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From: lindsay@gandalf.cs.cmu.edu (Donald Lindsay)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next,comp.arch
Subject: Re: parity is for farmers?
Message-ID: <13158@pt.cs.cmu.edu>
Date: 22 May 91 21:40:10 GMT
References: <1991May22.155818.20148@zoo.toronto.edu>
Organization: Carnegie Mellon
Lines: 17

In article <1991May22.155818.20148@zoo.toronto.edu> 
	henry@zoo.toronto.edu (Henry Spencer) writes:
>On well-broken-in hardware, parity errors are quite rare.

True, if the hardware is treated well. Parity can make a pretty good
electronic detector for air conditioning failure.

Further, not all hardware is well broken in. Leaving aside machines
that were shipped before their time, there's the fact that a lot of
memory upgrades are done by untrained personnel, with chips they
bought by mail order.

(Anyone who doesn't see the risks in the above should subscribe to
alt.folklore.computers. Sadly, the stories of hobbyists who left
cigar ash under the sockets, are not apocryphal.)
-- 
Don		D.C.Lindsay 	Carnegie Mellon Robotics Institute