hal@eecs.cs.pdx.edu (Aaron Harsh) (06/30/91)
In article <1991Jun29.150321.9791@NCoast.ORG> davewt@NCoast.ORG (David Wright) writes: > No, actually it is WORSE, at least in the brain-dead way that IBM >clones use it. If you have 1 bit out of 9 for parity, with no error correction, >that means that more than 10% of the time the error will be in the parity >bit itself. Since PC clones are not designed to have any ECC bits, and the >whole parity detection system is incredibly archaic, a parity error just brings >the whole machine to a halt, even when it is in the parity bit itself. > I cetainly call this "less reliable", since you have now added a >"feature" that will cause the computer to seemingly "fail" over 10% more than >it normally would. Why wouldn't an error in the parity bit be detected? If the parity bit changes value unexpectedly, it ends up with the wrong value for the information bits, and would sure look like it should cause an error. Flame me if I'm wrong here, Aaron Harsh hal@eecs.cs.pdx.edu