to, let's say, desktop non-ECC RAM). 

I think it was on one of the OpenIndiana videos where they saw a problem with non-ECC RAM and kernel compilation.


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## dndlnx (Feb 24, 2013)

Yes, I'm using ZFS. My question though, is about the client computer working with files on the server. Doing encoding, or what have you. The actual "workstation". Should you go ECC here too?


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## ondra_knezour (Feb 24, 2013)

Also see this thread http://forums.freebsd.org/showthread.php?p=209364


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## _martin (Feb 24, 2013)

dbsd said:
			
		

> Yes, I'm using ZFS. My question though, is about the client computer working with files on the server. Doing encoding, or what have you. The actual "workstation". Should you go ECC here too?



I see now. Strictly speaking you are introducing additional component that _could cause a problem. Chances of that are pretty slim, but not impossible. It depends on what you're doing and how important your data are. 

Frankly I've never seen this silent corruption. I've only heard it on the OpenIndiana video and I saw a post/blog when SUN was testing data integrity on a read-only mounted arrays for a year (problem with a physical properties of a disk itself, not RAM).


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