3 ms·

Not true with Ryzen, as long as you find unregistered ECC acceptable. Somewhat not true with Intel, as some of the lower end Xeons now support it.

dogma1138 9y ago
Only ASROCK currently has BIOS/UEFI support for ECC.
- binarycrusader 9y ago
  BIOSTAR specs list ECC support, but I don't know if it has specific BIOS/UEFI options for it.
snuxoll 9y ago
AFAIK all of the Xeon chips support ECC, every Xeon E3 chip (which uses the desktop socket) I've looked at includes it.
- binarycrusader 9y ago
  Sorry, I was a little obtuse. What I was inferring was that historically, only higher-priced server chips from Intel had ECC support. In 2013, Intel launched the v3 lower-end Xeon E3s server chips that were closer to the price of the consumer Intel chips and offer ECC with comparable clock speeds. Of course, all of those only have 4 cores instead of 8. Yes, all of the E3s support ecc, but Xeon's didn't always support ECC until the launch of the Xeon E3 as far as I can tell.
  - yuhong 9y ago
    There was the Xeon 3400 even before that. Trivia: it supported registered ECC, but only x8 chips and not x4.
  - wtallis 9y ago
    Xeon has implied ECC support for as long as Xeons have had integrated memory controllers, which is just a generation or two further back than the first Xeon E3 product line. Before that, ECC support was a function of the northbridge.
    - binarycrusader 9y ago
      Hmm, perhaps this is a quirk of ark.intel.com then; it shows that (as an example) that the Xeon X5690 supported ECC, but the Xeon L5638 did not. The list on WikiPedia also seems to imply that not all models did historically, perhaps this reflects the northbridge change?
paulmd 9y ago
Ryzen ECC support is a mess, no AM4 motherboard currently on the market has implemented ECC support fully and properly (not even Asrock). It's better than nothing but you would be a fool to rely on it. http://www.hardwarecanucks.com/forum/hardware-canucks-reviews/75030-ecc-memory-amds-ryzen-deep-dive-5.html http://www.hardwarecanucks.com/forum/hardware-canucks-review... "Kinda sorta works but the manufacturer won't stand behind it" is bunch of bullshit. If your data is worth using ECC in the first place - it's worth using a platform that has fully-implemented support, that has passed validation, that you know is going to work properly when you need it. Until that happens - this is an application where Ryzen is simply not appropriate. All of the modern i3s and Pentiums support ECC, but you do need the server chipset instead of the cheap consumer stuff. Good news though - those "expensive server boards" are roughly the same price as say, an AM4 motherboard with an X370 chipset. Heck, you can buy a basic off-lease ThinkServer TS140 for only about $300. You'll only have about 4 GB of RAM but it's a shell to start building out (which is cheaper than having an OEM assemble it for you anyway).
- binarycrusader 9y ago
  Ryzen ECC support is a mess, no AM4 motherboard currently on the market has implemented ECC support fully and properly (not even Asrock). It's better than nothing but you would be a fool to rely on it. Ryzen motherboard support is what is agreeably a "mess", not the processor itself, but at least it's functional on ASRock and select Gigabyte boards. As for "a fool to rely on it", not sure what you mean by that. The error correction itself is done by the hardware. Other than calling the initialization routines and providing logging/halt, the BIOS/UEFI isn't responsible for anything afaik. I'm well aware that this isn't the full grade of ECC support offered by higher-end Xeons and chipset combos, but it's better than nothing and it's affordable. Also, no offense, but I'm not going to rely on hardwarecanucks as an authority on this subject. All of the modern i3s and Pentiums support ECC, but you do need the server chipset instead of the cheap consumer stuff. Good news though - those "expensive server boards" are roughly the same price as say, an AM4 motherboard with an X370 chipset. The goal isn't ECC alone, at least not for me, the goal is an 8-core system with good single-threaded performance and ECC at a reasonable price. As far as I know, only Ryzen offers that. So for me, I'm looking at the possibility of getting a single system that can give me decent gaming performance, good development performance, ECC support, and more, all at a price that leaves me with money for other components.

dogma1138 9y ago

Only ASROCK currently has BIOS/UEFI support for ECC.

binarycrusader 9y ago
BIOSTAR specs list ECC support, but I don't know if it has specific BIOS/UEFI options for it.

snuxoll 9y ago

AFAIK all of the Xeon chips support ECC, every Xeon E3 chip (which uses the desktop socket) I've looked at includes it.

binarycrusader 9y ago
Sorry, I was a little obtuse. What I was inferring was that historically, only higher-priced server chips from Intel had ECC support. In 2013, Intel launched the v3 lower-end Xeon E3s server chips that were closer to the price of the consumer Intel chips and offer ECC with comparable clock speeds. Of course, all of those only have 4 cores instead of 8. Yes, all of the E3s support ecc, but Xeon's didn't always support ECC until the launch of the Xeon E3 as far as I can tell.
- yuhong 9y ago
  There was the Xeon 3400 even before that. Trivia: it supported registered ECC, but only x8 chips and not x4.
- wtallis 9y ago
  Xeon has implied ECC support for as long as Xeons have had integrated memory controllers, which is just a generation or two further back than the first Xeon E3 product line. Before that, ECC support was a function of the northbridge.
  - binarycrusader 9y ago
    Hmm, perhaps this is a quirk of ark.intel.com then; it shows that (as an example) that the Xeon X5690 supported ECC, but the Xeon L5638 did not. The list on WikiPedia also seems to imply that not all models did historically, perhaps this reflects the northbridge change?

paulmd 9y ago

Ryzen ECC support is a mess, no AM4 motherboard currently on the market has implemented ECC support fully and properly (not even Asrock). It's better than nothing but you would be a fool to rely on it. http://www.hardwarecanucks.com/forum/hardware-canucks-reviews/75030-ecc-memory-amds-ryzen-deep-dive-5.html http://www.hardwarecanucks.com/forum/hardware-canucks-review... "Kinda sorta works but the manufacturer won't stand behind it" is bunch of bullshit. If your data is worth using ECC in the first place - it's worth using a platform that has fully-implemented support, that has passed validation, that you know is going to work properly when you need it. Until that happens - this is an application where Ryzen is simply not appropriate. All of the modern i3s and Pentiums support ECC, but you do need the server chipset instead of the cheap consumer stuff. Good news though - those "expensive server boards" are roughly the same price as say, an AM4 motherboard with an X370 chipset. Heck, you can buy a basic off-lease ThinkServer TS140 for only about $300. You'll only have about 4 GB of RAM but it's a shell to start building out (which is cheaper than having an OEM assemble it for you anyway).

binarycrusader 9y ago
Ryzen ECC support is a mess, no AM4 motherboard currently on the market has implemented ECC support fully and properly (not even Asrock). It's better than nothing but you would be a fool to rely on it. Ryzen motherboard support is what is agreeably a "mess", not the processor itself, but at least it's functional on ASRock and select Gigabyte boards. As for "a fool to rely on it", not sure what you mean by that. The error correction itself is done by the hardware. Other than calling the initialization routines and providing logging/halt, the BIOS/UEFI isn't responsible for anything afaik. I'm well aware that this isn't the full grade of ECC support offered by higher-end Xeons and chipset combos, but it's better than nothing and it's affordable. Also, no offense, but I'm not going to rely on hardwarecanucks as an authority on this subject. All of the modern i3s and Pentiums support ECC, but you do need the server chipset instead of the cheap consumer stuff. Good news though - those "expensive server boards" are roughly the same price as say, an AM4 motherboard with an X370 chipset. The goal isn't ECC alone, at least not for me, the goal is an 8-core system with good single-threaded performance and ECC at a reasonable price. As far as I know, only Ryzen offers that. So for me, I'm looking at the possibility of getting a single system that can give me decent gaming performance, good development performance, ECC support, and more, all at a price that leaves me with money for other components.