Workstation Memory

Even though it’s two years later, the fastest workstation memory continues to be Corsair’s Registered 2-3-2-6 low-latency 512MB DIMMS available in a pair for $310 from Newegg. It’s really a compliment to Corsair to think that their flagship registered DDR memory from two years ago is still the fastest memory on the market. With the dual channel memory controllers and two CPUs, the optimum performance will be achieved with 4 DIMMS. This means 4x512MB or 2GB as a minimum spec.

Some people will want 4GB or more and unfortunately, the market for low-latency registered RAM is small. 1GB “server” modules from both OCZ and Corsair use slower 3-3-3-8 timings. 1GB Registered DIMMs at 2.5-3-3-6 are available from Kingston, but it’s even more expensive. It costs $310 for 2x0.5GB of 2-3-2-6 Corsair RAM, $720 for 2x1GB of Kingston 2.5-3-3-6. The 2x1GB of standard 3-3-3-8 Corsair RAM is just $280. That’s pretty cheap and is almost as cheap as Corsair’s ValueRAM for budget desktops.

Since we did want this system to reflect maximum stability, we’ve opted to go with Corsair’s 1GB 3-3-3-8 DIMMs. While these are slower than the XMS low latency DIMMs that Corsair also produces, the conventional server PC3200 is JEDEC certified and runs stably without the need of any additional cooling.

4 x Corsair CM72SD1024RLP-3200
4x $140
http://www.corsair.com
Running Total: $2955

Why is ECC and Registered Memory So Important?

If you left your computer on 24 hours, 7 days a week, at the end of the year, a bit in memory would have been inappropriately flipped anywhere from two to twelve times. It depends on how much RAM you have. That is to say that somewhere in memory, a 0 turned in 1, or a 1 turned into 0. This can be caused by cosmic rays flying through your RAM or decay of the minute radioactive isotopes found in your RAM (the impurity need only be a single atom). Most of the time, this flipped bit is unimportant. Not only is this rare (especially when dealing with only one system), occurring maybe only once a month, the flipped bit may be in unallocated memory, or maybe it simply altered the position of a pixel for a fraction of a second. So, for most people it’s no big deal.

That said, if you’re unlucky, this flipped bit can alter critical data and cause your system to crash or if you are using the computer to solve a long math problem, it could potentially alter your results. If you’re running a Beowulf cluster where you have 100’s of PCs running, the chances of encountering an error is also 100x greater...

ECC memory provides error checking and correction facilities. By adding an extra memory chip to every DIMM (1 extra bit for every 8), ECC memory makes your memory act in a similar way to a RAID array. Unlike parity which could only detect single-bit errors, ECC can detect 1, 2, 3, or even 4-bit errors. However it is only able to fix a single bit-error.