KS2009: How Google uses Linux [LWN.net]

KS2009: How Google uses Linux

Posted Oct 21, 2009 9:37 UTC (Wed) by crlf (guest, #25122)
In reply to: KS2009: How Google uses Linux by sdalley
Parent article: KS2009: How Google uses Linux

> Wow. Who actually wants to buy memory that doesn't work, or flips random bits on an off-day?

The issue is one of probability and large numbers.. Memory errors are already common today, and the continued increase in density will not help matters tomorrow.

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KS2009: How Google uses Linux

Posted Oct 21, 2009 12:28 UTC (Wed) by sdalley (subscriber, #18550) [Link]

Thank you, very interesting paper.

So, one chance in three per annum of suffering a memory error on a given machine, roughly.

With ECC memory which Google use as standard, 19 out of 20 of these errors will be transparently corrected.

With non-ECC memory, as in commodity PCs, stiff biscuit every time.

KS2009: How Google uses Linux

Posted Oct 21, 2009 21:08 UTC (Wed) by maney (subscriber, #12630) [Link]

You imply that denser chips will cause higher error rates, but that is not what they found:

We studied the effect of chip sizes on correctable and un- correctable errors, controlling for capacity, platform (dimm technology), and age. The results are mixed. When two chip configurations were available within the same platform, capacity and manufacturer, we sometimes observed an increase in average correctable error rates and sometimes a decrease.

There were other, also mixed, differences when comparing only memory module sizes, but that mixes together differences in chip density and number of chips on the module - and quite possibly chip width as well.

The best we can conclude therefore is that any chip size effect is unlikely to dominate error rates given that the trends are not consistent across various other confounders such as age and manufacturer.

Which, I think, summarizes decades of experience that refuted various claims that the ever-shrinking memory cells just had to lead to terrible error problems. I may still have an old Intel whitepaper on this from back in the days when chips sizes were measured in Kbits.