Windows Vista a reason to buy ECC memory?

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yeah like stealing it off the internet the good old chinese way. sad thing is, i have to steal windows xp (that i did pay for) because they want 25 freaking bucks for a replacement cd...
 
For what its worth, I think that other than initial supply troubles that may arise and rasies prices, the switch to ECC is a good thing. If it helps Vista run more stable, then great. More importantly, high end machines with large amounts of memory should have it for data accuracy. And it is not a requirement, just a strong reccomendation.

As far as upgrading and vision people, I never said that I don't think they should not release it, or that I will not buy it at all. I said that I know what is usually involved after an OS release and will wait till I see real evaluations of the product before I buy it. I am all for progress, I just haven't seen any improvements yet that really excite me.
 
Yeah actually your right, it is a good thing that microsoft is recommending ECC memory because what it will do is bring down the high prices. They will be within Non-ECC memory prices shortly after vista launch I am thinking.

-Mark
 
I don't get it, this is a good thing! maybe not for the first buyers but they are a pointless proportion of the eventual sales so who cares.

Windows does a far better job at coping with the memory quagmire than people give it credit for. What would rather MS do, spend months trying to cope when anything anywhere dies for no good reason, or giving you better features and performance from your OS?

If MS push this slightly stronger, then more ECC enabled mobo's will appear and more ECC memory will be made to fill them and everyone will benefit from having less random crashes that they can't diagnose.

As for the speed penalty: the more its used, the more research will be spent on making it faster. (and tbh I think the 5 minutes it saved by not rebooting more than covers that 1-2fps you got from oc'ing your memory.

As for overclocking wtf? you can and will be able to (when it gets more common use) overclock ECC stuff but 'never' too far.
 
almost all ECC ram is low speed, low performance ram that is sub par to what else is out there. i don't think ECC is that big of a deal, its more the software that matters.
 
almost all ECC ram is low speed, low performance ram that is sub par to what else is out there. i don't think ECC is that big of a deal, its more the software that matters.
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you missed 'at the moment' from the begining of that sentance!

agreed currently it is slower, but not because its ECC, but because there is not a big market that demands it being faster, with vista there will be such a market and that market will be catered for.

all Software has to be loaded into memory of some kind...and no amount of programming will help if that memory system is flawed at any stage.
 
If windows XP does everything I want it to do, what reason is there for me to upgrade, tell me that? What is so damn compelling about Vista?
Click to expand...

So I guess if it were up to you we'd all still be using Windows 3.11. Windows 3.11 can surf the net, it can do spreadsheets, it can play games, it can do powerpoint. So what's the difference between 3.11 and WinXP? Why should anyone upgrade to WindowsXP if Win3.11 can do all that?

If you have no interest in using it, then shut up and move on to the next thread.

For the record, here's what so damn compelling about Vista:
1. Better stability and security.
2. The beginning of the end for the registry
3. Completely new hardware accelerated GUI
4. Better support for EMT64/x86
5. WinFS (will be an add on... instant search results for anything on ur system... SQLesque)

I could go on forever. For me I think the coolest thing is this:

feat_UX_09.jpg


No more flipping through internet explorer browsers using the task bar.

-mpjesse
 
If windows XP does everything I want it to do, what reason is there for me to upgrade, tell me that? What is so damn compelling about Vista?
Click to expand...

So I guess if it were up to you we'd all still be using Windows 3.11. Windows 3.11 can surf the net, it can do spreadsheets, it can play games, it can do powerpoint. So what's the difference between 3.11 and WinXP?

If you have no interest in using it, then shut up and move on to the next thread.

-mpjesse
Can windows 3.11 support a wireless adapter? no

Can windows 3.11 support warcraft III? no

Can windows 3.11 support a 300 GB harddrvie? no

Can windows 3.11 support many of the modern webpages? no

Do windows 3.11 support todays plug and play devices? no

So you see there is a reason to upgrade from windows 3.11 and like I said when there is a compelling reason to upgrade to windows Vista I will probably buy a new computer. You still haven't listed a compelling feature worth upgrading for. I myself could even mention a few, but I guess you would rather get angry at me. :) That's fine.

If they truly had something revolutionary I would upgrade, but as of now I don't see it. No reason to get mad about it. Just because you see it as visionary doesn't mean it is. And just because it is new does not make it good or visionary, lol.

-Mark
 
Seriously though, it is about time they upgraded some parts of the OS. I will have been nearly 6 years. I am just taking a wait and see attitude about M$ "promises". There have been a lot of features to look forward to in the past that didn't really help much.

On the other hand, maybe it will take longer than 20 minutes for an unprotected Vista PC on the internet to become infested with spyware. The interface does look cool, and hopefully it will be more stable.
 
I think we should wait and see how this develops. Of course our WindowsXP would run better in an ECC memory, SCSI Raid5, 8MB CPU Cache, super-duper system :? ...
But it ALSO runs on non-ECC... no one said it wouldn run or crash. Just that manufactureres will have to re-think the buy-the-cheapest-memory strat to make their systems cheaper, and buy good quality non-ECC RAM.
 
I must have missed the rest of your post, but those are some features, none of which is worth an upgrade for me, it may be for you however. The windows thing looks neat no doubt, but are you seriously going to be using that? BTW, you can get that in Sun’s version of Java Desktop right now. Why haven’t you upgraded to it? And you think Windows Vista will be more stable than Windows XP? That will have to be proven I guess.

-Mark
 
You must not have been paying attention. I said that there isn't any reason to upgrade immediately, and that I plan on waiting to see what its really all about once people start getting their hands on it. I was just listing a few possible good points.

From a marketing perspective, M$ is doing great with creating all the controversy by releasing little tidbits at a time. They are getting a lot more attention, which will help spawn interest. Like they say, there is no such thing as bad exposure... :wink:
 
Make no mistake, I don't consider "Vista" revolutionary or "visionary." But neither was Windows 95 or XP... yet we all used/use both OS's at one time.

All I'm saying is that if everyone in the world took your attitude we'd be stuck on WinXP for eternity.

Sorry for telling you to shut up. It was rude.

-mpjesse
 
Make no mistake, I don't consider "Vista" revolutionary or "visionary." But neither was Windows 95 or XP... yet we all used/use both OS's at one time.

All I'm saying is that if everyone in the world took your attitude we'd be stuck on WinXP for eternity.

Sorry for telling you to shut up. It was rude.

-mpjesse
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No problem,

I mean, I will be using windows Vista also, I just won't be buying it to upgrade the windows XP on my current computer. When I get a new laptop or Desktop is when I will use Vista, even though my current computer can handle Vista. It does have some neat things, I agree, but we will find out how useful they are. I am more of a movie buff and I think the media center/HD DVD playback in Vista might be a compelling feature, we will see.

-Mark
 
Can windows 3.11 support a wireless adapter? no
Can windows 3.11 support warcraft III? no
Can windows 3.11 support a 300 GB harddrvie? no
Can windows 3.11 support many of the modern webpages? no
Do windows 3.11 support todays plug and play devices? no
Click to expand...

Did 3.11 have USB ? No but it could have been implemented via a patch
Did 98 have USB2 ? No but it was implemented with SE
Did 98 have NTFS support ? No but compatible read tools exist
Did 98 have big Hardware Drivers ? No but XP does, a patch was enough

Want the best part ?

Does XP have many Codecs ? No MPlayer sucks even on auto download
Is XP unknown file type help usefull ? That thing actually works ?
Does XP have a firewall ? Yes but its a piece of crap

Is windows safe ? Even after 2 SP, 1000 Patches, Its not
Is Explorer a good browser ? 10 Billion patches couldnt fix that crap.

The ONLY real improvement in the last 10-15 years have been the switch
to a non DOS based kernel for windows. And i'm willing to bet that all this
stuff was also a lie about advertisement. 2003 Server, NT4 Core...
Yeah Right

But i will agree that M$ has managed to make some real user friendly OS.
And that is why i will always keep upgrading mine. PnP / Drivers / USB2
It will also be the reason i will get Vista (depending on DRM issues).
To have for "user friendly" functions.

But you will NEVER fool me into believing it that took 3 4 years to create.

I am really happy with the OS M$ make. Why ? Cynism & Realism.
They have good points & bad points.

I had DOS 3.11 95 98 98SE NT3.5 NT4 XPHome all in original or OEM.
The day Microsoft lost me for ever as a client, was the day they put
that COMPLETELY RETARDED activation thingy.

You changed 1 item of your hardware ! REGISTER !!!!
That Key/Whatever is already used ! CALL OUR SPECIAL LINE !!!!
(Or the Internet registration not working)

WinXP Pro Corporate SP2 By Unicornis.
Never again.

PS : I wont even get into DRM & HDTV issues cause its gonna get X-Rated

PS 2 : Sorry for the derail, but i love M$ just as much as i hate them :)
 
I can't understand why you'd say that in relation to ECC memory.

I'm a system integrator; I design workstations and database servers for clients and install them on-site myself every day. The number of machines that cause problems that turn out to be bad RAM is astounding.

We began running memtest86 on every machine we build a few years ago and by replacing bad RAM before installation we've lowered our support calls significantly.

ECC RAM hasn't even been available in the desktop market for the most part because of a lack of support by the chipsets, and I for one am glad MS is stsanding up for quality hardware for once, instead of just 'bigger and faster is better'.

Yes, typically, new MS OS's are hogs and need massive amounts of horsepower to run, but the goal to get desktops using ECC memory is excellent and laudable on MS' part.
 
First things first, @mpjesse's first post:

1. Dude, I geenrally agree with your opinions expressed in these forums, but no, I am not mad and that was a silly question on your part;

2. Noone said that MS needs to benefit from its monopolistic position, as monopoly does not really have to mean "for profit," just counter competitive

3. Even so, to say that MS does not benefit is a little short sighted, imho. Somebody did bring up mutual favors on behalf of system builders and MS, and that is one of the more obvious areas. Second, is simply the complexity of required coding, and the relative sloppiness better hardware allows. For years, people were wailing about MS scheduler (all the way throughout Me), and XP finally improved on it. It took that long, and I saw an opinion I think on anandtech that still MacOS scheduler is far superior. Now, this is by no means related to the memory issue, just an example of the fact that MS likes to require better hardware instead of optimizing its software. Which by the way answers your other comment about 3.11 being sufficient (and yes, I understand it was tongue in cheek, but still) - XP is the first MS [consumer] system with true multitasking...

And in general, to most of the nonECC bashers in this thread, every negative example given relates to [Crappy nonECC] memory. For some reason, everybody wants to address the nonECC portion of this two-word description. And so does MS. However, that undermines good quality nonECC memory, which is equally stable and better performing than even the best ECC memory. Why not just require higher quality modules?! And yes, yes, before you start, I know this is not really a requirement per se. But, as history shows, with MS it is best to be cautious.

And whoever said that you can it can run adequately with 256 Mb of RAM - sorry, even XP runs like crap with that little memory for real world application beyond the basics. And that monitor resolution issue somebody cited just above is another good example.

Overall, the main point is I still think that consumers or industry organizations (and something better organized than the most recent wireless consortiums etc.) need to dictate the hardware specification issues, as opposed to a software giant, which will always be interested in pushing hardware requirements because it makes their job easier, and recently Microsoft has gotten its hands into all sorts of hardware wars, sometimes at expense of the consumer.
 
"And whoever said that you can it can run adequately with 256 Mb of RAM - sorry, even XP runs like crap with that little memory for real world application beyond the basics..."

Many things I agree with, and many things I disagree with you on your post, russki, but this stands out. At work where I am not in charge of upgrading the systems, they are using old Dell Optiplex GX100s that came with 98SE. They since upgraded from 64MB RAM to 128MB RAM, and run Windows XP SP1. Boots in less than 45 seconds, honest to god. Why? Only 18 processes run at startup, they disabled all those useless services and they force us to use 16-bit color instead of 32-bit color mode. Remember it uses the Intel 810E chipset with 4MB of onboard video memory (I think bios allows up to 8MB but it's set to 4), so we really run off of 124MB. For what programs we use (IE mostly as all our databases use Java interface--and BTW using the MS Java and not the over-bloated Sun Java), it runs fine. With 8 different IE windows open at once it can be slow but it gets the job done. XP can run off of 64MB of RAM, many fools do this. 256MB is plenty for the average Joe. The problem is that you spend too much time here that you assume "we" are average Joes. We're not. We use memory hogging apps.

Oh, btw the 18 processes is WITH the Panda AV 2003 running in the background.
 
Here's the thing:

The vast majority of custom built PC's are flooded with cheap, crappy memory. As we all know cheap memory can result and does result in BSOD's and lock ups.

Can you offer a different solution to fixing this? It seems to me the easiest and most logical way is to encourage system builders to use cheap crappy ECC RAM... then everyone can have it both ways. Cheap memory with added stability.

🙂

-mpjesse
 
bourgeoisdude: your example is the reason I inserted "beyond the basics..." in my statement. Browsing sites (and that's, essentially, what java accomplishes) is fine. But start using office (especially word and excel both), throw in something like adobe, plus IE, plus outlook constantly open - it is going to be a crawl, I guarantee.

Now, a "crawl" is a relative term, of course, but adding memory does solve that problem in a jiffy.

And yes, that is a real scenario; in my line of business we are often required to run all of them at the same time to accomplish what we are supposed to do.

So I acknowledge your experience (it's not even an opinion - it is fact), but I think that for most, even professional, environments this is just not very representative. Not to mention any kind of design work (CAD or graphics), video editing, or gee wheez gaming (Battlefield 2, as far as I hear, likes 2 Gb...)
 
That actually could be the reason why they are recommending ECC. I think with Vista's release you will see 2gigs become the 512 basic ram setup of today's systems. Which would stand to reason that 4gigs and more will become the norm for highend users thus the recommendation of ECC for stability reasons is not a bad idea. That has been a recommendation for a long time when using large amounts of ram this is nothing new. It's just where it is the rare system of today that has 4 gigs of ram where it will be common system in the future. I'm sure the worry worts will be fine as long as they use quality ram. I would expect them to create an operating system that takes advantage of the new hardware available. No one is going to force you to upgrade. This is the longest they have went without a new OS release. Its gotta be a big jump forward or people won't upgrade.
 
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