[gmx-users] Does Gromacs take advantage of ECC memory?

[David van der Spoel]

On 23/06/15 20:33, Peter Stern wrote:
> Dear Andrew,
>
> ECC is Error Correction Code for the memory and is not related to you application.
> For a single-user workstation, you generally don't need the ECC.  It is more important in servers.
> Not every motherboard supports ECC and most desktop motherboards do not, so if you do get it,
> you should be sure that your motherboard (not your app) can utilize ECC memory.

GROMACS does check memory errors on GPUs, in particular cheap GPUs 
sometimes have cheap memory, while the more expensive GPUs have ECC memory.
>
> Peter Stern
> Weizmann Institute of Science
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: gromacs.org_gmx-users-bounces at maillist.sys.kth.se [mailto:gromacs.org_gmx-users-bounces at maillist.sys.kth.se] On Behalf Of Andrew DeYoung
> Sent: Tuesday, June 23, 2015 6:36 PM
> To: gromacs.org_gmx-users at maillist.sys.kth.se
> Subject: [gmx-users] Does Gromacs take advantage of ECC memory?
>
> Hi,
>
> I'm looking into a workstation which I will use to run some Gromacs simulations.  I'm a chemist, not a computer person, so I'm not very well-versed in computer hardware.  I have the option of getting non-ECC or ECC memory, with the ECC being at extra cost.  In asking around about whether I need ECC, I've been advised to "research your simulation apps and see if they can take advantage of ECC."
>
> I don't see ECC mentioned in the manual.  Does Gromacs take advantage of ECC?  The simulations I will be running will not be terribly large: on the order of ~10,000 atoms for a few tens of ns.  My system will likely have 8 cores.
>
> Thanks so much for your time.
>
> Andrew DeYoung
> Carnegie Mellon University
>
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-- 
David van der Spoel, Ph.D., Professor of Biology
Dept. of Cell & Molec. Biol., Uppsala University.
Box 596, 75124 Uppsala, Sweden. Phone:	+46184714205.
spoel at xray.bmc.uu.se    http://folding.bmc.uu.se