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> These tools work really great, until they don't! Huh? Whats the problem? How is ZFS any different because its lower level? > ZFS without ECC memory is no wo

> These tools work really great, until they don't! Huh? Whats the problem? How is ZFS any different because its lower level? > ZFS without ECC memory is no worse than any other file system without ECC memory. You really do need ECC memory unless you are ok with your pool becoming corrupt every 6 months or so. Im just saying this from my experience of running a ZFS server without ECC, the data wasn't critical so I left it like that for 3 years before replacing the memory with ECC now its fixed.

90minuteAPI 5y ago
I was so tempted to jump on this with my anecdata of successfully running ZFS without ECC for a time, but that was in the context of a dirt cheap home tinker box. If you care about data integrity enough to use ZFS, just bite the bullet and use ECC. If you care about data integrity at all, use ECC. If you don’t, what are we even doing here?
alpaca128 5y ago
The bit about ZFS was a really flawed argument, saying it's just as complex but in an unavoidable way so that's fine for some reason: > One could argue that ZFS is complex as well, but that is on the filesystem level, a level on which you cannot avoid complexity no matter what you do.
soupbowl 5y ago
I stored 2tb of actively used data on zfs without ecc ram from freebsd 8 to 12. I had no noticeable corruption. I only post this because there is a weird assumption that not using ecc ram is a death sentence for your zfs data. I use ecc ram now and I think it's the proper way to do zfs, but let's not pretend you forfeit your data by not using ecc.
- vermaden 5y ago
  ECC RAM is useful for ALL FILESYSTEMS - not just only for ZFS. But from all filesystems ZFS works best of all when you do not have ECC RAM. The 'requirement' that ZFS needs ECC RAM to work properly is one of the biggest myths of the Internet ...
- dangerface 5y ago
  I am happy that worked for you but there is a huge difference between a 24 x 4tb pool and a single 2tb drive. 2tb is not a lot of data you would need to fill the drive 4 times a day before you would get close to hitting the single bit error rate, a pool of my size is guaranteed to hit that error rate just because of the volume of data. If we are talking about running zfs on a desktop then yea you are right you don't need ECC, but if you are running a storage server for data you want to keep then you absolutely do.
E39M5S62 5y ago
ZFS doesn't need ECC but it does benefit from it. If your pool was becoming corrupt every six months, look to a shitty drive controller or cabling first. I've run ZFS for quite a few years now on laptops and lower-end machines that can't use ECC memory and I've never had corruption, unrecoverable files/pools, etc. https://jrs-s.net/2015/02/03/will-zfs-and-non-ecc-ram-kill-your-data/ https://jrs-s.net/2015/02/03/will-zfs-and-non-ecc-ram-kill-y...

90minuteAPI 5y ago

I was so tempted to jump on this with my anecdata of successfully running ZFS without ECC for a time, but that was in the context of a dirt cheap home tinker box. If you care about data integrity enough to use ZFS, just bite the bullet and use ECC. If you care about data integrity at all, use ECC. If you don’t, what are we even doing here?

alpaca128 5y ago

The bit about ZFS was a really flawed argument, saying it's just as complex but in an unavoidable way so that's fine for some reason: > One could argue that ZFS is complex as well, but that is on the filesystem level, a level on which you cannot avoid complexity no matter what you do.

soupbowl 5y ago

I stored 2tb of actively used data on zfs without ecc ram from freebsd 8 to 12. I had no noticeable corruption. I only post this because there is a weird assumption that not using ecc ram is a death sentence for your zfs data. I use ecc ram now and I think it's the proper way to do zfs, but let's not pretend you forfeit your data by not using ecc.

vermaden 5y ago
ECC RAM is useful for ALL FILESYSTEMS - not just only for ZFS. But from all filesystems ZFS works best of all when you do not have ECC RAM. The 'requirement' that ZFS needs ECC RAM to work properly is one of the biggest myths of the Internet ...
dangerface 5y ago
I am happy that worked for you but there is a huge difference between a 24 x 4tb pool and a single 2tb drive. 2tb is not a lot of data you would need to fill the drive 4 times a day before you would get close to hitting the single bit error rate, a pool of my size is guaranteed to hit that error rate just because of the volume of data. If we are talking about running zfs on a desktop then yea you are right you don't need ECC, but if you are running a storage server for data you want to keep then you absolutely do.

E39M5S62 5y ago

ZFS doesn't need ECC but it does benefit from it. If your pool was becoming corrupt every six months, look to a shitty drive controller or cabling first. I've run ZFS for quite a few years now on laptops and lower-end machines that can't use ECC memory and I've never had corruption, unrecoverable files/pools, etc. https://jrs-s.net/2015/02/03/will-zfs-and-non-ecc-ram-kill-your-data/ https://jrs-s.net/2015/02/03/will-zfs-and-non-ecc-ram-kill-y...