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> ... this means that the base memory controller in the silicon should be able to support ECC. We know that it is disabled for the consumer parts, but nothing h
by dmm 10y ago
> ... this means that the base memory controller in the silicon should be able to support ECC. We know that it is disabled for the consumer parts, but nothing has been said regarding the Pro parts.
ECC should be a standard feature. If you don't want it you don't have to use it but to disable simply for market segmentation is lame.
- octoploid 10y agoAnandtech is wrong and ECC is not disabled at all. For example all ASRock AM4 boards support ECC memory.
- detaro 10y agoSource? Has Asrock explicitly stated that it works with all CPUs, or just that all their boards can do it (IF the CPU also supports it)?
- Asooka 10y agoIs that buffered ECC or unbuffured ECC? Because last time I checked, my AM3 board had support only for unbuffured, which is really hard to find and I just didn't bother.
- Qantourisc 10y agounbuffured Example: http://www.asrock.com/MB/AMD/X370%20Killer%20SLI/index.asp#Specification http://www.asrock.com/MB/AMD/X370%20Killer%20SLI/index.asp#S...
- throwawayish 10y agoI don't know why you're being downvoted, your comment is accurate. Consumer hardware traditionally does not support registered memory, which is (reg ECC) the standard for server hardware hence cheap, while unbuf, unreg ECC is rather rare. AM4/Zen is no exception, no DDR4R for consumers.
- Tsagadai 10y agoNot that expensive or rare: https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820242274&cm_re=unbuffered_ddr4_ecc-_-20-242-274-_-Product https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E1682024...
- Qantourisc 10y agohttps://www.reddit.com/r/Amd/comments/5vsz90/ryzen_does_not_support_ecc_memory/de4qzj2/ https://www.reddit.com/r/Amd/comments/5vsz90/ryzen_does_not_... De-comfirmed unless the source is lying.
- leoc 10y agoFWIW, I remember ASRock being mistaken about AMD features in the past: iirc there was a while when they were wrongly asserting that Bulldozer didn't support I/O virtualisation. (Eventually they implemented it on their own AM3 motherboards.)
- dmm 10y agoThanks for pointing this out. I found this on the specification page[0] for the ASRock "X370 Killer SLI/ac" AM4 board: > AMD Ryzen series CPUs support DDR4 2667/2400/2133 ECC & non-ECC, un-buffered memory So the board seems to accept ECC memory, hopefully that means the memory controller actually performs ECC? I found a reddit comment claiming that the boards accept ECC memory but don't perform error correction[1]. Not a great source but seemingly possible. Do you have any more sources suggesting that ECC is actually being implemented? For example, BIOSs often have ECC settings, if we had some screenshots of an AM4 board bios showing ECC setting that would be strong evidence. [0] http://www.asrock.com/mb/AMD/X370%20Killer%20SLIac/index.asp#Specification http://www.asrock.com/mb/AMD/X370%20Killer%20SLIac/index.asp... [1] https://www.reddit.com/r/Amd/comments/5v0cqo/ryzen_supports_ecc_memory/de4rfer/ https://www.reddit.com/r/Amd/comments/5v0cqo/ryzen_supports_...
- octoploid 10y agoSeveral people contacted ASRock in the last few days. And the reply always was that ECC is fully supported, e.g. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13762950 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13762950
- dmm 10y agoThat's good information but still doesn't tell us that these cpus support ECC, right? Maybe the motherboard fully supports ECC when used with a future 1800X-PRO but not with the 3 chips reviewed here. In that case anandtech saying "We know that it is disabled for the consumer parts" and ASRock saying "ASRock AM4 motherboards fully support ECC function" can both be true.
- chrisp_dc 10y agoIIRC just because it boots with ECC ram doesn't mean it is actually error correcting. I'm under the impression Intel spends considerable amount of money to prove their memory controllers actually error correct & historically AMD hasn't spent the money on documenting theirs.
- greglindahl 10y agoBack when high-end supercomputers used AMD Opterons, systems with a lot of memory would have had observable problems had ECC not worked pretty well. Right now the #3 system in the world is a Cray system using Opterons.
- throwawayish 10y agoECC is not complex to implement.
- Qantourisc 10y agoYes, I have not been able to find any data from AMD directly that ECC is not or is supported. In any case I am disappointed. Desktops, workstation, servers are all getting more and more memory. The changes for corruption are only going up. And getting an Opteron for each workstation is kind of silly. Edit: If no motherboard supports its, in Linux one can use ecc_enable_override (similar thing might be available in Windows). That is if the CPU support it. It can USE ECC memory, but we don't know if it can use the ECC checksums, most motherboards have a NO here.
- tutanchamun 10y agoConsidering previous AMD chips could use ECC I hope it's true this time as well. AMD's CEO Dr. Lisa Su has an AMA later today, we should probably ask her: https://www.reddit.com/r/Amd/comments/5vl431/its_happening_amd_cpu_division_will_host_an_ama/ https://www.reddit.com/r/Amd/comments/5vl431/its_happening_a... Might as well ask her about the possibility of coreboot if we are at it.
- Qantourisc 10y agoDoes anyone has a reddit account ? And know how AMA's work ? I'd love to get some input here. Or at least show we care. Edit: Account made, instructions received. If all goes well I should be asking later today.
- NotSammyHagar 10y agogo to reddit. create an account. you don't need an email. then in that 'discussion' you ask your question. that is how amas work.
- eatbitseveryday 10y agoMaking one takes 5 seconds and AMA = Ask Me Anything. You reply to the top post with your question and wait for a response.
- chris11 10y agoI'd also add it to the calendar here: https://www.cognitoforms.com/IAMA/IAMACalendarRequest https://www.cognitoforms.com/IAMA/IAMACalendarRequest. And mention the time in a few other subreddits like r/AMD, /r/buildapc, and r/technology. But it looks like the CEO has already scheduled an AMA for today: https://www.reddit.com/r/Amd/comments/5vl431/its_happening_amd_cpu_division_will_host_an_ama/ https://www.reddit.com/r/Amd/comments/5vl431/its_happening_a...
- 69mlgsniperdad 10y agoLooks like you figured it out. If not, I did actually see someone about a month ago mention in a comment here, that they may or may not be in possession of a Reddit account. I'll take a look and see if I can find the original comment. Maybe someone else has seen.
- joatmon-snoo 10y agoInterestingly the linked article doesn't have this quote anymore, but the cached version on Google has it: http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:wO1MKokkvxQJ:www.anandtech.com/show/11170/the-amd-zen-and-ryzen-7-review-a-deep-dive-on-1800x-1700x-and-1700/3+&cd=2&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:wO1MKok...
- dmm 10y agoWeird, I'm still seeing it on the "CPUs, Speeds, Pricing: ..." page.
- redm 10y ago>ECC should be a standard feature. If you don't want it you don't have to use it but to disable simply for market segmentation is lame. I agree ECC should be a standard feature, but it follows the same marketing patterns (in that industry) as disabling multi-processor support or artificially limiting clock speeds.
- dmm 10y agoI think ECC is in a different category than MHz or core count because with a lower frequency or fewer cores you may get your result slower but it will be the same result as a top end chip. Without ECC you may get a completely wrong answer when the increasingly small, vulnerable, and numerous dram cell is flipped.
- throwawayish 10y agoActually no, enabling external cache coherency (eg. QPI) incurs a significant cost in terms of pin count, power, die space and clock speeds. The same does not transfer to ECC memory.
- drzaiusapelord 10y agoThis is done so that whitebox system builders don't buy consumer level motherboards and CPUs, shove ECC in there, a cheap raid controller, and sell this setup as servers. Next thing you know all the AMD servers on the market are failing because of shoddy parts because consumer level QA is at a lower level than enterprise, not to mentioned the lowered performance of consumer level hardware. Now AMD has a bad reputation for reasons completely unrelated to its chip quality or performance and collapses in the market. I don't like this situation, but I certainly understand it. AMD needs the server market to raise revenues. This means its server offerings, from soup to nuts, need to be rock solid. Letting whitebox resellers junk up their reputation is not within their interests. Not to mention, enterprise sales often subsidize consumer sales. Those big enterprise markups go into the same pot of money that allows AMD to sell consumer chips at lower prices. Anything that threatens enterprise sales could affect the consumer space. AMD needs to be very careful here as, compared to intel, it needs to prove the value of its brand every chip generation. They also need to overcome a lot of bad mojo they've developed from questionable benchmarking and marketing of its previous two, or more, generations of chips. Bulldozer, I believe, had half the single core performance compared to the intel equivalant at the time, yet it benchmarked well due to its extra cores. The market doesn't forget shenanigans like these. That said, the market allows 'workstation' level cpus and motherboards that support ECC. A little legwork can find you decent deals, but no, they're not going to be $59 NewEgg specials and you won't be able to use the consumer Ryzen on it. Consumer CPUs are almost always gimped anyway - smaller caches, disabled features, slower clocks, etc. The ECC limitation isn't too different from this, but it is annoying.