On Dec 2,  7:11pm, "Michael L. VanLoon -- HeadCandy.com" wrote:
} 
} Modern memory is pretty darn reliable.  I run my motherboard with
} parity turned off because it actually causes me problems when I have
} write-back caching enabled at the same time as my BusLogic
} bus-mastering SCSI controller is going all-out.  With parity disabled,

     Then obviously something is wrong with your system.

} I get uptimes of multiple months.  It also allows me to throw in less
} expensive, yet fast, memory.

     This just goes to validate my earlier comment about the PC market
being completely price driven, at the expense of all other
considerations.

} The reason Intel stopped making parity systems is not to pull the wool
} over consumers' eyes, but because memory just doesn't fail very often
} any more in consumer systems.  The emphasis is on consumer systems.

     They stopped makeing parity systems to reduce prices and for no
other reason (certainly not engineering).  And your point is?

} I'm talking about my home machine, here.

     I don't know about you, but I expect my home machines to behave
themselves.  Also, many people use PC's in mission critical
applications.

} Now, if you're talking about a mission-critical server, then yes,
} error detection should be a requirement.  But, I'd say in that
} situation, a single-bit parity check isn't really enough.  If you're
} going to be running in that crowd, you should demand no less than full
} ECC memory correction.

     Yes, but I haven't seen too many PC's that have ECC memory, nor
could most people afford them, besides if you're going to pay that
much for a PC, you might as well buy a workstation or minicomputer.

}-- End of excerpt from "Michael L. VanLoon -- HeadCandy.com"