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What does "ECC Memory Supported" mean exactly?

Takuan
By Takuan
in CPUs, Motherboards, and Memory
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I have been researching ECC memory vs non-ECC memory for a while, but one answer seems to alude me. On Intel's ARK page, it simply says "ECC Memory Supported" "Yes" or "No". But what does that mean EXACTLY? What I am fishing for is this: Is ECC memory supported, in the way that I can choose to use ECC memory, or choose not to use it depending on the particular CPU that may or may not support it? Or does "ECC Memory Supported" simply mean, that I HAVE to use ECC memory for any particular CPU that - as Intel ARK says - supports ECC memory?

 

Do I have a choice, which memory (ECC or not) to use, or am I required to use ECC memory, when the Intel ARK specs says "ECC Memory Supported" "Yes"?

 

Thanks.

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when it says it is supported, that means that you can choose.

 

I have a Xeon E5 2670 CPU, that does support memory with ECC. but i run it with Dominator platinum memory, which doesn't have ECC. 

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So if I understand you all correctly, "ECC Memory Supported" means exactly that it is supported, and thus that I can choose to use it (or not) depending on the CPU and/or if the motherboard supports it as well of course. That is very good news. Thank you all for your input.

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4 minutes ago, Takuan said:

So if I understand you all correctly, "ECC Memory Supported" means exactly that it is supported, and thus that I can choose to use it (or not) depending on the CPU and/or if the motherboard supports it as well of course. That is very good news. Thank you all for your input.

Yes. I have mixed Corsair Dominator DDR3 non-ecc and Kingston ECC sticks. Normal ecc memory (non-registered) works with some motherboards that doesn't support ecc (works as a normal memory) but ecc registered memory doesn't work. ECC Registered requires a server board to work at all

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Stay very far away from REGESTERD ECC RAM. Unregestered unbuffered RAM will work in some enthusiast desktop board with select CPUs.

My Sabertooth X58 board and Xeon X5680 will run unregistered ECC RAM, but NOT regestered, and I'm currently running non-ECC desktop RAM.

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One additional question. Do you have to set any particular setting in the BIOS, when using ECC or when not using it? I have never used ECC before, and I have never had to set anything in the BIOS regarding memory, so I am very curious if you have to change any settings in order to use ECC. Thank you.

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17 hours ago, Takuan said:

One additional question. Do you have to set any particular setting in the BIOS, when using ECC or when not using it? I have never used ECC before, and I have never had to set anything in the BIOS regarding memory, so I am very curious if you have to change any settings in order to use ECC. Thank you.

I would assume the board would detect the RAM you are using and set the settings automatically accordingly. I don't imagine you would need to change a setting to run non-ECC RAM.

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That is also what I would expect. Having ECC or non-ECC in the system, should - as you also mentioned - be automatically detected by the BIOS and run accordingly depending on the support by the CPU and/or motherboard.

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