I was going to get a AMD based system: AMD 235e, Asus Board and DDR3 ECC RAM... but with the Core i3 proving good on power consumption I might just be tempted. Intels website says that it has the ECC memory controller built in but I can find a motherboard that supports it. The reason for the ECC memory is that this is for a low power server that will hopefully be sitting quietly in the corner for 2-3 years and I need it to be reliable. Thanks.
Yezwhat? Intel's website specifically says that it doesn't support ECC memory? ...Oh, and that it does. I see; How helpful is that? As I understand it, what that means is that the memory itself will work, but the ECC function is disabled. Xeons are the only Intel processors that can use ECC, AFAIK.
Once again, thanks Ahhh thats what was confusing me. Ah well, that makes the decision alot easier 235e/240e it is then
To be honest, you can get Core iX-equivalent Xeons for not much more than a regular Core iX. The problem is getting the matching motherboard. It's a bit like it has been with AMD processors since Athlon64 and later. Absolutely nothing should stop motherboard manufacturers from supporting ECC with these processors since the memory controller now is on-die. However, only a few like ASUS actually do support ECC on their motherboards. To make matters worse ASUS doesn't even support ECC on their regular Xeon-supporting motherboards. Only a couple of server/workstation boards support ECC.
Unless you need triple 9 uptime and your server is going to be handling financial matters (payroll, accounting etc) I wouldn't bother with ecc.
I cant understand why they dont. As you say the memory controller is in the CPU package, and then theres only some extra tracks from CPU to DRAM sockets, Oh and an IC on the DRAM modules. I think its more relevant now many people leave their PCs on 24/7 and rely on them. Theres a good paper on DRAM errors: http://www.cs.toronto.edu/~bianca/papers/sigmetrics09.pdf Anyway the AMD solution is cheaper and with core voltage and frequenncy control I think I can create a low power stable and reliable system thats pretty cheap. Only unknown now is the OS drive (as per my other thread).
I completely understand where you're coming from. I've used non-ECC memory exactly once and exactly that one time I had defective memory. Probably a coincidence, but I'm reasonably confident I won't use non-ECC-capable hardware for the foreseeable future. Good luck with your new build!
If I remember, I'll see if I can put an LGA 1156 Xeon on a DH55HC at work, and maybe see if I can borrow a DP55WB as another test. I have run LGA 775 Xeons on 'regular' mainboards (I have run a Xeon 3065 on a Zotac board). I have not tried this on the current socket though, and there are not currently any Xeons with integrated video. Oddly, Intel's Ark resource lists the CPUs as supporting ECC, but it isn't always 100% accurate. It's another thing for me to check if I can either find an i3 at work, or ask someone who may know for sure.
From what I can gather online, what that means is that the CPUs will work with ECC memory, but the ECC function of the memory will not work.
Interesting. I'm not sure if it's a bug or not, but all 32nm i3/5 processors have ECC memory listed as a feature. I'm pretty sure that if this is not a bug in the specifications then the processors will indeed support ECC memory. That is, IF the motherboard does also, and as stated before, herein lies the rub.
I just tried a quick boot check with a DH55HC board using a Xeon X3440 and an i7 650. Both CPUs boot with non ECC memory, the Xeon boots with ECC, but the i7 gives me a memory error. Ths was just a quick check so I didn't do an OS install, I just booted to DOS on a USB key. I'm also not exactly sure how I can test ECC either. The on;y way I have seen it done is ither with a purpose built DIMM or through a hardware debugger. Since the board I have does not support a hardware debugger and I don't have any of the special DIMMs, I can't really test. I also don't know if the BIOS will catch and report ECC errors. But a Xeon using ECC RAM on a desktop (non server) board will boot without throwing any errors.
