Error Detection & Correction
As transistors & wires become smaller, the number of electrons used to represent a stored 1 or 0 decreases
The probability that a cosmic ray, alpha particle, local electric field (crosstalk) or some other disturbance will change a stored value (or even the value on a wire) increases
Two aspects:
- Error detection (e.g. parity)
- Error correction (e.g. Hamming Codes)
- 2-bit detect, 1-bit correct