Post by marcbAnd you can use the term cosmic ray - it's a perfectly
acceptable and widespread way of discussing such high energy particles.
Your mis-use of the word "ray" is amazing. Do you deliberately try to
mislead others, or do you merely encourage the use of misleading terms?
Language is intended to get across ideas, that is the purpose of
language.
Now if your intention is to get across the wrong idea and mislead
people, by all means continue using the term "cosmic ray".
The predominant and common use of the word "ray" is to get across the
idea that the thing being described is electromagnetic radiation, as in
the term "X-ray".
The predominant and common use of the word "particle" is to get across
the idea that the thing being described is _not_ electromagnetic
radiation, rather instead a physical particle traveling less that the
speed of light.
There are differences between particles and electrmagnetic radiation,
and several standard tests to tell which is which.
A cosmic particle is not electromagnetic radiation.
So you have the choice of correctly describing the object as a
"cosmic-particle", or misleading people by incorrectly describing the
object as a "cosmic-ray".
I ask the two questions again:
1) Are you deliberately trying to mislead people into believing that a
cosmic particle is electomagnetic radiation?
2) Do you encourage the use of misleading terms?
Post by marcbSo the guy from Sun is clueless?
To some extent, yes. I agree that the author of the presentation did
not use good judgement when he titled his presentation:
"How Cosmic Rays Cause Computer Downtime"
The technical accuracy of the content of his presentation seems to be
valid, and there are enough references in the content, to allow a
reader to verify the facts.
Post by marcbPost by Mark ConradAt least get your facts straight, before you mis-represent whose
presentation it is, makes you look like an ignorant jackass.
Who said it was yours?
You did, you posted the following:
"And seriously, if you don't want to use the term cosmic rays don't
post a presentation titled" ...<rest of crap clipped>...
Above partial quote tries to give the impression to others that _I_
am the one who authored the presentation from:
I don't appreciate that crap.
Post by marcbAnyway, the facts as
I see them are that no-one has proved that any down to Earth, ordinary
computer's ram has suffered a soft fault from a 'cosmic ray' event -
it's a theoretical idea - and lots of other things could be the cause
of such faults.
You are completely wrong, it is easily provable that cosmic particles
do cause soft failures in ram. This is a major design headache for the
manufacturers of ram modules.
Not theoretical at all, if ram modules are subjected to cosmic particle
bombardment, they _will_ suffer soft ram failures, many laboratory
ram testing facilities have verified and re-verified that fact over
decades of time.
ECC ram lessens the soft ram failure rate 19 fold.
<http://www.ewh.ieee.org/r6/scv/rs/articles/ser-050323-talk-ref.pdf>
If that pdf is too heavy reading, a much clearer and simplier
description of soft ram failures is here:
<http://www.anandtech.com/guides/viewfaq.aspx?i=3>
Post by marcbPost by Mark ConradI dug around in my IEEE references, trying to find something simple
enough to educate you - - - ah, here it is!
<http://www.ewh.ieee.org/r6/scv/rs/articles/ser-050323-talk-ref.pdf>
LOL! Are you stocking up on bottled gas and water for your underground
bunker?
No, prickhead. I was answering a question specifically asked by the
OP, providing him with both the pros and cons, so he could make his own
choice.
Your further education, I will leave to others with more patience than
I have.
Go ahead and post your insinuations, bum dope, insults, lies,
misleading comments, and other assorted crap.
Mark-