The reliability of single-error protected computer memories

Author

Blaum, Mario ; Goodman, Rodney ; Mceliece, Robert

Author_Institution

IBM Almaden Res. Lab., San Jose, CA, USA

Volume

37

Issue

1

fYear

1988

fDate

1/1/1988 12:00:00 AM

Firstpage

114

Lastpage

119

Abstract

The lifetimes of computer memories which are protected with single-error-correcting-double-error-detecting (SEC-DED) codes are studies. The authors assume that there are five possible types of memory chip failure (single-cell, row, column, row-column and whole chip), and, after making a simplifying assumption (the Poisson assumption), have substantiated that experimentally. A simple closed-form expression is derived for the system reliability function. Using this formula and chip reliability data taken from published tables, it is possible to compute the mean time to failure for realistic memory systems

Keywords

circuit reliability; error correction codes; error detection codes; life testing; semiconductor storage; statistical analysis; Poisson assumption; SEC-DED codes; closed-form expression; lifetimes; mean time to failure; memory chip failure; reliability; single-error correcting double-error detecting codes; single-error protected computer memories; Application software; Asynchronous circuits; Circuit simulation; Computational modeling; Protection; Random access memory; Read-write memory; Reliability theory; Switching circuits; Very large scale integration;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Computers, IEEE Transactions on

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

0018-9340

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/12.75143

Filename

75143